Communication Strategies Used by the Fourth-Semester Students of English Department in Discussion and Debate Class

Abstract

Communication strategies become beneficial in overcoming the communication gaps. This study aims to investigate the type of communication strategies and to find the most dominant type of communication strategies used by the fourth-semester students of English Department at Muhammadiyah University of Purworejo. Qualitative method was used to conduct this research by recording students’ speech. The result of this study showed that students performed the various types of communication strategies. This research conducts typology of communication strategies proposed by Faucette (2001). There are eleven types of communication strategies performed by the students: approximation (9.01%), circumlocution (3.60%), borrowing (11.71%), foreignizing (1.80%), word coinage (16.22%), topic avoidance (5,.41%), message replacement (6.31%), abandonment (10.81%), appealing for assistance (8.11%), non-verbal (5.41%), and time-stalling devices (21.62%). The researcher found that time-stalling-device strategy became the most dominant strategy used.

Keywords: communication strategies, Discussion and Debate Class