Kita’s usage in spoken discourse: Collectivity to singularity

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

12-24-2018

Abstract

This short communication explains that kita ‘we’ has an alternative usage as a singular personal pronoun, presented as kita ‘I’. The usage of kita is classified into six classes, based on its substitutability with saya and the context in which kita occurs. The purpose of this paper is to prove that there are three contexts that render kita a singular pronoun: (i) the speaker refers to people in general to share her point of view; (ii) the speaker wants to share information with a group of people whom she knows; (iii) the speaker exercises negative politeness.

Keywords

Collectivity, kita ‘we, I’, Malay language, personal pronoun, singularity

Divisions

FLL

Publication Title

Pertanika Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities

Volume

26

Issue

T

Publisher

Universiti Putra Malaysia

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