HomeTin-awvol. 2 no. 1 (2018)

A Discourse Analysis on Flip top Battles among Filipino Youth

Janice A. Fernandez

 

Abstract:

Pinoy rap battle also known as Flip top became the most popular vehicle of lyrical creativity and innate musical rhythm and talents of Filipino youth nowadays. Hence, this qualitative research which employed Discourse Analysis aimed at identifying, analyzing and describing the linguistic features such as the morpho-semantic and syntactic features including the moves embedded in the Flip top battles. The corpora of the study were the top 12 trending Flip top battle videos downloaded from You Tube channel. Results of the study revealed that Flip top battles contained morpho-semantic features such as acronyms, affixation, borrowing, compounding and reduplication. The syntactic features observed in the Flip top battles were the use of phrases, clauses, types of sentences according to meaning, and types of sentences according to structure. Finally, the moves of Flip top battles involved: move one, introducing the emcees in the Flip top battle; move two, getting the rounds for the first set of emcees. Move two had 11 sub-moves such as attack on physical attributes, attack on rapping skills, attack on family members and friends, attack on emotional aspect, attack on social status, boasting lines, word play / rhymes, rebuttal, involvement of famous celebrities, sexual bullying and use of trash talks. Move three was a break. Move four, getting the rounds for second set of emcees. Move five was break and move six was proclaiming the winners.