VULNERABILITY OF INTERLANGUAGE SYSTEM: A CASE STUDY OF STUDENTS LEARNING ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE IN Vulnerability Of Interlanguage System: A Case Study Of Students Learning English As A Foreign Language In SMP Muhammadiyah 1 Surakarta.

VULNERABILITY OF INTERLANGUAGE SYSTEM: A CASE STUDY
OF STUDENTS LEARNING ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE IN
SMP MUHAMMADIYAH 1 SURAKARTA

RESEARCH PAPER

Submitted as Partial Fulfillment of Requirements
for Getting the Bachelor Degree of Education
in English Department

By
SHELFI APRI WIJAYANTI
A 320 080 227

SCHOOL OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION
MUHAMMADIYAH UNIVERSITY OF SURAKARTA
2013

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VULNERABILITY OF INTERLANGUAGE SYSTEM: A CASE STUDY

OF STUDENTS LEARNING ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE IN
SMP MUHAMMADIYAH 1 SURAKARTA

RESEARCH PAPER

Submitted as Partial Fulfillment of Requirements
for Getting the Bachelor Degree of Education
in English Department

By
SHELFI APRI WIJAYANTI
A 320 080 227

SCHOOL OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION
MUHAMMADIYAH UNIVERSITY OF SURAKARTA
2013

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MOTTO

“If you do things WELL, do them
BETTER.
Be DARING, be FIRST, be DIFFERENT,
be JUST.”

-Anita Roddick-

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DEDICATED TO

My wonderful parents
SRI WIDODO

& AGOES EFENDI

whose love has always been a source of hope and guidance in my life

My awesome brother
HIDAYATULLAH SUCAHYO
who lived through the highs and lows of this project with me
.

All Splendid Readers
who appreciate this piece of work

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ACKNOWLDGEMENT

Assalamu’alaikum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh
First of all, the writer wants to express gratitude and presents a big thanks
to her grateful and her merciful Allah SWT for guiding and helping her to finish

her research paper. The writer realizes that the research paper would never be
possible without other people’s help, therefore the writer would like to thank to
people who have supported her personally and professionally over the years and
during the arrangement of this research paper, they are:
1. Dra. N. Setyaningsih, M. Si., the Dean of School of Teacher Training and
Education of Muhammadiyah University of Surakarta,
2. Titis Setyabudi, S. S., M. Hum., the Head of English Department,
3. Prof. Dr. Endang Fauziati, M. Hum., the first consultant, thank you for always
guiding and giving her advice at the whole of her research paper arrangement,
4. Dra. Dwi Haryanti, M. Hum., the second consultant, thank you for suggesting
and correcting her research during the arrangement of her research paper,
5. Drs. Maryadi, M. A., the examiner of her research paper, thank you for giving
her a lot of brilliant thoughts,
6. All lecturers of English department who share their knowledge to the writer,

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7. Koesoemo Ratih, S. Pd. and Rini Fatmawati, Dra., M.Pd., the academic
consultant,
8. Her beloved parents, Sri Widodo and Agoes Efendi, whose contributions to

my education and my life empowered me to contemplate doing this study,
9. Her beloved brother Hidayatullah Sucahyo, whose love empowers me to
complete the study,
10. Her cousin, Danang Warsito, big thank for the tasty and healthy moment,
11. Her aunts, Sujiyati and Suparti, thank you for many inspiring stories they
shared,
12. Her big families in Bali and Boyolali,
13. Her dearest friends and consultants, Fani, Retno, Kelik, and Ika, thank you for
the laugh, advice and encouragement,
14. Her dearest friends, Azizah, Yuni , Attin, Rini, Handa, Rossy, Rutha, Sharas,
Vika, Hepy, Andam, Yani, Citra, Dina, Rani, Arqi, Adin, Anjar, Amin, Andi,
Valdi, Lilik, Badrun, Hari, and all the F.comm peers, thank you for the laugh
and the splendid moments. Your love cannot be precious more,
15. Her dearest friends in English department ’08,
16. Her helper, Bang Mail, big thank for every single helps,
17. Her dearest friends in Bali, Novi, Iis, Marlia, Rina, Ervin, and all Snacollar
peers. You are totally epic, and
18. All people who can be mentioned one by one, thank you for the help although
it just a single help.

