THE EXPRESSION OF EVALUATION IN “THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO MUST-TRY INDONESIAN FOOD”: AN APPRAISAL ANALYSIS

Abstract

Appraisal, under Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) especially interpersonal meaning, concerns with evaluation of language that is negotiated through the text (Martin and White, 2005; Martin and Rose, 2007). Briefly, appraisal is used to assess things, situation, or people. This study investigates the Journalist’s evaluation towards ten of most popular Indonesian savory foods across Indonesia from the perspective of appraisal system. Indonesia is a home for 300 ethnic groups, and it offers a wide range of culinary. In this study, the researcher limits the study on one type of attitudes subsystem namely appreciation. Appreciation is our evaluation about ‘things’, particularly thing we make and actions we give, and it also includes natural phenomenon (Martin and White, 2005; Martin and Rose, 2007, Santosa, et.al, 2023). This study employs qualitative research using a criterion-based sampling technique known as purposive sample and content analysis for the technique of data analysis (Santosa, 2017). The source of data in this study was a document that consists of 10 must-try savory Indonesian foods which was retrieved from an Indonesia travel website https://www.indonesia.travel/sg/en/home. Thus, the data were segmented into types of appreciation such as reaction: impact and quality, composition: balance and complexity, and valuation. Furthermore, in analyzing the data, the researcher applies appraisal theoretical framework developed by Martin and White (2005). The results of this study show that the most dominant type of appreciation exploited by the journalist is positive valuation. It is used to show the journalist’s appreciation and critics to the foods he reviewed. The following clause is the example of the finding ‘Rendang, an authentic Indonesian dish from Padang’. The bold lexis is used by the journalist to show his appreciation towards the typical food from Pandang, West Sumatra, Indonesia called Rendang. It indicates that the journalist expresses his positive valuation to some foods he reviewed to evoke people’s appetites and to invite them to try some authentic Indonesian foods. Moreover, the result of this study is in line with the research conducted by Daniarsa & Ningsih (2023) about tendency in Indonesian newspaper editorials. The result of the study indicates that the tendency of using positive appreciation is to give implicit and explicit praise and assessment to Jokowi and his vice’s leadership. Meanwhile, the finding also supports research carried out by Wu & Pan (2021) who also stated that the use of positive appreciation is to express the journalist’s wishes or appreciation towards the ‘things’ he wrote about.