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LANGUAGE INTERFERENCE: THE INFLUENCES OF INDONESIAN MOTHER TONGUEON THE INDONESIAN LEARNERS OF EN

ABSTRACT

This study attempts to discuss language interference with special reference to the Indonesianmother tongue, which can affect Indonesian learners of English. It also addresses some aspects ofthe two languages, English and Indonesian, which can cause some errors on the Englishlearners in particular, and on Indonesian speaking people in general.

It has been identified that there are seve ral language aspects of the students native language, inthis case Indonesian, which are different from the target language (English) and presumed toinfluence L2 learning. Among them are: sound system (e.g. spelling, substitution of phonemes,differentiation of vowels), structure (e.g. tenses, plurality, nouns and the use of articles,

prepositions), sociolinguistics (e.g. greeting, leave talking, and small talk after introduction).

It is suggested that the language produced by foreign learners (including Indonesian) is sounavoidably influenced, and even distorted, by the mother tongue of the learners that it shouldrather be termed an Interlanguage (Selinker, 1972), since it will always be a blend of theforeign language and the mother tongue. The better the learner is at overcoming languageinterference, the more dilute that blend will be.

Key words: interference, mother tongue, Indonesian learners of English

IntroductionPeople have constantly communicated via language, particularly their family language whichthey use to communicate with others and in order to be able to live as a social community. Alanguage is often identified as a group of people (Finegan et. al., 1997:6). For instance,Indonesians are people who speak Indonesian, Germans are people who speak German, theEnglish are people who speak English, etc. Such language identification is called peoplesmother tongue or native language, or home language, because these languages are primarilyused in families where the people grow up.Mother tongue is a language which is potentially mastered when people are born (some say thateven before we are born!). It is acquired informally and unconsciously. It is the languagelearned as a child because it is the one used in the childs environment (Tomlinson, 1984:95).This is known as first language acquisition, which according to Krashen (1988:64) is anunconscious process, the sort of spontaneous picking up of a language that occurs in naturalsettings where no formal classroom instruct ion is involved; whereas a second language is thelanguage learned formally and consciously as a foreign language, or the language acquired afterthe first language. It is the study of how learners learn an additional language after they haveacquired th eir mother tongue (Ellis, 1985:5).


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Furthermore, first language acquisition refers to all peoples activities to master their mothertongue. The stream of activities could be done through both informal and formal education.Informal education is often name d learning a language at home or untutored or naturalisticacquisition, while formal education refers to learning a language at school or tutored orclassroom acquisition (Ellis 1985:5). Similarly, Tarigan (1988:4) argues that informal education

is learning a language naturally, whereas formal education is learning a language scientifically.Moreover, people who speak two languages (bilingual) or more (multilingual) interchangeablymay affect the use of each language because one can use the L1s rules on L2s, and vice versa.This language interference is most often discussed as a source of errors (negative transfer),although where the relevant feature of both languages are the same, it results in correct language

production (positive transfer). The greater the differences between the two languages, the morenegative the effects of interference are likely to be.This study, therefore, attempts to discuss language interference with special reference to theIndonesian mother tongue, which can affect Indonesian learners of English. It also addressessome aspects of the two languages, English and Indonesian, which can cause some errors onthe English learners in particular, and on Indonesian speaking people in general.

Literature ReviewExtensive research has already been done in the area of native language or mother tongueinterference on the target language. Dulay et.al. (1982) define interference as the automatictransfer, due to habit, of the surface structure of the first language onto the surface of the targetlanguage. Interference may also be viewed as the transference of elements of one language toanother at various levels including phonological, grammatical, lexical and orthographical(Berthold, Mangubhai & Batorowicz 1997, cf. Skiba 1997). Lott (1983) defines interference aserrors in the learners use of the foreign language that can be traced back to the mother tongue.Whereas Brown (2000:95) states that interference occurs when the previous performancedisrupts the performance of a second ta sk.

In addition, Ellis (1994: 51) refers to interference as transfer, which he says is the influencethat the learners L1 exerts over the acquisition of an L2. He argues that transfer is governed bylearners perceptions about what is transferable an d by their stage of development in L2 learning.In learning a target language, learners construct their own interim rules (Selinker 1971 cf. Bhela1999, Seligar 1988 and Ellis 1994) with the use of their L1 knowledge, but only when they

believe it will help them in the learning task or when they have become sufficiently proficient inthe L2 for transfer to be possible.Moreover, Ellis (1994) raises the need to distinguish between errors and mistakes and makesan important distinction between the two. He says that errors reflect gaps in the learnersknowledge; they occur because the learner does not know what is correct. Mistakes reflectoccasional lapses in performance; they occur because, in a particular instance, the learner is

unable to perform what he or she knows. In addition, Carroll (1964) argues that thecircumstances of learning a second language are like those of a mother tongue. Sometimes thereare interferences and occasionally responses from one language system will intrude into speechin the other language. It appears that learning is most successful when the situations in which thetwo languages (L1 and L2) are learned, are kept as distinct as possible (Faerch and Kasper 1983,cf. Bhela 1999). To successfully learn L2 requires the L2 learner to often prevent the L1structures from the L2 learning process, if the structures of the two languages are distinctlydifferent. Beardsmore (1982) suggests that many of the difficulties a second language learner has


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with the phonology, vocabulary and grammar of L2 are due to the interference of habits from L1.The formal elements of L1 are used within the context of L2, resulting in errors in L2, as thestructures of the languages, L1 and L2 are different.

Some Aspects of the Students L1 (Indonesian) w hich may Influence the Learning of L2

(English)There are several language aspects of the students native language, in this case Indonesian,which are different from the target language (English) and presumed to influence L2 learning.Among them are:

A. Sound SystemThe students who learn English are required to know and understand the sound system of thelanguage. In using English vocabulary, they may be prevented from using unfamiliar wordssince the choices of vocabulary are huge. Similarly, the use of sentence patterns may still beselected, though the choices are not as many as the vocabulary. In producing the sound system,however, it is easily recognized between English native speakers and non-native ones from their

pronunciation of words. The greater the mispronunciation of the words, the more difficult thewords are understood. For instance, an Indonesian student may find it difficult to differentiate between I need a pen and I need a pan, since Indonesian language does not distinguish the pronunciation of the two vowels (Tarigan, 1988:15).Furthermore, the problems of sound system may still be divided into several parts:1. SpellingEnglish is a language that has complicated spellings. Mispronunciation may be caused byspelling; and it may then cause a misunderstanding.The sound /i:/, for example, has many spellings:ee as in need or feet ei as in receive

ie as in belief i as in machine eo as in people

However, the spelling ough may have six different sounds:

cough koff tough tuff bough bow through thru though tho

thoroughfare thurafare

There are also some English letters which are not uttered, such as:- letter k as in know, knight, knee - letter l as in talk, walk, balk - letter e as in love, care, make - letter b as in doubt, debt - letter p as in photo, psychology, pneumonia


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feel fill = Feel/fill this bagsleep slip = Dont sleep/slip on the desk

/ei/ and /e/taste test = Can you taste/test it?

sail sell = He wanted to sail/sell the boat

/u:/ and /u/ pooling pulling = They are pooling/pulling itfool full = Only a fool/full horse would do it

/ou/ and /o/coat cot = That coat/cot is too small

B. StructureSince Indonesian language belongs to the Austronesian family, while English belongs to Indo-

European (Atmodarsono 1988, Finegan et.al. 1997), there are several aspects of languagestructure which are significantly different between the two languages. Among them are:1. TensesIndonesian language does not have tenses; people emphasize the exact time by only describing itin words: now, today, yesterday, last week, tomorrow, next year, and so forth. In addition, thesewords are used only if necessary. In English, however, most of the sentences have certain tenseswhich have certain pattern drills as well. The use of tenses in English sentences has been,therefore, considered as the most difficult aspect of English to be mastered by Indonesianlearners (Subiyakto and Nababan 1992).It is possible for Indonesian students, for instance, to have sentences like this:You go to Jakarta tomorrow?

I live in Jakarta for 5 years.

which they should be:Will you go to Jakarta tomorrow?I have been living in Jakarta for 5 years.

