Speech Actin the Kette Katonga Weri Kawedo Tradition in Southwest Suba District

The oral tradition of a society is a cultural heritage that must be preserved from extinction. Tradition contains values and symbols of the identity of an area. The values applied are the way of life of each ethnic group. This research aims at describing speech acts found in Kette Katonga Weri Kawedo in Sumba Barat Daya Regency which originally use Wewewa Dialect in Sumba Language. In addition, this research also aims to discover the types, to demonstrate the function and to find out the dominance of speech acts in the tradition. This is a field research which was conducted by implementation of qualitative method. Data analysis result shows that KKWK's utterances contains of locution, illocution and perlocution acts. Locution acts are realized in form of declarative sentences, interrogative sentences, and imperative sentences. Illocution acts are realized in form of assertive acts (informing and suggesting), directive acts (ordering and requesting), expressive acts (greetings, saying thanks, and complimenting), and commissive acts (promising and offering). From the data calculation, it shows that assertive acts dominates the speech acts in KKWK. Another productive acts is directives acts besides expressive and commissive acts. It could be concluded that the utterances in KKWK contains locution acts, illocution acts, and perlocution acts which is dominated by assertive and directive acts. Researcher recommended to develop the research in the wider scope by collecting data from various subject.