Denny Wahyu Setyadji

12020154045

The Analysis of Jargon between Airports Employees in A Movie

The Terminal

ABSTRACT
People use a language to interact with an individual or with a group. It could also a group
with an individual or vice versa. People tend to make a special language so they can
communicate more intimate and more privacy with their communication. They use a
particular type of language to communicate with others. A word or a sentence than only thus
in the group knows about the behind meaning. Like an example before, that kind of language
is called Jargon. The definition of Jargon is a type of language that is used in a
particular context and may not be well understood outside of it. The context is usually a
particular occupation (that are, a certain trade, profession, or academic field), but any ingroup can have jargon. This study analyses about the using of jargon by Airports employees
in a movie The Terminal. This study uses a qualitative method in order to get the analysis of
jargon in the movie The Terminal and this study focuses in the analysis of jargon in the
daily conversation of airports employees. In conclusion, the result of this study showed that
the using of jargon in the airport by airports employees erefers to the object closely into the
real meaning.
Key Terms : Jargon, A Qualitative Method and Profession.

Introduction
Language is a communication tool for people to interact or make a conversation with
another person. That makes a language really important for our life. A living people cant live
by themselves. They need another person around them so they must have an interaction with
others so they can help them. That is how important language is.
Language could be used everywhere and every time. Language could be an identity
for some who used it. People could be seen or could be identified by their languages. It could

be said that Language is how people represent themselves in a public. The way they
communicate with others could be valued as their status or their job.
People use a language to interact with an individual or with a group. It could also a
group with an individual or vice versa. People tend to make a special language so they can
communicate more intimate and more privacy with their communication. They use a
particular type of language to communicate with others, for example a group of Lecturer in
the college tends to have their own words to represent the thing that they want to talk about.
A word or a sentence than only thus in the group knows about the behind meaning.
Like an example before, that kind of language is called Jargon. The definition of
Jargon is a type of language that is used in a particular context and may not be well
understood outside of it (Wikipedia). The context is usually a particular occupation (that are,
a certain trade, profession, or academic field), but any in-group can have jargon.
The main trait that distinguishes jargon from the rest of a language is
special vocabulary including some words specific to it and, often, narrower senses of words
that out groups would tend to take in a broader sense. Jargon is thus "the technical
terminology or characteristic idiom of a special activity in a group".
This paper analyses the using of jargon between Airports employees in a movie The
Terminal. This movie is a 2004 American romantic comedy film directed by Steven
Spielberg and starring Tom Hanks and Catherine Zeta-Jones. It is about a man who becomes
trapped in New York City's JFK International Airport terminal when he is denied entry into
the United States and at the same time cannot return to his native country due to a revolution.
Almost all of the scenes in this movie had taken in an airport. There were a lot of interaction
between Airports employees, thus this paper analyses the jargon that being used by the
employees and the analyses about the word choice of using jargons.
This study analyses the using of jargon by airports employees in the movie The
Termina. The jargon as a part of the airports employeess daily conversarion in the
workplace in this case was an airport. Specifically, this study analyses the meaning behing the
jargon and this study focused in the language choice between airports employees when using
jargon.

Method and Material

This study is talked about the analysis of jargon between Airports employees in the
movie The Terminal. This study used descriptive qualitative. The differentiate qualitative
and quantitative is qualitative concerned with how and why something is, while quantitative
focused on how much or how many.
As Robert Bogdan and Sari Biklen describe in their education text, "historians of
qualitative research have never, for instance, included Freud or Piaget as developers of the
qualitative approach, yet both relied on case studies, observations and indepth interviewing".
(Bogdan & Biklen 1982:14).
The used of qualitative method was to analyze the utterances of airports employees
when they were using jargon in their working life. As a part of daily conversation in the
working life, Jargon has made special to specialize their profession in the airport. The daily
conversation of the airports employees when they were working in the airport.
The data is taken from the movie The Terminal. The data was the scene of the film
when the movie was showing the scene of airports employees while using jargon. The source
of data is taken from the scene in The Terminal movie using the application of video player
in the laptop to play the movie.
From this film is being selected, the data are being collected. Data collection
techniques are done by observation. In this case, the writer using techhniques without any
participation in which the writer observes the data through taking notes and gathering the
scene of the movie and without making interview or questionnaire.
The data is the script of the scenes in The Terminal movie about the using of jargon
by the aiports employees. The data is being collected in two ways with the original scripts
and the table of jargon used by the airports employees in the movie The Terminal.

1st Script
As the scene shows Dixon watch the passengers through the CCTV in the office.
-Thurman

: Stand by. He's fishing.

- Officer

: Copy that.

-Dixon

: See this bunch of Mickey Mouse sweatshirts?

2nd Script
As the scene shows Dixon come in the office and order his underlings or his employees.
-Dixon

: Come on, let's go. South America and Madrid are on the tarmac.
I want them out of here in half an hour.

3rd Script
As the scene shows the employees watch Navorski through the CCTV and then Dixon
come in.
-Dixon

: What's going on?

-Thurman

: It's Navorski. He's figured out the quarters.

4th Script
As the scene shows Dixon has a conversation with Thurman about Navorski while Dixon
watches Navorski through CCTV.
-Dixon

: One of my own men came up to me the other day. Asked me if I

wanted to join the big pool.
Look at him. (Watching Navorski)
Place a bet on when Navorski is going to leave this airport. Have you
heard about this?

-Thurman

: I have January 3rd

5th Script
As the scene shows Dixon has a conversation with Thurman about Navorski while Dixon
watches Navorski through CCTV.
-Dixon

: How much does Navorski make?