2. PluralityPlurality form also does not exist in Indonesian language; we just repeat the word twice if wewant to emphasize its plurality. In every English sentence, however, we have to identify thesubject to know whether it is singular or plural. Variable nouns in English have both a plural anda singular form which differ from each other, most often by the addition or subtraction of an 's',

though there are, of course, many irregular variable nouns. Invariable nouns in English come indifferent forms. Some have only a singular form, as is the case with uncountable nouns likefurniture and the names of some academic subjects, game s and diseases, e.g. mathematics,darts and measles, which look misleadingly like plurals. Others have only a plural form inEnglish, whereas their counterparts in other languages may have singular forms. For example,many objects which are made up of two hinged or joined parts and are symmetrical, such asscissors, scales, secateurs and trousers, have only a plural form in English. To refer to thesenouns in the singular, we have to use 'a pair of' or 'some'. If the Indonesian learners assume that


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the number of these nouns is the same in English as in their mother tongue invalid noun forms,like trouser, an incorrect verb-noun and determiner-noun agreement errors, as in 'this trouser istoo small' will result. This is all the more confusing since in languages where nouns of this typehave been borrowed from English, they are usually given a singular form, regardless of theirstatus in the language they were borrowed from (Nicholls 2002). Similarly, some nouns in

English, like sheep, aircraft and offspring have the same form in both the singular and the plural,with only context to help with their interpretation. The Indonesian learners who have notsufficiently learnt these facts may rely on the assumption that these nouns behave in the sameway as they do in their mother tongue.3. Nouns (and the Use of Articles)

Nouns in English are divided into two basic types: countable nouns and uncountable, or mass,nouns. Countable nouns are those which refer to individual entities which can be counted, suchas coins, fingers and buildings. Uncountable nouns are those which refer to mass entities or tonotions, which cannot be counted, such as money or laughter. These two types of noun havedistinct grammatical behaviours (Nicholls, 2003). Moreover, countable nouns must have anarticle, which does not exist in Indonesian language as well. We cannot say 'coin is made of

silver'. Uncountable nouns can stand alone without an article; we can say 'laughter is contagious'.While both types can take the definite article 'the', only countable nouns can take the indefinitearticle 'a' (e.g. a coin, but not a money). Countable nouns have a plural form, whereasuncountable nouns do not; we can say coins but we cannot say laughters.Indonesian learners who start learning English and discover that, rather than being a qualitywhich is inherent in the things denoted by the nouns themselves, countability is something whichis written into the English language and what is countable in one language (i.e. English) can beuncountable in another (i.e. Indonesian). If the learners assume that the same countability appliesto a word in English as in their mother tongue, interference errors will be occurred. For example,the word advice is an uncountable noun in English. We cannot say an advice (we have to say'a piece of advice' as though it is a mass entity that has to be carved up, like bread), and we

cannot say advices. In Indonesian, however, the word for the concept of advice is countable.It is accepted in Indonesian context to say 'he gave me a good advice' or 'his advices were useful',for example. In fact, when it comes to countability, English is often the exception, runningcounter to the trend in other languages, leaving learners mystified and making mistakes(Nicholls, 2003).In addition, other words which are uncountable in English but often countable in otherlanguages, including Indonesian, are: information, news, luggage, furniture, weather, equipment,work, and money. The learner who only learns the noun and does not also learn the countabilityand attendant grammatical behaviour of the noun, will always make themselves understood, buttheir English will be incorrect. Cross-linguistic differences in countability are the source of suchforeign-sounding statements as 'what a lovely weather', 'the money are in my pocket' and 'I have

to do my homeworks' (Lott 1983).4. PrepositionsUnlike tenses, plurality and nouns, Indonesian learners are familiar with prepositions becausesentences in Indonesian have the preposition as well. However, the students often put theIndonesian preposition into the English. For example:I told to him to goThe teacher is explaining about the problem to the students.I like with you.


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they should be:I told him to goThe teacher is explaining the problem to the students.I like you.

C. SociolinguisticsSociolinguistics is one of several language aspects which is concerned about the culture and thesociety of a nation. According to Hudson (1980, cf. Wardhaugh 1988:12), sociolinguistics is th estudy of language in relation to society. It is concerned with investigating the relationships

between language and society with the goal of a better understanding of the structure of languageand of how languages function in communication. The importance of sociolinguistics is oftenneglected in learning one language. As long as the Indonesian learners use English among them,sociolinguistics is not needed. However, in communicating with the native speakers of English,we should not use the sociolinguistics in Indonesian context in order to be able to prevent frommisunderstanding.

There are several aspects of sociolinguistics in English context that Indonesian people, particularly the learners, should be aware. They are:1. GreetingEnglish : Hi, how are you? Indonesian : Halo, mau kemana?

It is common in Indonesian context to continue with the question: Where are you going? orWhere do you want to go? In the English speaking communities, however, it is uncommon to ask such question except forour close friend or someone we already know well (Montgomery, 1995:210).2. "Small Talk" After Introductions

After an introduction, there is usually a range of time to have a small talk. It is a commonsituation for English speaking people to ask such questions: "Do you live in this area?", "How doyou like living here?" or "What are you studying?" Someone may also ask, "What do you do?which means "What is your job?" Indonesian people may further ask, "How much money do youmake?" or "How old are you?" and even a very personal question such as: "Are you married?"will also be inquired. These kinds of personal questions may make the English native speakerssurprised as they consider the questions rude and impolite, whereas such questions are verycommon in Indonesian speaking people.

ConclusionSome studies and research which have been conducted indicate that there are, of course, many

other influences at play when we learn a foreign language, but the influence that the mothertongue has on the language we produce when we use a foreign language has become a veryimportant aspect to be aware of. Indonesian language which has some different aspects of rulesand norms from English, has the potential to create interference among students and otherIndonesians who learn the language.It is therefore suggested that the language produced by foreign learners (including Indonesian) isso unavoidably influenced, and even distorted, by the mother tongue of the learners that it shouldrather be termed an Interlanguage (Selinker, 1971), since it will always be a blend of the


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foreign language and the mother tongue. The better the learner is at overcoming languageinterference, the more dilute that blend will be.

References

Atmodarsono, S., (1988). Linguistic Tutorials. Jakarta: Open University, Educational Affairs ofIndonesia.

Beardsmore, H.B., (1982). Bilingualism: Basic Principles. Tieto, Avon.

Bhela, B., (1999). Native Language Interference in Learning a Second Language: ExploratoryCase Studies of Native Language Interference with Target Language Usage. InternationalEducation Journal 1:1 [Online], Available at http://iej.cjb.net [Downloaded 08.06.05].

Brown, H.D., (2000). Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. Fourth Edition. New York:Longman.

Carroll, J.B., (1964). Language and Thought. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs.

Dulay, H., Burt, M. & Krashen, S., (1982). Language Two. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Ellis, R., (1985). Understanding Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Ellis, R., (1994). The Study of Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Finegan, E., Blair, D., and Collins, P., (1997). Language. Its Structure and Use. Second Edition.

Australia: Harcourt Brace and Company.Krashen, S.D., (1988). Second Language Acquisition and Second Language Learning. UnitedKingdom: Prentice Hall.Lott, D. (1983). Analysing and Counteracting Interference Errors, TESL Journal, 37:3[Online], Available at http://iteslj.org/Articles/Lott-Interference.html, [Downloaded 10.06.05].

Montgomery, M., (1995). An Introduction to Language and Society. Second Edition. London:Routledge.


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Nicholls, D., (2002). What is Learner English? MED Magazine, 1 [Online]. Available at:http://www.macmillandictionary.com/MED-Magazine/ Sample-Issue/01-language-interference-learner-english.htm [Downloaded 10.06.05].

Nicholls, D., (2003). Beyond False Friends. Language Interference Outside Word Meaning.MED Magazine, 11 [Online]. Available at http://www.macmillandictionary.com/MED-Magazine/September2003/ l1.Language-Interference.htm [Downloaded 10.06.05].Seligar, H., (1988). Psycholinguistic Issues in Second Language Acquisition In Beebe, L. M.(ed.), Issues in Second Language Acquisition: Multiple Perspectives. London: Newbury.

Skiba, R., (1997). Code Switching as a Countenance of Language Interference. The InternetTESL Journal, 8:10 [Online], Available at http://iteslj.org/Articles/Skiba-CodeSwitching.html[Downloaded 06.06.05].

Subiyakto, S. U., and Nababan, (1992). Metodologi Pengajaran Bahasa (Language Teaching

Methodology), Jakarta: PT. Gramedia Pustaka Utama.

Tarigan, H. G., (1988). Pengajaran Analisis Kesalahan Berbahasa (The Teaching of LanguageError Analysis). Bandung: Angkasa.

Tomlinson, B., Checklist of Basic EFL Terms. In Cunningsworth, A. (ed.) (1984). Evaluatingand Selecting EFL Materials. London: Heinemann Educational Books, 80-102.

