WOMEN REPRESENTATION IN ENCANTO MOVIE SCRIPT:

A COMMISSIVE SPEECH ACT ANALYSIS

Mazida Izzatul Azka

13020119130079

Metode Penelitian

mazidaizza01@gmail.com

Abstract

The goal of this study was to determine the sorts of commissive acts depicted in the film Encanto, which

served as the data source. The data for the study was gathered from the movie's characters' utterances,

which were categorized using Searle's notion of commissive acts. This is a descriptive qualitative study,

which means that the data is described in words and sentences. According to the findings, there were 25

utterances of commissive acts throughout the film. There are the acts of promising, threatening,

accepting, refusing, and offering shown by the characters. They were 6 data of promising, 6 data of

threatening, 7 data of accepting, 1 data of refusing, and 6 data of offering. From the commissive data

analysis, the researcher found two women represented in this movie. First, women’s gender roles

portrayed by Abuela Alma as a head of Madrigal’s family. Then, the perception of privilege that is

portrayed by Mirabel who has no privileges or powers but she could save her family and home.

Keywords: commissive acts, pragmatics, speech act

A. INTRODUCTION

1. Background of the Study 

         Speech events are a social reality, whereas speech actions are individual symptoms of a

psychological character, and their consistency is governed by the speaker's ability to deal with certain

situations. Speech act is divided into three categories, there are Illocutionary act, Locutionary act, and

Perlocutionary act. Searle (1969) developed Austin's theory by dividing illocutionary acts into five levels.

There are directive, expressive, commissive, declarative, and assertive. The researcher focuses on

commissive speech activities in this study.

Commissive speech acts have a lot of potential for strengthening the listener-speaker relationship.

We can use a variety of mediums to investigate the commissive speech act. The commissive speaking act

was chosen as the focus of this journal's research. Speakers use a commissive speech act in a discourse

when they commit themselves to future actions based on their utterances. As Yule (2006) points out,

speech actions are employed to indicate what the speakers intend to do, which can include promises,

refusals, threats, acceptances, and offers. 

Commissive speech actions can be found in magazines, movie scripts, journals, newspapers, short

stories, and novels, among other sources. As a result, in this study, the author considers studying

commissive speech acts in the Encanto Movie Script. The movie script includes lines uttered by the

characters in the film. It not only contains dialogues, but also depicts the characters' expressions and

actions. Furthermore, a film script has several utterances that include the various forms and functions of

speech acts. The dialogues in the movie script can be used to figure out what the characters are saying by

doing something.

The title of this research is “Women Representation in Encanto Movie Script: A Commissive

Speech Act Analysis”.  The author chose this topic because no one has discussed women representation

from the point of view of the commissive speech act. The author also chose the Encanto movie as the

object of research because the film contains the struggle of a girl who is looking for her identity with
societal pressures and differences between herself and her family. Most of the characters in this film are

also women who have superpowers so this film is even more interesting to study.

2. Research Questions 

Based on the background of the study above, this study aims to answer the following research problems:

a. What kinds of commissive illocutionary acts used in Encanto Movie Script?

b. What kinds of women are represented in Encanto Movie Script?

3. Purpose of the study

 Based on the problems formulation above, there are two purposes of the study to be achieved.

a. To find out the types of commissive speech acts that produced by the characters of Encanto movie

b. To find out the women representation in Encanto Movie based on commissive analysis.

4. Scope 

The scope of this study was speech act and it was limited to commissive speech act. This study was

focused on five types of the commissive speech act. There are promise, threat, accept, refusal, and offer.

5. Significance 

         The researcher believed that the findings would be valuable to readers. The following are some

examples of the research's significance:

a. Theoretical considerations

This study aids in the study of English speaking acts, particularly commissive illocutionary acts.

b. Practical

The findings of this study are predicted to provide significant contributions to instructors, university
students, and future researchers, among others. This research could be beneficial to professors when it

comes to teaching English.

B. REVIEW OF THE UNDERLYING THEORIES FOR DATA ANALYSIS

The focus of this research is the Commissive Speech act. The act can be a promise or a simple

declaration, but the purpose is for the person to be dedicated to the commitment he or she has made.

Commissives are speech acts in which the speaker commits to a future course of action.. These

include promising, threatening, offering, and refusal. For example when someone says “I’ll be back”,

represents the speaker’s promise that he/she will be back.