-Thurman

: Sir ?

-Dixon

: How much does he make?

How much are they paying him?

-Thurman

: They're paying him cash under the table.

-Dixon

: I know that. How much?

-Thurman

: $19 an hour.

6th Script
As the scene shows Dixon and his underlings on the outside of the airport while
watching Navorski left the airport.
-Officer

: You want us to block the south exit

and have AP sweep every vehicle ? Sir ?

-Dixon

: 5.30 from Tokyo just landed.

Got two planes on the tarmac.
Barcelona on approach.
The night is young
and 1500 people are headed our way.
Everybody inside.
Everybody inside.

The Table of Jargon

Jargon
Hes fishing.
The Tarmac.
The Quarters.
The Big Pool.
Under the table.
AP sweep every vehicle

Noun

Phrase

Result and Finding

From all of those scripts, the one that underlined are the jargon. The scripts eventually
came from Frank Dixon conversations with his underling and one of them is Thurman. As a
Field Commissioner, Dixon must take care problems from the airport. On the other hand,
Thurman is a an aiports police. His job include the passengers security and also the safety of
the airports environment.
The 1st Script with the jargon Hes fishing, Truman said to the officer about what
Dixon did. In the scene, Dixon watched the passengers through the CCTV. Truman said to the
officer that Dixon was fishing so the other officer could stand by in their position at any
moment. The literally meaning of the fishing is catching a fish by a rod or a kind of fishing
tools. But in this terminology, it has a different meaning that only the airports employees
know the meaning.
Dixon as a Field Commissioner must control and keep the airport safe from all kind of
criminal that might happen. So, everyday he must watch the terminal through the CCTV to
make sure that there would be not any problems. The meaning of fishing here is the behavior
of Dixon when he watches or search a problem in the terminal through his office.
In the 2nd Script, there is the tarmac as their jargon. Dixon said it as a part of his
order to the employees or his underling. He said it in the office about the airplane from South
America and Madrid was on the tarmac that would be take off in half an hour. The tarmac

itself has a literally meaning as an area of black material used for building roads, etc., which
consists of tar mixed with small stones.
In the movie, Dixon used the tarmac as referring to the Airport apron. Despite the
fact that most of these areas are often paved with concrete not tarmac, It often referred to as
PQ (Pavement Quality) concrete. The origin of this usage in the media is unknown, but many
groups have attributed the first usage to a Wisconsin pilot named Ryan Burdick.
The 3rd Script had the quarters as its jargon. The script happens in the office when
the employees watch the the CCTV then Dixon come in and ak them what have they watch.
Thurman explain that Navorski has found the quarters. The quarter means one of four equal
or almost equal parts of something; in the literally meaning.
In the movie, Thruman said the quarters as referring to a machine that collects the
airports carts. The machine was manually so it needs people to take all the carts and then
place its all to the quarters. The reason why they called it the quarters was the machine gives
25 cents for every cart that being place in the machine.
In the 4th script, there is the big pool as its jargon. In this scene, Dixon have a
conversation with Thurman about Navorski. Dixon explained that one of his men ask him to
join the big pool and place a bet about when Navorski is going to leave this airport. The Big
Pool in the literally meaning means a place with a big scale and for swimming.
In the movie, Dixon said the big pool was to refer about a type of gambling in which
people risk a small amount of money and try to guess the results of the date when Navorski is
going to leave correctly and win a lot of money.
In the 5th Script, there is under the table as its jargon. In this scene, Dixon have a
conversation with Thurman about Navorski while watching watching Navorski doing his job
in the construction area inside the airport. Dixon asking Thurman about Navorskis wage in
the construction. The literally meaning of under the table is something happen or someone
are placed in the below of the table. It also means in or to a position below or lower than the
table, often so that one thing covers the other.
In the movie, Thurman said under the table refers to the way Navorski get his wages
from his job in the construction job Navorski get his wages in the secret way or without
anyone know when he would get his wages.

In the last script, there is AP sweep every vehicle as its jargon. In this scene, Dixon
and his underlings on the outside of the airport while watching Navorski left the airport.
Navorski left the airport using a cab or taxi. One of Dixons underling asking Dixon about
how would he do to Navorski. The literally meaning of AP sweep every vehicle is the job that
AP does to every vehicles or cealn ing every vehicle.. In this case, AP is Airport Police.
In the movie, Dixons underling said AP sweep every vehicle refers to Airport Police
searching Navorski in every vehicle that left the the airport. Dixons underling said it to
Dixon about this suggestion to stop or to make Navorski can not leave the airport.

Conclusion
From the discussion above, the word choice to represent the term in Airports jargon
actually have s close meaning with the literally meaning. From the 1st jargon, the choosing of
the word fishing means Dixon was like a fisherman who want to catch a fish but in this term
the fish represent the passengers problem. The 2nd Jargon is the tarmac, the 3rd is the
quarters and the last one is the big pool. All of the jargons actually have a close meaning with
the literally meaning.
In conclusion, the group of Airports employees in the movie The Terminal using
jargon to represent the technical term. This jargon have the behind meaning that only the
member o the group know about. The people from the outer group usually finds the word
foesnt seems related with the actual meaning The word choice in the jargon prove that have a
slight similarity with the literally meaning.

REFERENCES
Bogdan, R.C. & Biklen, S. (1982). "Qualitative Research for Education: An Introduction to
Theory and Methods". Boston: Allyn & Bacon. p.14.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jargon . Retrieved 2015-05-20