Wardhaugh, R., (1988). An Introduction to Sociolinguistics. United Kingdom: Basil Blackwell.


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Influence of Mother Tongue in Learning English

Abstract: Mother tongue has another name as the first language, which would be one or

several languages that a person touches, learns and masters firstly. The application ability ofmother tongue is crucial to further study for a person, since thinking is mostly based on mothertongue; therefore, it plays a key role in education process. Mother tongue would exert two typesof influence, ie., the positive transfer and negative transfer. It is important to adequately use the

positive transfer and avoid the negative one in learning English. There exist many interference inEnglish learning such as: the dialect interference, and the so called Clinglish for our Chinese

people, as well as the interference from cultural differences, etc.. All in all, when learningEnglish, the usage of mother tongue is not an aim but a mean, the final purpose is to skillfullymaster English, with which to communicate. So we have to try best to avoid mother tongueinterference in learning a foreign language, thus, to make full use of it.

Key words: Mother tongue, Transfer, Interference, Vowel, Chinglish

Introduction:

Chinese language is the mother tongue for Chinese people, so it is unavoidable to getinfluence from Chinese language when they learn English and other foreign languages.Sometimes the influence is positive, and sometimes not, to handle the relation between mother

tongue and foreign languages, and make use of the positive transfer to cut down the interferenceto the minimum is the key factor of well learning a foreign language.

1. Definition of mother tongue

Mother tongue has another name as the first language, which would be one or severallanguages that a person touches, learns and masters firstly. Mother tongue is usually beentouched from young and been maintained till teenage or even later; meanwhile, during the familyor formal education, especially the early period, the majority of which is imparted by the mother

tongue. The application ability of mother tongue is crucial to further study for a person, sincethinking is mostly based on mother tongue; therefore, it plays a key role in education process.Without good command of mother tongue, it would be difficult to learn other languages.

2. Transfer of mother tongue in English learning

Transfer is an influence exerted by the study and application of one kind of knowledge skillto another one. The scope of such influence depends both on the trait of personal cognition


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structure and the organization feature of the cognition structure in ones fixed knowledge field,and such influence could be positive, playing a promoting role; it also could be negative, playingan interferential role.

2.1 Positive transfer

2.1.1 Definition

The positive transfer means a positive and promoting influence exerted by one kind of studyand application of the knowledge skill to another study and application of the knowledge skill.

2.1.2 Rational use of the positive transfer

2.1.2.1Rational use of mother tongue thinking

The summarizing level of existed experience would inevitably influent the transfer effect.

The higher the mastered experience summarizing level is, the bigger possibility of realizing the positive transfer is and consequently, the better effect.

The output process of language is based on thinking no matter in speaking or writing, so themother tongue thinking comes to be the concerned question in learning second languages. Interms of the internal relations of mother tongue and second language study, the former one ishelpful to the latter one in a certain degree. A research said that the mother tongue is alwayscounted on in second language writing during primary period. Some people once asked 48Japanese college students to have a self-assessment of how much proportion of mother tonguethinking is used in English writing, the result showed that 75% of mother tongue thinking countsfor the total thinking during 17% of students, and 50-70% during 48% of students, 25-50%

during 27% of students, and only 8% of students whose mother tongue thinking is below 25%.

For another instance, when the interpreter receives the second language (English) and takesshorthand during interpreting, what on the notebook is not quite all English hints. Usually takingChinese language will be better, for example, when receives the terra -cotta soldiers andhorses, I think the hint will be better to interpret, and another one, when receives the

Oriental Powel Tower, I think will be more understandable than the English hint.

Chinese language is the mother tongue of Chinese people, the rational use of mother tonguetransfer would help us better command foreign languages.

2.1.2.2 Expand the language input and strengthen the positive transfer

Krashen, American linguist, has put forward the language input hypothesis theory in1980s, which has exerted deep influence on foreign language teaching. He put forward thatlanguage learning and language acquisition are two different ways for obtaining secondlanguage ability. Language input hypothesis mainly means: the learners learn the language byinputting the language a little higher than the existing level, ie., i+1 ( i means existing level; 1means the level a little higher than i). The learners enhance their language skill by absorbing the


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ever-stopping language input. The difficulty of language materials input should be a little abovethe learners existing level I , and the learners would turn to the former knowledge experience orassess by making use of the context in order to understand the newly input language materials.Throughout the effort, the learners will understand the difficult part in language material haveinput, thus, get a progress in language acquisition.

2.1.2.3 Master the cognition tactics and promote the positive transfer

The transfer process is realized by complex cognition activities. At the time of masteringmore Chinese language knowledge, mastering the cognition skill and strategy of solving

problems can also promote the positive transfer in learning.

The English educator, L.G.Alexander supposed that the foreign language teaching shouldadhere to the following principles: listening before s peaking, speaking before reading, and

reading before writing. Since the process of learning a foreign language is: input -intake-output-internalize. So it is helpful to promote English learning if the learners can consciously strengthenthe knowledge forming process.

2.2 Negative transfer

2.2.2 Definition

The negative transfer means a negative and interferential influence from one kind of studyand application of the knowledge skill on another study and application of the knowledge skill.

2.2.3 The negative transfer in English learning

The Chinese language is the mother tongue of the Chinese people, it is unavoidable to getinfluence of Chinese language when they are learning English and other foreign languages, inother words, they will undoubtedly give the guidance in English by Chinese language, such as:mark the meanings or translate by Chinese language, in order to reach the effect of reciprocityor contrast, actually the majority of us studied English in this way.

2.2.3.1Phynomenon

Perhaps when we learned English at the very beginning, we considered the articles written

by Chinese people are easier to understand and digest, and the spoken English from Chinese people is sentence clearly with a fluent thinking, however, such understanding will change whenwe take the learning for a long time. Take my own experience, we have the oral English course

by foreign teacher, when I communicate with my foreign teacher, I gradually realize that what Isaid, used, and learned belongs to another school of English, that is, Chinglish, which wasalways mentioned as Pigeon English by experts in last century.


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What impressed me most is once one of my friends asked me how to translate a Chinese phrase , after knowing the context, the firstly appeared translation process in mymind is: star speak for somebody or speak on somebodys behalf so Thestar speaks on behalf of is more or less ok in grammar, whose structure is geared to this phrase:on ones behalf. But, later on, I began to ask myself whether there are similar sentences in

English? How about other expressions with similar meaning? Based on accumulations, Iremembered that should be translated as celebrity( ) and afterconfirmation should be endorsement This time I really tasted that there were two languagesectors in brain, one is pure English sector, and the other one isChineselized English sector,which is actually the Chinese sector, because all the grammar and habitual use like the starspeaks on behalf of is the expression of Chinese language.

2.2.3.2 Cause and counter measure of negative transfer

I always consider the hardest obstacle on the way of English learning is the influence fromour mother tongue--Chinese language. It is not difficult to discover that: 99% of outline for examvocabularies are only marked by Chinese meaning; 99% of English teaching materials(excluding English major materials) are marked only by Chinese meaning; 99% of writingteaching material s are formed by Chinese to English; 99% of guidance materials are explained

by Chinese version for those English articles; and 99% of English grammar are analyzed byChinese items. All that would undoubtedly produce Chinglish. No matter speaking or wri ting,with all Chinese way of thinking, the result of the translated sentences would be more or lessimpacted by Chinese language, thus comes the odd phenomenon that the Chinese people canunderstand but the foreigners not. Some people may say, this kind of phenomenon is unavoidablein English learning, but with unstopping practice and understanding, the negative transfer willcut down, and finally reaches the level of double clear sectors (Chinese language sector andEnglish sector) like some English experts.

How to cast off the interference of Chinese on English? I think at the beginning of learningEnglish, we can start the English sector, use the English thinking, and shake off the interferenceof Chinese. Some learners are used to using e-dictionar y, its quite convenient, but in the longrun, there would appear the set, psychologically speaking. Just imagine, once we see English,we think in a Chinese way, we can never form English first thinking habit, so we should try touse English way of thinking, which can not only weaken the interference of mother tongue, butalso can enlarge the vocabularies.

3. Types of interference of mother tongue in learning English

3.1 dialect interference

Every language and dialect has its own unique pronunciation system. Research from the phoneticians showed that theres no long distance between Chinese dialect pronunciation systemand English, theres no any dialect is close to English pronunciation system. The fact is theshortcomings of English pronunciation vary with different dialect.


