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“...it seems to me that in relation to L2 teaching, the most important role of contrastive analysis - or rather, of the data obtained by contrastive
analysis - is explanatory rather than predictive p. 159.
Catford is certainly pleased to see CA practitioners design a lot of theories on language teaching and learning. However, he deems it more important
for them to go into the field and collect data about students’ mistakes and arrange them into types, exactly like what practitioners of Error Analysis EA do. By
combining CA and EA, he argues, a language analyst can explain more clearly why certain students make certain mistakes.
2.1.8.4 In Defence of Contrastive Analysis
The controversy above indicates that contrastive analysts and their critics differ mostly about two basic claims of Contrastive Analysis CA. The first is the
claim of CA that the native language interference is the major cause of difficulty in a second language learning. The second is that CA can predict difficulties in the
learning of a second language. In an effort to tackle the first issue, it is well to consider what CA was really
like in the early stage of its development in the 1950-s. Back then, Fries and Lado, the two founders of CA, directed their searching light mostly to the phonological
errors of their students. They turned out to be fairly successful and quickly made a name for themselves. However, problems appeared as soon as their ambitious
followers began to include syntactic and semantic errors in their analysis. In other words, every language scholar seemed to agree in the early days of CA that the
native language interference in learning the phonology also popularly known as pronunciation of a foreign language was undeniable. Regarding the first language
interference in phonology, Lado comments: PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
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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
