An Analysis of Figurative Language in Three Michael Jackson’s Songs

Abstract

This paper aims to discover the figurative language and its meanings in three Michael Jackson’s songs. It employed qualitative method to describe types of figurative language and its meaning in the song lyrics. The findings revealed five kinds of figurative language based on Perrine’s theory. The types of figurative language were Metaphor with 16 data (50%), Personification with 06 data (18.8%), Metonymy with 01 data (3.1%), Symbol with 05 data (15.6%), and Overstatement with 04 data (12.5%). It is concluded that metaphor is the most frequent type of figurative language used in three Michael Jackson’s songs.