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3.1.1 The influence on English vowel from dialect

People in Yangtse River area would pronounce never as lever, while the students inJiangxi province cant distinguish r from l. There are more single vowel in Shanghai andJiangsu area, Shanghai people usually read [mei] as [m?], which is the exact pronunciation

of the word May in American English. In all the dialects, one perhaps cant distinguish a pronunciation, but which can be distinguished in another dialect. For example, in the mandarin,

and and and and are the same pronunciation, however,

it is totally different in Hunan, Guangdong, and Fujian dialect, just like and shouldnt be mingled in the mandarin.

Nearly all the people in northe rn China prefer to read [Ai] (similar to ) instead of the

correct [ai] (similar to ), that is to say, Mike likes bikes(

), they are likely to pronounce them as: , which is in factincorrect, but they are hardly aware of such mistakes. In addition, the north dialect boasts richdouble vowels, such as the word setup, they read it as [seitEp], and [raid] for [red]. And theword talk is in fact a pure single and long vowel, which can be read as [tR:k] or [tB:k] one isBritain English, the other is American English but the students in north China are easily tolengthen the pronunciation somehow like [tBRk] [tRok] or [taok], and there are many other

problem in other aspects.

The Guangdong peoples problem is when they pronounce the words accent success,they usually miss the first consonant, thus, accent sounds like [`AsEnt], another problem is theycant close the mouth and pronounce m in the word name. The majority of Chinese people

cant open the mouth in full w hen read [e] and [z]. but the Chengdu people can precisely pronounce the vowel [e] and [z], because when they say , and are theexact pronunciation, so they take the strong points in these two vowels. Some Beijing people

pronounce zero as [`dziErEu], but Shanghai people can pronounce it correctly, because this pronunciation is exactly the consonant of and in the sentence , sothey also take their advantages.

Generally speaking, the pronunciation problems vary with different dialects in differentareas. If there must be a compare, the phoneticians deem that with the same teaching conditions,the students in Shanghai, Guangdong, and Fujian should have a better English pronunciation.The reason is simple, because the three areas have the largest quantity of phonemes. The total

quantity of phonemes in all the languages, dialects in all the countries in the world sums to abouta bit more than100, and every language and dialect accounts for dozens among the 100 phonemes. For an instance, the British English has 48 phonemes, and the French has 36,Japanese has only 30, and only 24 for Spanish. The Japanese has few phonemes, therefore, theirEnglish pronunciation is not so beautiful, because many different phonemes in English come to

be one phoneme in Japanese. Vice versa, the people who can speak more phonemes have fewer problems as they learn the language with fewer phonemes.


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3.2 Chinglish

In China, the teachers usually greet to students at class: Good morning/afternoon,everyone! And the students response no exception: Good morning/afternoon. Teacher!obviously, such response is the typical Chinglish. In the process of second language

acquisition, the interference of mother tongue, or negative transfer caused a large number ofChinglish.

3.2.1 Definition of Chinglish

The word Chinglish is combined by Chinese and English in clipping way, whichmeans the when Chinese students express ideas in English, due to the influence of mother tonguethinking way and habit, they would subconsciously use non-native or incorrect expression both

orally and in writing. ( : ) Chinglish is not fresh in universitycampus, just take the above instance, the classroom language is the typical Chinglish.

3.2.2 The representing form of Chinglish

Firstly is in oral English. Some students will ask the foreign teachers when participatingEnglish Corner: have you had your breakfast?, where are you going? and so on. Thesecompliments sound commonly used, however, the foreigners have their own way of compliment,so they dont think the above compliment can make sense, even sometimes they will feelembarrassed. Those oral expressions are only personal language habit though, which wont affectthe meaning.

On the other hand, Chinglish i s more embodied in writing expressions. For examples,

1)How much goods do you want to order?( ?)

2)I like this T-shirt, but its price is too expensive.( T ,

)

3)Reading made me learn a lot of new words.( )

Through the above examples, it can be concluded that Chinglish carries obvious differenttrail compared with other types of grammar mistakes.

3.2.3 Cause of Chinglish

First, in terms of linguistics, mother-tongue interference is the most important cause.Foreign language learners are likely to bring their mother tongue into the foreign language study.We who learn foreign languages may all have the same experiences: at the very beginning oftouching English, before we speak English, we usually consciously prepare the ideas in Chineselanguage, then translate these content in English sentence by sentence. Such English is actuallyinterfered by mother tongue in a large degree.


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When making a self- introduction, some students usually say: My English base is very badand writing is always my weakness. I must take a strong measure to raise my English. (

, ) Such kind ofsentence is typical stereotyped Chinese phrases, though there are no obvious grammar mistakes,

but it lacks native taste.

Besides, when learning English, some people completely depend on Chinese explanation.Such as: I have grasped more than 5000 vocabularies. (the author meant to express

5000 ,but the meaning comes to be 5000 ).This is the directtranslation which completely depends on Chinese language and regardless of the true meaning,the structure matching of the words, and therefore caused confuse one thing with another.

3.2.4 How to avoid Chinglish

Clinglish as a language shortcoming, could be regarded as a normal phenomenon in the

process of learning English for Chinese people, so it can be tolerated. The question is we have to be fully aware that Chinglish is a real obstacle in deepening English learning. Without timelyattention and salvation, it would develop in such way and finally is hardly to recover. Thefollowing is the measures to prevent and avoid Chinglish in English teaching.

Firstly, during teaching process the teachers should pay attention to discover such problemand take positive and effective measures to help students conquer the obstacle of mother-tongueinterference. The teachers should try best to create sound English atmosphere, and take Chineselanguage just as a guidance way. When explain with Chinese, they should control the proportion

between Chinese and English. For an instance, when teaching an expression that is far fromChinese or very close to Chinese, the teachers can consciously make a contrast by quoting

Chinese to strengthen the students memory. Meanwhile, the teac hers have to let students knowthat the mother tongue can interfere in English study, but in certain condition it is helpful tostrengthen their comprehension of English. For those habits that some students overly depend onChinese language, we dont have to require them to think in English way. In fact, thinking inEnglish way cant be realized in short term. Under such circumstance, we might as wellintroduce the students some basic translation knowledge, and guide them walking out of the deadend by themselves.

Secondly, in the light of students they have to pay attention to correct the bad habit ofChinese thinking when applying English. During the learning process, they have to try to useEnglish marked dictionary, at least they should use both English and Chinese marked dictionary.

Nowadays, many students tend to use e-dictionary for convenience, which is really a bad habit.There is neither exact meaning of words in e-dictionary nor concrete usage in words, so it is not beneficial to us to deeply understand the meanings and to nurture the sense of language.

Then, the students should swiftly apply and consolidate the mastered language knowledgecontinuously. Some people often complain that they lack vocabularies when write something.Actually, the quantity of vocabularies is compared relatively. Sometimes if we rigidly pursuedifficult and fresh words, we probably would miss the commonly used words or phrases. Take an


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example: The words he said made me feel surprised and, as a result, I asked what his meaning iswhen he said I was . From this sentence we can see that it is long and not smooth. I thinkhis words surprised me, so I asked what he meant by would be much better. Thoughthis student cant say in English because they lack vocabula ries, but the usage ofsurprise and mean are commonly seen in the text books. The key to the problem is their

psychological barrier that they dare not to learn and do beyond Chinese language, which causedthe unsmooth and ambiguous sentences. Consequen tly, stereotype doesnt work in learningEnglish, only to integrate it with Chinese can flexibly make use of the two languages.

Finally, the students should have a right attitude towards the relation between mother-tongue interference and English learning. Mother-tongue interference begins with Englishlearning, so the learners have to eliminate such interference unceasingly. Professor inBeijing Foreign Language Studies University once said sincerely: I always intend to compareEnglish learning to a besieged war. Whats besieged in your mind is the mother tongue, whileEnglish is going to attack the blockhouse. You guide the army to attack the line of defense untilyou win the indomitable blockhouse the mother tongue. As long as we can have a rightcognition towards mother-tongue interference problem, and tentatively accumulate every pointsin learning, we can improve our own English level step by step, gradual master of the languagesense, and finally be familiar with the British and American way of thinking and expressing. Thefollowing exposition is on mother tongue interference problem by foreign scholars, from whichwe can draw some inspiration: The learners first language [L1] is an important determinant ofSLA. It is not the only determinant, however, and may not be the most important. But it istheoretically unsound to attempt a precise specification of its contribution or even to try tocompare its contribution with that of other factors. The L1 is a resource of knowledge whichlearners will use both consciously and subconsciously to help them sift the L2. Precisely whenand how this resource is put to use depends on a whole host of factors (Rod Ellis:Understanding Second Language Acquisition, p. 41)

4. Interference from cultural difference

Culture is the integration of belief, view, customs, behavior and social habit among all themembers in a society, while language is a specific expression way of the ideas. Language andculture cant be separated for they are mutual influenced and depen ded. By learning English wecan know the corresponding social culture, the natural environment, social customs and habits,religion and belief, historical stories, way of thinking in the western society. Though rich theChinese and English languages are, the more broad and profound the eastern and western cultureare, through compare the difference between eastern and western culture, it truly plays animportant role in language learning .

