Purposes of CA Contrastive Analysis
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“The learner transfers the sound system of his native language and uses it instead of that of the foreign language without fully realizing it. This transfer occurs even
when the learner consciously attempts to avoid it. Force of habit influences his hearing as well as his speaking. He does not hear through the sound system of the
target language but filters what reaches his ears through his own sound system.”
Language Teaching, 1965: 72. Present-day language scholars also see clear signs of the first language
interference in learning the phonology of a second language. M.F Baradja, a staunch advocate of CA, argues that “unless the learner is very young, nobody can deny that
there is interference of the mother tongue in the acquisition of the phonology of a foreign language. The fact that an Indian speaks English with an Indian accent, a
Japanese speaks English with a Japanese accent, etc., is a definite proof of the existence of the native language interference” 1971: 4. Jack Richards 2002
agrees when he asserts “that very few learners are able to speak a second language without showing evidence of the transfer of
pronunciation features of their native tongue”. In fact, even those scholars who are critical of CA generally agree that there is
interference from the mother tongue L1. What they refuse is the claim that L1 is the primary source of interference. W. R. Lee states… “but it is not only the
learner’s native language which exercises the influence. There is interference both from L1 and at every stage from what has already been taught and
absorbed.” Alatis, 1970: 186 In response to the opposing view, strong proponents of CA such as Baradja have
to admit that it is difficult to prove whether or not the major cause of difficulty is interference from the mother tongue of the learner. However, they maintain, it is also
hard to prove that the major cause of errors come from the target language. Only one PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
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thing is certain, they have finally admitted, that both L1 and L2 are important potential sources of difficulty 1971: 5.
Now comes the issue of prediction. Proponents of CA generally complain that critics of CA misunderstand the meaning of ‘ to predict’ in contrastive analysis.
Therefore, staunch advocates of CA such as Baradja consider it necessary to explain that ‘to predict’ means no more than ‘to show with some explanation what, where,
and why certain areas in the target language are likely to be potential trouble spots for a learner. To predict, Baradja ascertains, is not intended to mean ‘to show with
certainty’. Thus, in making a prediction, it is always possible that an analyst can anytime make a mistake. Fortunately, the Indonesian linguist and English teacher
adds, a linguistic science has made so much progress that it can nowadays help a contrastive analyst to attend to the phonological problems more effectively.
The brief discussion above may have made it clear that CA is still useful and relevant in a foreign language teaching. This is precisely the reason why the present
writer insists on conducting a CA of English and Nataia phonology in spite of the controversy.