What People Revealed through Greetings

Abstract

Greeting is an important part of communicative competence that each member of speech community must know hence s/he can be function appropriately in the speech community. It is culturally bonded that it becomes the first and formemost part of language skill taught to children in learning in their native language and students in learning their second or foreign language. The study is aimed at finding out what people may reveal when they greet each other as well as the kind of greeting they used. The study is conducted to Indonesian who live in United States, by observing and filming their interactions during a party. During their interaction, the participants do not only used popular term of greetings such as ‘hallo’ or ‘how are you’ but they also greet each other by other forms such as giving compliments, hence it suggest more than acknoledging other’s presence. Beside verbal greetings, there are also types of body gestures used as greeting suggesting the different types of background relationships. The most obvious observable fact is that greeting is consistently used as mark of solidarity with the consistent similar respond, though it may as well use to reveal power and authority. One of important means of greeting is that it is used to maintain their cultural identity. Male and female respondents also show different ways in using verbal greetings and gesture showing that they greet each other. They also use different ways in giving compliments and in responding toward them. Key words: greetings, cultural identity, compliments