4.1 Natural environment

In the mind of the Chinese people, the summer is usuallyconnected with hot temperature. Nevertheless, there are such poems in Shakespeares sonnet:shall I compare thee to a summers day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate. (

)


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The poet compared lovers t o the summer days, lovely but temperate. summer bringstotally different imagination to Chinese people and British people. The reason is due to thedifference of the geographic location, China lies in Asia continent, has a continental temperaturewith vivid four seasons, and the typical summer has scorching sun and it is too hot to getthrough. On the contrary, the Britain lies in northern temperate zone, which has an oceanic

temperature with bright and comfortable summer. Certainly, there are many other examples inthis aspect, lets say, Eastern wind in Chinese language would make people feel quite warmand temperate, while western wind would bring a chilly feeling, which is completely differentin western countries. The reason is the same as above, for the feeling vary with the differentgeographic locations.

4.2 Production and labor

There are many phrases related to aquatic products and boat or ships in English language,

like fish in the air( ) an odd fish( ), miss the boat( ) and so on, whichare rarely seen in Chinese language. The reason is that Britain is water surrounded, so theindustry of aquatic product and shipping take a key position in its financial construction, so it isnot inexplicable that there are so many above phrases. However, in China, only the people incoastal regions often weave the net and catch the fish, so relatively these phrases are hardly seen.And whats more interesting, the expression of physically carry some things in Chinese

language would have many ways li ke " withspecific match, but in English there is only one expression carry to describe this action. SinceChina has been in an agricultural society for a long time, the physical labor are demanded all thetime, there produced so many verbs.

4.3 Customs and habits

The western people pursue equality, and for a long time they respect the personal values,and they are ready to show themselves and emphasis on foster personal self-confidence. So it isobviously different in responding to ot hers compliment or congratulations between Chinese

people and westerners. Usually Chinese people make some modest remarks to others positiveassessment, but the westerners would say thank you without hesitation. Once I read a jokefrom a newspaper: at a dance party, an American man praise one Chinese lady: you look very

beautiful today( ). And this lady answered modestly: where where. Then the American man felt very strange and he answered unwillingly: Everywhere (

). According to the western habits, when they praise someone, they expect them to saythanks or quick answer to accepting the praise, otherwise they will misunderstand that other

people doubt the judge. Take the title of paper as another example, in China, the title usuallycarries modest meaning apart from expressing the papers content, like:

, but in English articles, the titles are very brief and direct without any modifier , like

Science and Linguistics ( )


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Conclusion: frankly speaking, we can make full use of mother tongue in English learning, but we have to be aware that the mother tongue is just an approach not a purpose, the purposeshould be skillfully master and communicate of the foreign language. So what we have to do inlearning a foreign language is to eliminate the mother-tongue interference, and exert its positiverole to avoid its abused use. As long as we learn English by the above points and methods, and

be more diligent, we can learn English well. But the prerequisite is to have perfect practice,though practice makes perfect, without correct practice, it wont work, so it should be perfect practice makes perfect.

References

1. Atkinson, D. 1987. The Mother Tongue in the Classroom; A Neglected Resource ELTJournal 41/4

2. Krashen, S. 1981. Second Language Acquisition and Second Language Learning.Oxford: Pergamon.

3. , .

4. , .

5. , .

6.Rod Ellis: Understanding Second Language Acquisition

7.


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Mother-Tongue Interference in Spanish- Speaking English Language LearnersInterlanguage

posted Feb 17, 2010 11:51 AM by Qu c-Anh (Ly) V ng [ updated Mar 31, 2010 3:50 PM by Trung-Phap Dam ]

Phap Dam, Ph. D.

Texas Womans University.

Interlanguage, or learner language, is the type of language produced by second-language learnerswho are in the process of learning a language. In this process, learners errors are caused by such

phenomena as borrowing patterns from the mother tongue, extending patterns from the targetlanguage, and expressing meanings using the vocabulary and syntax which are already known(Richards, Platt, & Platt, 1992).

This article is a practical reference guide that explains how Spanish-speaking English languagelearners make errors in their interlanguage by borrowing patterns from their mother tongue, a

process referred to as negative transfer or interference by a number of researchers (James,1980; Nobel, 1982; Swan & Smith, 1987; Brown, 2001; Parker & Riley, 1994; Horwitz, 2008).The author hopes that this guide will help teachers of Spanish-speaking English languagelearners anticipate the characteristic errors potentially made by this particular student populationand understand how these errors arise. This information has practical pedagogical value, aboutwhich Parker and Riley (1994) commented that the influence of L1 on L2 acquisition cannot beignored (p. 225), and Fillmore and Snow (2000) noted that understanding the variety ofstructures that different languages and dialects use to show meaning, including grammaticalmeaning such as plurality or past tense, can help teachers see the errors of their students who arelearning English (p. 16).

Typical interference errors are exemplified and explained in the following areas: (1) articles, (2)gender, (3) number, (4) personal pronouns, (5) relative pronouns, (6) adjectives, (7) prepositions,(8) possessives, (9) question formation, (10) negation, (11) verb tenses, (12) passive voice, (13)word order, and (14) false cognates. The examples illustrating these interference-induced errorsare from the authors own observations as well as those shared by bilingual education teachersenrolled in his graduate-level course in second-language acquisition during the past several yearsat Texas Womans University. Examples containing interference errors are italicized, and belowthem are their correct forms and explanations for the negative transfer, illustrated by a Spanish
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sentence whose structure influences the interlanguage example.

1. Articles I will read my book and the yours also. I will read my book and yours also.

In Spanish the definite article (el, la) is used with possessive pronouns: Voy a leer mi libro y eltuyo tambin.

Our uncle is doctor. Our uncle is a doctor.In Spanish the indefinite article (un, uno, una) is not used before nouns describing profession,occupation or social status: Nuestro to es mdico.

Juan is looking for one house for his parents. Juan is looking for a house for his parents.

No distinction is made between the indefinite article (un, uno, una) and the number one (uno) in

Spanish: Juan est buscando una casa para sus padres.

Can you recommend ones good books? Can you recommend some good books?The plural form (unos, unas) of the Spanish indefinite article (uno, una) means some: Puederecomendar unos buenos libros?

2. Gender What bright moon! Look at her! What bright moon! Look at it!Grammatical gender is assigned to nouns in Spanish, in which the moon (la luna) is

feminine: Qu luna ms brillante! Mrala!

3. Number We love hers news friends. We love her new friends.In Spanish, the plural marker applies not only to nouns, but also to articles, adjectives, and

possessive adjectives: Queremos a sus nuevos amigos.

The other childs got lost. The other children got lost.There exist no irregular plural nouns in Spanish.

Roberto needs a new trouser. Roberto needs a new pair of trousers.English words d escribing such symmetrical things as trousers and pajamas tend to be singularin Spanish: Roberto necesita un nuevo pantaln.

I owe him two hundreds dollars. I owe him two hundred dollars.


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The word for two hundred in Spanish (doscientos) ends with a plural marker: Le debo a ldoscientos dlares.

4. Personal pronouns Alberto is not from Mexico. Is from Cuba.

Alberto is not from Mexico. Hes from Cuba. Subject pronouns are frequently dropped in Spanish, which is a pro -drop language: Alberto noes de Mxico. Es de Cuba.

Are many sick students in class today. There are many sick students in class today.Spanish does not have the equivalent for the English surrogate subject There found inexistential sentences like There is hope and There were many people at the party. Accordingto Butt and Benjamin (2000), In Spanish such sentences usually involve the special verb haber(present indicative hay ), which means there is/are (p. 407): Hay muchos estudiantes enfermosen la clase hoy.

5. Relative pronouns The teacher which spoke Spanish left our school. The teacher who spoke Spanish left our school.The song who was played was romantic. The song which was played was romantic.

No distinction is made between personal and non-personal relative pronouns in Spanish, as Buttand Benjamin (2000) noted, Que is by far the most frequent relative pronoun and may be usedin the majority of cases to translate the English relative pronouns who, whom, which orthat (p. 495).