5.1 Promising 

A promise is a declaration that you will do or will not do something in the future. It is a

promise made to another person to do something in the future. To make a genuine promise

speech act, Searle (1975) recommends five elements. The speaker must purposefully

accomplish what he promises, then claim that the action is in the best interests of the hearer,

think that he can perform the action, anticipate a future action, and predict an act of himself.

5.2 Threatening 

A threat is a declaration of intent to punish others. It means to intimidate the listener if the

listener refuses to obey the speaker's order. Threats are frequently driven by the speaker's

anger and curiosity for the listener.

5.3 Offering 

When you make an offer, you are indicating that you are willing to do something for or give

something to someone. The hearer's expression to offer an act in the hearer's or addressee's

interest is called an offer.

5.4 Accepting
 Acceptance has four definitions that clarify what it means to accept something: 1) accepting

or taking something as a pleasure, satisfaction of a demand, or a responsibility; 2) positive

reception, esteem, or approval; 3) assenting to or believing; and 4) acceptability

5.5 Refusing

Invitations, requests, offers, ideas, and the like are regularly utilized in our daily lives, and

refusal is a negative response to them. It's more important to say "no" than it is to give an

answer. Depending on the cultural-linguistic and ethnicity values, both the speaker and the

hearer are expected to comprehend the context as well as the form and function of rejection.

Here are the theories presented by Searle about the Speech Act, especially the Commissive.

Furthermore, the author will analyze the discovery of commissive speech at the same time

with representations of women in the film.

C. REVIEW OF LITERATURE

1. REVIEW OF THE PREVIOUS RESEARCH

In this chapter, the researcher reviews the related theories and literature to understand the

question theoretically. The researcher aims to avoid replication of study. Before choosing this topic,

the researcher found five papers related to this study. The first thesis entitled “The Commissive

Speech Act In Cinderella Movie” by Santi Kumalasari. Refusal gets the highest number in this

research. It is because commonly in the dialogue of Cinderella movies it is dominated by Kit who is

facing King‟s opinion and Grand Duke‟s opinion. (Kumalasari, 2019)

The second journal entitled “Illocutionary Act In Alice In Wonderland Movie Script” by Putri

Amalia Safitri Lubis. The most dominant type is Assertives. The reason for the most dominant one is

because this movie is fantasy adventure genre, there are a lot of utterances to be used to express what

the cast said like command, asking, state, offering that why illocutionary acts are realized in this movie

script. (Lubis, 2018)

 The third research paper entitled “An Analysis of Donald Trump’s Commissive Speech Act

In USS Yorktown On December 7, 2015” by Khalimatul Maulidiyah. Through the result of the

analysis of sentences delivered by Donald Trump in his speech, it can be concluded that in a speech

found speech use commissive illocutionary act, which is classified into commit, promise, threaten,

assure, refuse, guarantee, bet, and it uttered directly. (Maulidiyah, 2018)

The fourth journal entitled “Illocutionary Acts Found in Novel the Never Girls: Before the

Bell by Kiki Thorpe “ by Dolla Vania Petriandy and Leni Marlina. The dominating type of

illocutionary act is representative, and the leading sub-type of representative is informative, according

to the findings of the study. (Marlina, 2018) The fifth journal entitled “A corpus study of Commissive

Speech Acts Performed by USA Presidential Candidates.” by Gede Irwandika. Specifically, this study

contributes to the tendency of politicians in performing commissive acts as a sign of commitment to

their voters. (Irwandika, 2021)

The sixth journal entitled “The Representation of Women Characters in The Movie The

Breadwinner” by Deta Maria Sri Darta and Diah Kristina. It is discovered that women are depicted in

the film in two ways: as an object of man dominance and as a subject capable of speaking her views

and making her own decisions. (Kristina, 2018). The seventh journal entitled “Woman Representation

in Tangled Film” by Rahajeng Herningtyas Woro Utamie. According to the analysis, there are three

components of Rapunzel's physical appearance, personal traits, and relationship to other characters

that reflect woman representation in the Tangled film. (Utamie,2014)

The eighth journal entitled “Measuring Female Representation and Impact in Films over

Time '' by Luoying Yang. Three key findings from our research have underlined the challenges that

women confront both upstream and downstream in the film business. (Yang, 2020). The ninth journal

entitled “Representation of Female Stereotypes in Sense and Sensibility Film (2008) Through

Cinematography and Narrative Elements” by Tirta Nyuminnar. Using Mulvey's theory of visual

pleasure, this study identifies the critical use of camera position, movement, and point of view as well
as the extensive use of framing to reveal representation of female stereotypes as the barer of the

novel's early feminism in Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility adaptation. (Nyuminnar, 2011).

