readers. As the ELESP graduates, they are assumed to have good proficiency of English. It means that they are considered to be good role models for the readers of
their writings. Therefore, if the readers are lower level English users, they might imitate the same errors as what the writer does in producing their own writings.
Nevertheless, for the advanced English readers, the errors would disturb and confuse them. As a result, they would doubt the proficiency of the writers. Second, for
English teacher candidates, the result of this research would bring awareness of prepositional verb errors in teaching their students so that they could guide their
students to produce accurate language. In addition, they could apply recommended solutions presented in this research to the problem of prepositional verb errors that
they find in their teaching. Third, the readers of this thesis in general are expected to be more aware of the significance of prepositional verbs in English language.
F. Definition of Terms
There are some terms in this research that need to be defined. The terms which are frequently used in this research are as follows.
1. Errors
Based on Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English Quirk, 2001: 462, errors mean “mistakes that cause serious problems.” According to Ellis and
Barkhuizen 2001: 17, “errors are deviations in usage which results from gaps in learners’ knowledge of the target language.” Then, Gass and Selinker 2001: 453
stated that error is the incorrect form of target language produced by learners. Harmer 2007: 96 added that errors are mistakes which students could not correct themselves
because they have not mastered the new information that they need deeper explanation. Errors in this research mean the incorrect usage of English prepositional
verbs produced by the fifth semester students of ELESP taking Academic Essay class in their writing assignments. The errors appear because of lack of knowledge of
prepositional verbs.
2. Prepositional Verbs
According to Swan 1982: 492, a prepositional verb is a verb that has two parts: a ‘base’ verb and a preposition.
According to Downing and Locke 2002: 334, “prepositional verbs are combinations of a lexical verb and a preposition which is
semantically associated.” It is usually a monotransitive complement verb, in which
the component which follows it has a function as a direct object Aarts and Aarts, 1982: 42. Thus, the noun phrase which follows the preposition is called prepositional
object Oprep. There are two types of prepositional verbs. They are type I and type II
prepositional verbs. Type I includes V + prep + Oprep. Examples of type I prepositional verbs are: insist on, care for, agree with, arrive at, ask for, believe in,
belong to, deal with, depend on, hope for, insist on, laugh at, listen to, look after, look for, pay for, send for, talk about
. Type II includes V + NNP + prep + Oprep. Examples of type II prepositional verbs are: remind someone of, provide
something with, thank someone for, protect someonesomething from, confine something under, ply someone with, deprive someone of
. Therefore, it is obvious that a prepositional verb is a transitive verb plus a
preposition which are semantically associated. This research is intended to find out the prepositional verb errors in Academic Essay students’ assignments.
3. Academic Essay Writing
According to Oshima and Hogue 1991: 2, academic writing is a type of writing which college or university students are required to compose. Then, an essay,
according to Muhyidin 1988: 153-154, is a formal composition which consists of introductory, body, and concluding paragraphs which develop one central idea.
Additionally, Heaton 1979: 127 stated that an essay includes not only the production of grammatically correct sentences within paragraphs, but also originality
and creativity of the writer to inform and entertain the readers. In this research, based on Academic Essay Writing Syllabus Aji, 2009,
Academic Essay Writing is one of the writing classes of ELESP Sanata Dharma
University which aims at introducing the students the underlying principles of academic writing. Then, through this class, the students are expected to be able to
analyze the characteristics of academic essays and to write good academic essays. The students’ academic essays in Academic Essay Writing class are
implemented in the form of writing assignments. Based on Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
Quirk, 2001: 66, the word assignment n means “a piece of
work that is given to someone as part of their job, or that a student is asked to do.” In this research, writing assignments are the writing compositions written by students
taking the Academic Essay Writing class, the topic of which are comparison and contrast, cause and effect, argumentation, and book or article review, which are
conducted during the semester in order to fulfill the requirements of the Academic Essay Writing class. In this research, the students’ writing assignments are used as
data, in which prepositional verb errors are found.
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CHAPTER II REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