6. Adjectives He found two shirts of different colors and bought the blue. He found two shirts of different colors and bought the blue one.An adjective in Spanish can act as a noun after the definite article: El encontr dos camisas dediferentes colores y compr la azul.

My father is more rich than my uncle, but my grandfather is the most rich. My father is richer than my uncle, but my grandfather is the richest.Comparative and superlative forms of Spanish adjectives are consistently constructed withms and el ms, which are the equivalents of more and most: Mi padre es ms rico quemi to, pero mi abuelo es el ms rico de todos.

Look at these beautifuls flowers! Look at these beautiful flowers!In Spanish, adjectives agree with nouns that they modify: Mira estas lindas flores!

Everyone was boring with the principals speech. Everyone was bored with the principals sp eech.The Spanish adjective aburrido means both boring and bored: Todos estaban aburridos


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con el discurso del director.

7. Prepositions Who assassinated to Abraham Lincoln? Who assassinated Abraham Lincoln?

In Spanish, the personal preposition a is used after a transitive verb whose direct object ishuman: Quin asesin a Abraham Lincoln?

For what did they come? What did they come for?Prepositions cannot occur at the end of a sentence in Spanish: Para qu vinieron?

After to eat breakfast, we go to school. After eating breakfast, we go to school.An infinitive verb can follow a preposition in Spanish: Despus de comer el desayuno, vamos ala escuela.

My friend and I talk by the phone all the time. My friend and I talk on the phone all the time.By the phone is the English rendition of por telfono: Mi amigo y yo hablamos por telfonotodo el tiempo.

The tourists finally arrived to Madrid. The tourists finally arrived Madrid.To Madrid is the English rendition of a Madrid: Los turistas finalmente llegaron a Madrid.

8. Possessives

Lisa washes the hair twice a week. Lisa washes her hair twice a week.In Spanish, the definite article el --not the possessive adjective su -- is used in this context:Lisa se lava el pelo dos veces por semana.

Please show us the house of Mary. Please show us Marys house. The Spanish of - phrase is used instead of the English possessive case: Mustrenos la casade Mary, por favor!

9. Question formation

Has seen Mary the movie? Has Mary seen the movie?Spanish word order is used: Ha visto Mary la pelcula?

When John left? John left when? John, when left? When did John leave?


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In Spanish, word order is not fixed for questions, and there are no counterparts for the questionwords do, does, and did.

10. Negation Roberto not found his book.

Roberto did not find his book.There are no Spanish equivalents for do not, does not, and did not which express a verb inthe negative. In Spanish, the negative particle no is put in front of the verb phrase, regardlessof tenses or persons: Roberto no encontr su libro.

He said he did not see nobody. He said he did not see anybody.Double negation is standard in Spanish: Dijo que no vio a nadie. This syntactical feature makesit difficult for Spanish speakers to differentiate the three English categories of assertive formssuch as some and somebody, non -assertive forms such asany and anybody, and negative forms such as no and none (Coe, 1987).

11. Verb tenses Look, it snows! Look, its snowing! In Spanish, the simple present tense is frequently used to express an action that is taking place atthe moment of speaking. Thus, Nieva means both It snows and It is snowing.

We see each other tomorrow. We will see each other tomorrow.In Spanish, the simple present tense is often used for a future action: Nos vemos maana.

I live here since 1995. I have lived here since 1995.In Spanish, the simple present tense can express an action that began in the past but continues tothe moment of speaking: Vivo aqu desde 1995.

Come you this evening to eat with us! Come this evening to eat with us!In Spanish, a sentence in the imperative mood can have an expressed subject: Venga usted estanoche a cenar con nosotros!

12. Passive voice

Spanish speaks itself here. Spanish is spoken here.Spanish speaks itself here is the English rendition of Se habla espaol aqu, a syntacticalconstruction used in preference to a passive sentence without the agent phrase. An agent phraseis a prepositional phrase beginning with by in English and por in Spanish, as in Spanish isspoken here by the people and Espaol es hablado aqu por la gente. According to Nobel(1982), passive sentences which lack the agent are not used often in Spanish (p. 233). Nobelalso noted that a special construction called the se - passive is used instead, and that this


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construction has no counterpart in English.

13. Word order Arrived very late the teacher this morning. This morning arrived very late the teacher.

The teacher arrived this morning very late. The teacher arrived very late this morning.Word order is much freer in Spanish than it is in Engli sh. According to Coe (1987), The freerword order allows words that are emphasized to be placed last (p.79). The three interlanguagesentences listed above reflect this particular feature of Spanish, causing errors in English.

Often they have given to the church. They often have given to the church. They have often given to the church.In Spanish, adverbs of frequency have several possible positions in the sentence, but not thetypical central position as in English.

Juan belongs to the Club of Soccer of Dallas. Juan belongs to the Dallas Soccer Club.In Spanish, head nouns are typically post -modified, in opposition to English: Juan pertenece alClub de Soccer de Dallas.

John sent to Roberto a gift. John sent a gift to Roberto.John sent Roberto a gift.In Spanish, an indirect object must have a preposition such as a, and the direct object andindirect object can go in either order. The English two-object structure without a preposition

(John sent Roberto a gift) is unfamiliar to Spanish speakers and they may avoid it (Coe, 1987).

Felipe took to school his favorite books. John took his favorite books to school.In Spanish, a preposition phrase is regularly put in front of a direct object: Felipe llev a laescuela sus libros favoritos.

Our teacher speaks very well English and Spanish. Our teacher speaks English and Spanish very well.In Spanish, an adverbial phrase is regularly put in front of a direct object: Nuestra maestra hablamuy bien ingls y espaol.

14. False cognates Spanish originates from Latin; therefore, its vocabularies correspond with the Latin-derived sideof the English language (Coe, 1987). These corresponding vocabularies are known as cognates.As Crandall, Dias, Gingras, and Harris (1981) warned, Cognates can be both a blessing and acurse for the teachers and learners of a second language (p. 49). Indeed, while these thousandsof cognates can help Spanish-speaking English language learners accelerate their acquisition ofEnglish vocabulary, some of them are false friends and deserve to be pointed out for the


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benefit of the learners. Examples of interference errors due to false cognates are given below.

Every child should assist to school. Every child should attend school.In Spanish, asistir a la escuela means to attend school.

Take me to a library. I need to buy some books there. Take me to a bookstore. I need to buy some books there.In Spanish, librera means bookstore.

Mrs. Gonzalez was a professor in a high school in South America. Mrs. Gonzalez was a high-school teacher in South America.In many Spanish- speaking countries, profesor means teacher of any school, from elementaryschool to university.

My friend was constipated. He took a Comtrex tablet and felt better.

My friend had a head cold. He took a Comtrex tablet and felt better.The Spanish adjective constipado means suffering from a cold and has nothing to do withdifficult evacuation of the bowels.

Our instructor can speak several idioms. Our instructor can speak several languages.The Spanish noun idioma means language.

After a long vacation, its hard to regress to school. After a long vacation, its hard to return to school. The Spanish verb regresar means return.

In addition to the previously-mentioned supporting comments by Parker and Riley (1994) andFillmore and Snow (2000) on the benefits of teachers ability to anticipate the characteristicinterference-induced errors made by English language learners, the author believes that knowingthe reasoning behind certa in errors should be part of the teachers role as monitor and assessor ofthe learners output. As James (1980) eloquently put it, It is on the basis of such diagnosticknowledge that the teacher organizes feedback to the learner and remedial work. Even thelearner should know why he has committed errors if he is to self-monitor and avoid these sameerrors in the future (p. 148).

References

Brown, H.D. (2001). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language Pedagogy. White Plains, NY: Longman.Butt, J., & Benjamin, C. (2000). A new reference grammar of modern Spanish.

Lincolnwood, IL: NTC Publishing Group.Coe, N. (1987). Speakers of Spanish and Catalan. In M. Swan & B. Smith (Eds.),

Learner English (pp. 72-89). Cambridge, England: Cambridge UniversityPress.

Crandall, J.A., Dias, J., Gingras, R.C., & Harris, T.K. (1981). Teaching the


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Spanish-speaking child. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall Regents.Dam, P., De la Ossa, E., Garcia, A.C, Graham, N., Hong-Fincher, B., Kim, S.,

et al. (2004). Teachers resource guide of language transfer issues for English language learners. Barrington, IL: Rigby.

Fillmore, L.W., & Snow, C.E. (2000). What teachers need to know about language.

Washington, DC: US Department of Education.Horwitz, E.K. (2008). Becoming a language teacher.Boston: Pearson.

