Representation of Gossip Culture in the ˋˋTilik'' Short Movie on YouTube

Abstract

“Tilik” is the title of a short film that tells the social reality of everyday life in Javanese society. This film received a lot of attention and appreciation, and was watched by millions of viewers on YouTube. Throughout the film, the contents of the story are dominated by gossip activities. This research aimed to describe the representation of gossip displayed in the movie “Tilik” and to reveal the function of gossip. Foster’s study suggests four primary gossip functions: information, entertainment, friendship and influence. Descriptive qualitative method were used and the results were analysed using semiotic analysis by Roland Barthes. The results indicate that gossip activities in the film “Tilik” display, among other things, the function of information. This can be seen when the group that wants to meet up in the truck shared a story discussing gossip about Dian’s character. Second, the entertainment function is also seen when talking about gossip: they are listening, enjoying and laughing. Furthermore, the friendship function can be seen in the sharing norms of in-group members. Finally, the role of influence can be seen from the main character, namely Mrs. Tejo, with her body language trying to convince and lead the opinions of group members. Yu Ning’s character became an outsider because she disagreed with the sentiment. The message conveyed in this film is that people must start using technology and keep up with the changes. This film also describes the hoax phenomenon in society, where information that is conveyed is sometimes not true. So public education is needed to confirm the truth of the information circulating on social media. Keywords: film, gossip, representation