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Finally, the writer realizes that the research is far from perfect. Therefore,
the writer invites comments and suggestion from the readers for the betterment of
the research paper. Hopefully, this research paper will be useful for those who are
interested in investigating the other element of speaking skill.
Wassalamu’alaikum Wr. Wb

Surakarta,

May 2013

The Writer,

Shelfi Apri Wijayanti

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ABSTRACT

SHELFI APRI WIJAYANTI. A320080227. VULNERABILITY OF
INTERLANGUAGE SYSTEM: A CASE STUDY OF STUDENTS
LEARNING ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE IN SMP
MUHAMMADIYAH
1
SURAKARTA.
RESEARCH
PAPER.
MUHAMMADIYAH UNIVERSITY OF SURAKARTA. 2013.
The current research deals with the vulnerability of interlanguage (IL)
system of SMP Muhammadiyah 1 Surakarta students towards the influences of
native language/L1 (Indonesian) system and target language/L2 (English) system.
The objectives of the research are to identify: 1) how the influence of native
language (Indonesian) linguistic system to the students’ interlanguage system is,
2) how the influence of target language (English) linguistic system to the students’
interlanguage system is, 3) to what extend the students’ native language
(Indonesian) system influence their interlanguage system, 4) to what extend the
target language (English) system influence the students’ interlanguage system and
5) the ratio of L1 (Indonesian) influence to L2 (English) influence on the students’
interlanguage system.

The research is a descriptive qualitative research. The data and data
source of the research is the erroneous sentences found in English compositions
written by two classes of grade VIII students in 2012/2013 academic year in SMP
Muhammadiyah 1 Surakarta. The data collection techniques are elicitation and
documentation. The data analysis techniques are collecting data, identification and
list of error, classification into error types, analysis of the source of error,
description of the influence degree and drawing conclusion. The writer utilizes the
interlanguage (IL) theories by Selinker, Rutherford, Adjémian, Ellis and Corder as
well as the error analysis (EA) framework by Shridar, James, and Corder.
The study reveals that the students’ IL systems are vulnerable to the L1
and L2 influences. The L2 influence is having much higher percentage than the
L1’s which implies that the students are in the right track within their IL
developing stages towards L2 system. The results of the study show that (1) the
influence of native language/L1 (Indonesian) linguistic system to the students’ IL
system are involving morphological influence and syntactic influence, (2) the
influence of target language/L2 (English) linguistic system to the students’ IL
system are involving morphological influence and syntactic influence, (3) the total
number of L1 (Indonesian) influence percentage is 32.5% consisting of
morphological influence (20.37%) and syntactic influence (12.4%), (4) the total
number of L2 (English) influence percentage is 67.47% consisting of

morphological influence (55.32%) and syntactic influence (12.4%) and (5) the
ratio of L1 (Indonesian) influence to L2 (English) influence is 1:2.07.
Keywords: Interlanguage, vulnerability, second language acquisition, applied
linguistics

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TABLE OF CONTENT

COVER .......................................................................................................... i
APPROVAL ................................................................................................... ii
ACCEPTANCE ............................................................................................. iii
TESTIMONY ................................................................................................ iv
MOTTO ......................................................................................................... v
DEDICATION ............................................................................................... vi
ACKNOWLEDGMENT ............................................................................... vii
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................... x
TABLE OF CONTENT ................................................................................ xii

LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................ xviii
LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................... xviii
LIST OF CHARTS ....................................................................................... xviii
LIST OF APPENDICES ............................................................................... xix
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ...................................................................... xx
CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION ...................................................................1
A. Background of the Study .......................................................1
B. Problem Statement .................................................................5
C. Objective of the Study ...........................................................6
D. Benefit of the Study ...............................................................6
E. Research Paper Organization .................................................7

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CHAPTER II: REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE ...........................8
A. Previous Study ......................................................................8
1. Ghani’s Study ...................................................................8
2. Hobson’s Study ................................................................10
3. Caneday’s Study ..............................................................11
4. Lightbound’s Study ..........................................................12

5. Position of the Current Study ...........................................13
B. Theoretical Review ...............................................................14
1. Interlanguage (IL) ............................................................14
a. Concept of Interlanguage (IL) .....................................15
1) Composition of Interlanguage ................................22
a) Universal Elements ............................................23
b) Formulaic Elements ...........................................23
2) Interlanguage Continuum .......................................24
a) Morphological Development .............................28
b) Utterance Development .....................................28
b. Characteristics of Interlanguage ..................................29
1) Systematicity ..........................................................29
2) Fossilization ............................................................30
3) Vulnerability ...........................................................31
a) Interference ........................................................33
b) Transfer ..............................................................34
c) More Studies of the L1 Influence to IL .............35

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d) Evaluating Acquisition ......................................37
2. Error Analysis (EA) Framework ......................................38
a. Identification of Error ..................................................39
b. Error Categorizations ..................................................46
1) Comparative Taxonomy .........................................46
a) Developmental Error ..........................................47
b) Interlingual Error ...............................................47
c) Intralingual Error ...............................................47
d) Ambiguous Error ...............................................50
2) Linguistic Categories ..............................................50
3) Surface Strategy Taxonomy ...................................51
a) Omission ............................................................52
b) Addition .............................................................52
c) Misformation .....................................................53
d) Misordering ........................................................54
c. Algorithm for Conducting EA .....................................55
CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHOD .......................................................56
A. Type of the Research ............................................................56
B. Object of the Research .........................................................56
C. Data and Data Sources .........................................................56
D. Data Collection Technique ...................................................57
E. Data Analysis Technique .....................................................57