The last journal entitled “Gender Representation in American Movies: A Corpus-based

Analysis” by Zahra Montasseri, Mohammad Saber Khaghaninejad, and Amirsaeid Moloodi. The

findings portrayed that men were revealed to be passively related with inferior features, low-income

employment, child-bearers, and sexual elements, whereas women were shown to be passively linked

with inferior features, low-income jobs, child-bearers, and sexual aspects, according to the findings

(Moloodi, 2013). There are ten journals that reference this research. Five journals that explain about

the Commissive Speech Act and five others explain about women representation in a film. The above

majority reference uses Searle theory with qualitative methods. With various objects such as comics,

song lyrics, movie scripts, and novels.  

D. METHOD OF RESEARCH

1.       Research Design

This study was used as part of a descriptive qualitative study. Qualitative research includes descriptive

data, voice or word, and practice that the subject can implement. Because it simply gathers and describes

The Commissive Speech Acts in the Encanto movie script, this research also qualifies as a descriptive

study. It indicates that the approach should produce a systematic and accurate description that focuses on

the facts and elements of data investigation. The writer intends to use this method to gather and describe

The Commissive Speech Acts in the Encanto film, as well as connect the analysis to women's

representation.

2. Source of The Data

The source of the data is Encanto movie script.

3. Technique for collecting data

The technique for collecting the data was stated as follows: First, watching Encanto movie then searching

the Encanto movie script. Second, find all the words containing Commissive Speech Acts in the movie

script. Third, describe and explain the types and the function of commissive speech acts based on Searle’s

theory. Last, analyze the women's representation based on the results of the commissive act findings.

4. Technique of Analysis Data

The following processes were employed in the data analysis concept: 1) Gathering information. This

stage gathered all of the notes that had been made as a result of the observations that had been made.

2)Reduction and categorization of data. The process of data simplification and categorization is carried

out in this step. 3) The process of displaying the outcomes of data reduction and categorization in a matrix

based on particular criteria is known as data display. 3) Draw a conclusion using the theory and the

observed data results if the data display results reveal that the data gathered is sufficient and in agreement

with the information requested.

E. RESULT AND DISCUSSION

         This research showed that there were 25 utterances of commissive acts found in the movie. There

are the acts of promising, threatening, accepting, refusing, and offering shown by the characters. They

were 6 data of promising, 6 data of threatening, 7 data of accepting, 1 data of refusing, and 6 data of

offering. The total of the data is shown in Table 1

Type of Commissive Speech Frequency

Promising 6

Threatening 6

Accepting 7

Refusing 1

Offering 6
 Total 25

A. Commissive Analysis

1. Promising   

There is one of some promising samples that included in Encanto movie script :

Data 1 

Isabela looks at Mirabel and scoffs. Abuela looks at the candle, then back to Mirabel, embarrassed and
disappointed.

MIRABEL  : “Abuela, I promise.”

In the sentence above, Mirabel promises to Abuela that she wants to save their house. At first, Abuela did

not believe her because she didn’t have a power like other siblings. Mirabel always told her that the house

had become cracked. But all of her siblings did not believe her. Finally, the house is cracked and all of

their sibling’s power is lost.

2. Threatening

There is one of some threatening’s samples that included in Encanto movie script:

Data 2 

ABUELA ALMA: “The cracks started with you. Bruno left because of you. Luisa’s losing her powers,

Isabela’s out of control, because of you. I don’t know why you weren’t given a gift, but it is not an excuse

for you to hurt this family! I don’t know why you weren’t given a gift, but it is not an excuse for you to

hurt this family!”

         From the beginning, Mirabel had already warned her family that the House they lived in would be

destroyed. Everyone didn't listen to her because when she wanted to prove to all people, the cracks

disappeared. Only Dolores and Isabela believed it. When the house was destroyed, Abuela Alma as the
head of the family saw Mirabel's increasingly strange behavior and then said the threat to Mirabel. Abuela

blames Mirabel for the destruction of the house.

3. Accepting

There is one of some accepting samples that included in Encanto movie script:

Data 3

DOLORES appears out of nowhere.

DOLORES: “OKAY I’LL TAKE IT FROM HERE, G’BYE!”