James, C. (1980). Contrastive analysis. Essex, England: Longman Group UK Limited.

Nobel, B.L. (1982). Linguistics for bilinguals. Rowley, MA: Newbury House Publishers.

Parker, F., & Riley, K. (1994). Linguistics for non-linguists. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon.

Richards, J.C., Platt, J., & Platt, H. (Eds.). (1992). Longman dictionary of language Teaching & applied linguistics. Essex, England: Longman Group UK Limited.

Selinker, L. (1992). Rediscovering interlanguage. New York: Longman, Inc.Swan, M., & Smith, B. (1987). Learner English. Cambridge, England:

Cambridge University Press.

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the influence of the mother tongue on second language vocabularyacquisition and use

(In Vocabulary: Description, Acquisition and Pedagogy, ed. Schmitt and McCarthy, CUP 1997, pp. 156 180)

1 introduction

" contrastive analysis, error analysis, etc., are not simply unrelated to linguistic theory in particular, they are dead meat in general." (Gregg 1995: 90, reviewing Cook 1993)

Oh, well

In this paper I shall consider the ways in which the mother tongue can support, fail to support or

actively hinder someone who is learning or using the vocabulary of a second language. Thismay happen: 1) when a learner acquires new vocabulary, 2) when he or she tries to recall and use

previously-learnt vocabulary, and 3) when he or she tries to construct a complex word orexpression that has not already been learnt as a unit.

"As a learning process , transfer supports the learner's selection and remodelling of inputstructures as he progresses in the development of his interlanguage knowledge. As a productionprocess , transfer is involved in the learner's retrieval of this knowledge and in his efforts to

bridge linguistically those gaps in his knowledge which cannot be side-stepped byavoidance." (Kohn 1986: 22)

Before looking at these three areas, it will be useful to consider briefly how languages differ inthe ways they encode the world through lexis, and to settle on a definition of crosslinguisticinfluence.

2 how languages differ

"It is quite an illusion to think, as even literate people sometimes do, that meanings are the samein all languages, that languages differ only in the forms used for those meanings." (Lado 1957:77)

"The vodka is all right, but the meat is bad." (Alleged computer translation, into Russian and

back, of "the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak".)

The world contains too many things for us to have one word for each; we economise by usingwords in more than one sense, leaving context to disambiguate. Unfortunately, differentlanguages parcel up meanings into words in different ways; and so a word in language A mayhave various equivalents in language B, depending on exactly what is meant. There are severaldifferent typical patterns of relationship between words in different languages:


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1 We may find a relatively exact fit: Swedish vxellda = English gearbox ; French chamois =Italian camoscio ; English re-proof = French rimpermabiliser . This happens most often wherewords relate to concepts that are firmly grounded in physical reality. Even here, though, theremay be differences of use ( scarpe di camoscio are chaussures en daim or suede shoes , notchaussures en chamois or chamois shoes .)

2 Sometimes, although speakers of two languages seem to divide the world up conceptually inthe same way, they stick the linguistic labels on in different places.

"Conceptual organization and its component concepts are not the same as the meanings for thelexical items of a language. For example, English speakers typically make do with just one verbin talking about dressing, namely put on . This verb serves for all clothing, headgear, socks andshoes, jewelry, glasses, everything. Yet ask a group of English speakers to demonstrate, withgestures, how to put on a shoe, a glove or a sweater, and they will offer clear and consistentactions based on their conceptual knowledge. They know more about dressing, in other words,than the one lexical item put on would suggest. And speakers of other languages in fact use a

much more elaborate lexicon for talking about dressing. Japanese speakers use one verb forgarments on the upper body, another for those on the lower body, yet another for garments onextremities like feet and hands, another for articles that go on the head, and another still for

jewelry like earrings or a watch At the conceptual level, though, these speakers will representthe same actions as speakers of English. Conceptual knowledge, in other words, is not identicalto our knowledge about word meanings." (Clark 1993: 10)

3 Unlike gearboxes, chamois and dressing, many aspects of the world have unclear boundaries,and categorisation is more subjective. In such cases, both lexical and conceptual organisationmay vary from one language to another. Different languages notoriously divide up the colourspectrum in quite different ways (see for example Taylor 1989: 1 20). English distinguishes

streams from rivers, rather unclearly, on the basis of size; French, unlike English or Italian,distinguishes rivers which run into the sea ( fleuves ) from rivers which are tributaries of others(rivires ). The following diagram (after Arcaini 1968) shows how French, Danish and Swedishrefer to what English calls a tree , the material wood , a wood (collection of trees) and a forest .

English

French

Danish

Swedish

tree

______________

wood (material)


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wood (small forest)

_______________

forest

arbre

_____________

bois

bois

_____________

fort

tr

_____________

skov

trd

_____________

tr

_____________

skog

Extreme cases of such semantic relativism are sometimes reported; for instance, one often readsthat Eskimos have a vast number of words for different sorts of snow. These claims need to betreated with caution, however see Pullum's entertaining paper The Great Eskimo Vocabulary

Hoax (Pullum 1991: 159 171).

Very often this pattern involves prototypicality: languages may have exact translationequivalents for words when these are used in their central senses, but not when they are used inmore marginal or metaphorical ways. English bite and French mordre correspond closely whenthey refer to cutting with teeth, but outside this use they go their separate ways: one is piqu , notmordu , by a mosquito, while la balle a mordu la ligne means the ball just touched the line . Nodoubt most languages have a word which corresponds to read ; but how many of theseequivalents can be used not only transitively and intransitively, and to refer to reading aloud as


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well as silent reading, but also to talk about a machine reading a credit card, or about a personreading a balance sheet, a meter, music, a map, somebody's lips, people's minds or between thelines?

4 More problematically, people with dissimilar cultures may classify things (especially abstract

concepts) so differently that it becomes very difficult to establish crosslinguistic equivalences atall. Words like guilt , shame , remorse , apology , repentance , penance , for instance, reflectconcepts that may not be in anything like a one-to-one correspondence with the ways in whichanother culture analyses notions of blame and guilt. Here it is not just a matter, so to speak, of

putting the labels in different places on the same picture; the picture itself may be so differentthat it is hard to relate the labels to each other in any meaningful way.

5 Differences of conceptual organisation may be reflected in differences in the very way wordsare assigned to part-of-speech categories. The Japanese equivalents of many English adjectivesare effectively nouns or verbs.

6 Related languages abound in cognates e.g. German Buch , Danish bog and English book , orGreek duo , Portuguese dois and English two. Where the meanings have diverged, as is often thecase, the formal similarity can be very misleading: French agenda , Italian morbido and Spanishembarazada mean respectively diary , soft and pregnant .

7 Even where words in related languages 'mean the same', they may be false friends from the point of view of permissible grammatical context or collocation. French expliquer , unlikeEnglish explain , can be followed by an indirect object without a preposition ( expliquez- moi ).English want can be followed by an 'object + infinitive' construction, as in I want her to starttomorrow ; corresponding verbs in most other European languages cannot be used in this way.

8 Questions of formality and style are also relevant. English get (before a direct object)corresponds quite well to German kriegen , which is also casual in tone, but less well to theclosest French equivalents ( prendre, obtenir ), neither of which is marked as informal. French hasa slang word for shoes (godasses) , for which there is no stylistically congruent counterpart inEnglish. Some non-European languages differ radically from English in their ways of expressingformality through the lexicon, to the extent of virtually having separate word-lists in their 'high'and 'low', or 'respectful' and 'intimate' styles.

9 The way vocabulary is organised in discourse may differ from one culture and its language toanother. According to Bartelt (1992: 103), for instance, Navajo uses types of repetition foremphasis which would be regarded as inelegant and redundant in English.

10 Finally, the very notion of a 'word' is far from constant across languages. The French for gearbox is not a single noun, but a three-word phrase; the German word Erzeugerabfllung ,common on wine labels, has to be rendered into English as chateau bottled , while its Spanishequivalent has four words and its French counterpart six. Comparisons between less closelyrelated languages are even more striking. As Ringbom points out,


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" the word has a different status as a linguistic unit in synthetic and analytic languages average Finnish words contain more semantic information than English or Swedish words". Sofor instance the single Finnish word autostammekin corresponds to the English phrase from ourcar, too . (Ringbom 1986: 155, 1987: 20)

3 crosslinguistic influence and ease or difficulty of learning

interlingual or intralingual?