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CHAPTER IV: RESEARCH FINDING AND DISSCUSSION ...................60
A. Research Finding ..................................................................60
1. Influence of Native Language (Indonesian) to the
Students’ IL System .........................................................61
a. Morphological Influence .............................................61
1) The Use of L1 Lexical Item ....................................62
2) The Use of L1 Words with Slight Modification .....63
3) The Use of Mismatch Lexical System ....................64
4) The Use of Function Words ...................................65
a) Omission of Article ............................................66
b) The Use of Preposition ......................................67
c) Omission of Verb Auxiliary ..............................70
5) The Use of Wordy Construction .............................71
b. Syntactic Influence ......................................................72
1) The Use of Literal Translation ...............................72
a) L1 Structure in Phrase ........................................73
b) L1 Structure in Clause .......................................74
c) L1 Structure in Sentence ....................................75
2. Influence of Target Language (English) to the
Students’ IL System .........................................................76
a. Morphological Influence .............................................76
1) The Use of Misspelled Words ................................77
2) The Use of False Friend .........................................78
a) False Friend Caused by Similarity in Form .......78

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b) False Friend Caused by Similarity in Meaning .79
3) Diction ....................................................................81
4) The Use of Content Words .....................................82
a) The Use of Pronoun ...........................................82
5) The Use of Function Words ...................................84
a) The Use of Article ..............................................85
b) The Use of Preposition ......................................87
c) The Use of Incorrect Conjunction .....................88
d) The Use of Verb Auxiliary ................................89
e) Addition of Verb Inflection ...............................90
6) The Use of Affixation .............................................91
a) The Use of Plural marker ...................................92
b) Misuse of Present Participle Marker ..................93
c) Misuse of Possessive Marker .............................94
7) Misformation of Noun Phrase ................................95
b. Syntactic Influence ......................................................96
1) The Use of Tenses ..................................................97
2) The Use of Phase Structure ....................................98
3) The Use of Parallel Construction ...........................99
4) Omission of Subject in Sentence ............................100
5) Omission of Predicate in Sentence .........................101
6) Redundancy in Sentence .........................................102
7) Miscellaneous .........................................................103

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3. Frequency of L1 (Indonesian) Influence to the Students’
IL System .........................................................................105
4. Frequency of L2 (English) Influence to the Students’
IL System .........................................................................108
5. Ratio of L1 (Indonesian) Influence to L2 (English)
Influence on the Students’ IL System ..............................112
B. Discussion of the Research Finding .....................................117
CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION ..................................123
A. Conclusion ............................................................................123
B. Pedagogical Implication of the Study ..................................126
C. Suggestion ............................................................................131
1. Constraint of the Study and Suggestion ..........................131
2. Constraint of the Research Finding and Suggestion ........132
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................134
VIRTUAL REFERENCES .............................................................................137
APPENDICES ..................................................................................................138
Appendix I

: Students’ English Compositions ...........................................139

Appendix II : List of Erroneous Sentences ..................................................140
Appendix III : List of Influences ....................................................................141

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LIST OF TABLES
CHAPTER IV
Table 4.1 L1 Influence to the Students’ IL System ...........................................106
Table 4.2 L2 Influence to the Students’ IL System ...........................................109
Table 4.3 Ratio of L1 to L2 Influence on the Students’ IL System ..................112

LIST OF FIGURES

CHAPTER II
Figure 2.1 Interlanguage System ........................................................................16
Figure 2.2 IL Continuum ....................................................................................25
Figure 2.3 Psycholinguistic Process of IL ..........................................................26
Figure 2.4 Error Identification ...........................................................................39
Figure 2.5 Notion of Error .................................................................................44

LIST OF CHARTS

CHAPTER IV
Chart 4.1 L1 Influence to the Students’ IL System ...........................................107
Chart 4.2 L2 Influence to the Students’ IL System ...........................................110
Chart 4.3 Ratio of L1 to L2 Influence on the Students’ IL System ...................115
Chart 4.4 The IL System of SMP Muhammadiyah 1 Surakarta Students .........119

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LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix I

: Students’ English Compositions ........................................... 139

Appendix II

: List of Erroneous Sentences .................................................. 140

Appendix III

: List of Influences .................................................................. 141

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

EA

: Error analysis

CA

: Contrastive Analysis

IL

: Interlanguage

ILs

: Interlanguages

L1

: First Language

L2

: Second Language

MT

: Mother Tongue

NL

: Native Language

NS

: Native Speaker

SL

: Second Language

SLA

: Second Language Acquisition

SLL

: Second Language Learner

SLLs : Second Language learners
TL

: Target Language

V

: Verb

The asterisk (*) : used as an error signal
The tick (√)

: indicates well-formedness

Italic type

: used for giving emphasis and examples.

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