         Dolores was the first child of a madrigal family. He has the power to see the future. When she

sees the future of her family, Dolores sees the destruction of the house and the annihilation of all her

family's strength. He was terrified all the time and he was considered crazy by his family. Dolores had

tried to tell what she saw but no one believed it. He then decided to leave the house. Since then, his

whereabouts are unknown and considered a disgrace by his family. Nor do people dare to mention his

name blatantly

4. Offering

There is offering’s samples that included in Encanto movie script:

Data 4

DOLORES : “Here, let me help you, let me help you.”

         Dolores did not actually leave the house, but lived in a hidden room inside her house. He was

discovered by Mirabel who at that time saw him peeping at his family eating. Mirabel always approached

him so that he would rejoin the Madrigal family. Mirabel also told about the cracking of a madrigal house

that is getting bigger and bigger, but no one believes it. Dolores, who knew about the situation from the

beginning, finally decided to help Mirabel. Dolores helps her by showing Mirabel a little bit of the future

he has seen.
5. Refusing

Data 5

The House : “no... and I’m worried about you,”

When the madrigal family house collapsed, everyone was very worried about Mirabel and the entire

Madrigal family. Abuela Alma, the head of the madrigal family, was deeply shocked by the incident.

When her entire family decides to evacuate, Mirabel decides to return to her damaged home. The house

refuses when Mirabel asks about how it cracked. But the house said that it was worrying about Mirabel

rescuing the candles to save all the power of her siblings. Mirabel has a good attitude and heart. She

always prioritizes other people's problems more than herself.

B. Women Representation

Based on commissive speech analysis in Encanto movie script, there are women representation that can
be concluded:

1.       Gender Roles

From the commissive analysis data above, it can be concluded that the role of women in this film is

very strong which is represented by Abuela Alma as the head of the Madrigal family. Abuela Alma

was the oldest person and the highest decision-maker in the family. This is what is usually done by

men. From some of the samples above, there is also an example of Abuela Alma who tried to

maintain the integrity of the family by keeping secrets about the destruction of the house but was

finally saved by Mirabel.

2.       Perceptions of privilege

From the commissive analysis data above, Mirabel as the main character in Encanto is the only

member of the Madrigal family who has no privileges or powers. When other family members have

superpowers, he lives his life as an ordinary human being. However, it can be seen from some of the

samples above that Mirabel dominates all commissive speech acts and in the analysis she tried her

best to protect her family. When the destruction of her house and all the strength of her family
 members, with her sincerity, Mirabel managed to return her home to its original state along with the

strength of all members of the Madrigal family

F. Conclusions

         The research result showed there were 5 types of commissive acts performed by the characters in

the Encanto movie script. This research showed that there were 25 utterances of commissive acts found in

the movie. There are the acts of promising, threatening, accepting, refusing, and offering shown by the

characters. They were 6 data of promising, 6 data of threatening, 7 data of accepting, 1 data of refusing,

and 6 data of offering. From the commissive data analysis, the researcher found two women represented

in this movie. First, women’s gender roles portrayed by Abuela Alma as a head of Madrigal’s family.

Then, the perception of privilege that portrayed by Mirabel who has no privileges or powers but she could

save her family and home.

G. REFERENCE

Encanto Play (n.d.). Scripts.com. Retrieved June 12, 2022,

from https://www.scripts.com/script/encanto_play_25948
Irwandika, G. (2021). A Corpus Study of Commissive Speech Acts Performed by USA Presidential
Candidates. ELLITE: Journal of English Language, Literature, and Teaching, 21-30. 
Lubis, P. A. (2018). ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN ALICE IN WONDERLAND MOVIE SCRIPT.
SKRIPSI, 1-112\. 
Marlina, D. V. (2018). Illocutionary Acts Found in Novel the Never Girls: Before the . E-Journal of
English Language & Literature, 44-50. 
Maulidiyah, K. (2016). An analysis of Donald Trump's Commissive Speech Act in USS Yorktown in
December 7, 2015. Thesis, 1-80. 

Searle, J. R. (1969). Speech acts: An essay in the philosophy of language. London: Cambridge University
Press.
Searle, J. (1975). Indirect Speech Acts. In P. Cole, & J. Morgan (Eds.), Syntax and Semantics 3: Speech
Acts (pp. 59-82). New York: Academic Press.
Yule, G. (2006). The study of language. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

H. SCHEDULE

Activity February March April May June

Choosing a V

topic

Searching V

previous

studies

Reviewing V

previous

studies

Searching

theories

Reviewing

theories

Classifying

data

Analyzing

data