Recent research has confirmed more and morer strongly what language teachers have alwaysknown: that the mother tongue has a strong influence on the way a second language is learnt andused. (e.g. Kellerman 1984, Kellerman and Sharwood Smith 1986, Ringbom 1987, Odlin 1989,Perdue 1993)

"There is obviously one critical way in which L2 acquisition cannot be compared with L1:children can experience no 'transfer' or 'interference' from a previously acquired language. All of

the reports of the ESF [European Science Foundation] project are rich with documentation of SL[source language] influence I have claimed that each native language has trained its speakersto pay different kinds of attention to events and experiences when talking about them. This kindof training is carried out in childhood and is exceptionally resistant to restructuring in ALA[adult language acquisition]." (Perdue 1993: II 245

The pioneers of contrastive analysis believed that by making crosslinguistic comparisons onecould predict learning difficulty.

"We assume that the student who comes in contact with a foreign language will find somefeatures of it quite easy and others extremely difficult. Those elements that are similar to his

native language will be simple for him, and those elements that are different will bedifficult." (Lado 1957: 2)

As Lado himself recognised, however, things were not quite so simple: not all crosslinguisticdifferences cause learning problems, and some things turn out to be more difficult than predicted

by contrastive analysis. The notions of crosslinguistic influence and learning difficulty latercame to be more clearly distinguished, and learners' errors were seen as falling into two possiblecategories: 'interlingual' confusions, caused by interference or transfer from the mother tongue,and 'intralingual' confusions, caused by complexities in the second language itself.

A notorious problem with this model, which is still current, is that it is difficult to classify certain

kinds of error. If an English-speaking learner of French confuses fentre , vitre , vitrine and vitrail(words for different types of window), is this an interlingual error (because the learner is misled by the simpler English system for referring to windows), or does it make more sense to call it anintralingual error (because the French lexical system is complicated in this area and English

provides nothing useful to transfer)? The same question arises in relation to the omission ofEnglish articles if a learner's mother tongue has no article system, is it realistic to consider hisor her failure to use articles in English as an instance of transfer?


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There are perhaps two reasons for the confusion. First of all, there is the mistaken view thaterrors have to be analysed in either-or terms: they must either be attributable to the mothertongue, or to features of the second language. And secondly, there is a common tendency to seemother-tongue effects, too narrowly, in terms of the 'transfer' of a detectable feature of themother tongue into the second language.

"As Kellerman (1987) has pointed out, researchers tend to reflect their theoretical biases in whatthey interpret as transfer effects. He notes that Arabski (1979) made the somewhat surprisingassertion that the 974 article errors in his Polish-English corpus were not transfer errors on thegrounds that, because Polish does not have articles, there is nothing to transfer. Clearly, though,the absence of a structural feature in the L1 may have as much impact on the L2 as the presenceof a different feature."

(Ellis 1994: 311 312)

relating intrinsic difficulty and crosslinguistic influence

Intrinsic difficulty and crosslinguistic influence are not alternative sources of error. For all theelements of a second language, we clearly need to consider:

1) how difficult they are in themselves (in terms of factors like transparency, complexity and processing load)

2) what sort of position the mother tongue puts a learner in when he or she approaches them:does it help, hinder, or simply stand aside?

The notion of difficulty in language is elusive. None the less, one can readily think of lexical

features that seem intuitively to be intrinsically easy or hard. English and German words fornumbers are quite straightforward; French number-words between 70 and 99 are slightly morecomplicated; one of the Japanese systems of number-words is extremely elaborate. Vietnamesehas a very complex system of personal pronouns. English has a daunting array of verbs in thearea of shine, gleam, sparkle, glitter etc, but not many different words for tastes. Of the twoCzech words srdce and mi, the first is clearly more difficult to say than the second. An Englishchild will learn to use the words postman , fat and run earlier and more easily than collateral ,metaphysical or denigrate .

Independently of the intrinsic ease or difficulty of items, however, a learner's mother tongue cangreatly affect the way he or she is able to approach them. For instance:

The Italian word attuale ( = current, topical ) is reasonably easy for most learners to grasp;especially easy for speakers of several European languages ( aktual , actuel , aktuel etc mean thesame); but a confusing false cognate for an English-speaker.

German numbers, though intrinsically unproblematic, are 'the wrong way round' from anEnglish point of view: English-speaking learners typically mix up pairs like fnfunddreissig (35

literally 'five and thirty') and dreiundfnfzig (53 literally 'three and fifty').


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The English structure I like X is structurally and semantically straightforward, but problematic if one is coming at it from Spanish or Italian: me gusta X and mi piace X have amisleadingly similar word order to the English structure, but require the liked thing rather thanthe 'liker' as subject.

Different learners approach the difficult French gender system from different starting points.Italians get enormous help from a mother tongue which assigns gender to nouns much as Frenchdoes, though there are of course problems with particular words. German has three genders asagainst the French two, and knowledge of German is of little help in predicting the gender of aFrench noun; on the other hand, German-speakers are at least psychologically prepared fornouns to have genders, and this may well help them to notice and store the genders of Frenchnouns as they learn them. English- or Turkish-speaking learners of French do not even have thisadvantage, and find French genders very difficult.

Serious problems arise where the second language contains whole classes of word which arenot shared by the mother tongue. Finnish uses case-endings to express the meanings which are

communicated by prepositions in most European languages. Consequently Finnish learners ofEnglish have substantial trouble with prepositions as a class: they find them not only difficult tolearn, but difficult to notice.

"It may be assumed that a Swedish learner does not perceive the category of English prepositionsas either particularly salient or non-salient: he simply recognizes them as prepositions and soonknows roughly how they function a Finnish learner, on the other hand, perceives the categoryof prepositions to be clearly non-salient, since they are redundant according to his L1 code. This

perception often makes him omit them in production to a surprising extent even after many yearsof English." (Ringbom 1986)

The article systems of western European languages are similarly non-salient for speakers oflanguages which do not have articles: it is not unusual, for instance, to encounter Russians whohave a relatively good command of English, but who use articles rarely or not at all.

language distance, transfer and learning

Language distance clearly has some effect on the amount of transfer that can take place betweenlanguages, and therefore on the extent to which transfer can support or hinder learning. Relatedlanguages often share a great deal of cognate vocabulary, and even where vocabulary is notcognate, there tend to be close translation equivalents: this can give learners an enormousadvantage. Where languages have less common ground, word forms will generally be quitedifferent; more information about word meaning and use also has to be acquired from scratch.Studies have demonstrated, for instance, that Swedish- and Spanish-speaking learners of Englishacquire vocabulary faster and more successfully than Finnish- and Arabic-speakers (see Odlin1989: 77 80 for details and discussion). Transfer from third languages seems to depend verymuch on relative language distance (Ringbom 1987: 113 14, 119). Difference of phonologicalstructure also has an effect on vocabulary learning. It has been shown that, as one might expect,those foreign words which conform more or less to the phonetic and orthographic patterns of themother tongue are the easiest to assimilate (Laufer 1990, Ellis and Beaton 1993). English has a


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large inventory of phonemes, permits quite elaborate consonant clusters, and reduces unstressedvowels. These features make many English words hard to handle for speakers of languages, likeSpanish or Japanese, which have a different type of phonology.

Cultural distance, as well as language distance, can greatly affect ease or difficulty of learning. A

Hungarian learner of Spanish, for example, will find that, though there are virtually no cognates(Spanish and Hungarian are unrelated), the new words in general express familiar concepts andare often semantically congruent with mother-tongue roots; so that a good deal of semantictransfer is possible. This will be far less the case for a Hungarian learning Chinese: not only arethe words quite different in the two languages, but there is also far less overlap between theconcepts that they express.

Types of error are therefore likely to vary somewhat with language distance. Where the first andsecond language are closely related, there may be fewer errors resulting from the intrinsicdifficulty of what has to be learnt, since the mother tongue will provide support in more areas. Atthe same time, since more can be transferred, there is more scope for the type of interference

errors which arise when items in two languages are similar but not identical in form or use.Conversely, where languages are unrelated, more errors are likely to result from the intrinsicdifficulty of second-language items, whereas the role of interference will be somewhatreduced.

4 learning vocabulary

"I shall always regret your lessons." (C. Ducarme, personal communication)

generalisation

Words (other than proper names) mostly refer to classes of things, events, properties etc, not toindividuals. When a baby learns a word, a major part of its task is to find out where the

boundaries of the relevant class lie: does cat refer to all four-legged creatures, all domesticanimals, all felines, all furry things or just the family pet? As small children learn vocabulary, infact, they are simultaneously learning the world, as it is categorised and described by the cultureinto which they have been born. To some extent, children seem to have built-in strategies forfitting categorie

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