Introduction to

Sociolinguistics
“Examples of Interference in Daily Life”

DIAH AYU PRATIWI (34.13.1.116)

PBI-IV/IV

DEPARTEMENT OF ENGLISH EDUCATION

FACULTY OF TARBIYAH
STATE UNIVERSITY FOR ISLAMIC STUDIES
NORTH SUMATERA
MEDAN
2015
 INTRODUCTION
Being a multilingualism person is not something easy to be used with those all languages
rules. Many factors can cause some errors in the target language. A habit in the source language
is something that affects the most for the target language. This habit carries some errors, such as
in phonology, morphology, syntax, or even in the grammatical structure. In linguistics sight, this
is called as interference.
Interferences are the errors by carrying over the speech habits of native language or
dialect into second language. Interference may occur at all linguistics levels-phonetic and
phonological, morph syntactic, and semantic. Interference arises when the bilingual speaker
interprets linguistic features of his second language in terms of the linguistic features of his first
language or, conversely, when he transfers elements from his second language into his first
language.
There are so many interferences happen in our daily life. These errors have been ignored
since the users of the language have been used to with those mistakes. Here the writer tries to
reveal those interferences in the daily life.
 DISCUSSION
Interference may occur at all linguistics levels-phonetic and phonological, morph
syntactic, and semantic. Interference arises when the bilingual speaker interprets linguistic
features of his second language in terms of the linguistic features of his first language or,
conversely, when he transfers elements from his second language into his first language.1

(Interference are) the errors by carrying over the speech habits of native language or
dialect into second language. (Hartmann and Stork, 1972).

When the learners are speaking in L2, they tend to rely on their L1 structures to
produce the utterance. If the structures of the two languages are so much different, then the
influences of L1 produce errors in the L2. In other word, errors found in the L2 are indicating
some interference of the L1 on the L2.2

Interference may be found often in our daily life. There are some internal or external
factors of the errors that carried by the L1 to L2. For internal factors, it can be the mother
tongue itself which affect the most to the L2, the routine for practicing, and the knowledge of
the L2, etc. For external factors, it can be the environment where the user lives and the
habits in using the wrong elements of the L2 which has been familiar with.

For Indonesian-English students, code-mixing between English and Indonesian is not

something rare to be found. But, in this case, there are some mistaken that has spread out and
has been used with the mistakes. For example:

Code-mixing : “Kapan mau married?

Well, ‘married’ in English determines an event that has been passed (Simple past and
Present perfect). When we translate the sentence into English, it may seem as below here:

Interfered English : When will you married?

1
Robert J. Jeffers and Ilse Lehiste, Principles and Methods for Historical
Linguistics, (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1986), p. 139.
2
Ridwan Hanafiah, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics: The Study of Language and
Society, (Medan: Universitas Sumatera Utara, 2013), p. 95.
We can see that Simple future is mixed with Verb Past Participle. Indonesian learners are used to
use “married” that equivalent with “menikah” in Indonesian even it should be “marry”.

According to the pattern of English grammatical structure for simple future, it should be
Subject + Auxiliary verb (will/ shall) + Verb 1 + Object/ Compliment3. It will look as the
example below:

The correct English : When will you marry?

The other example seems more familiar with us in ever year, every month, or even
every day. When someone’s birthday is coming, we will hear many people say “Happy
Birthday”, but realize it or not, we have made a mistake in pronouncing the word “birthday”.
Many people may pronounce this word as “bɜ:rsdei” not “bɜ:deɪ”. This interference occurs
because the symbol “” are a bit to be pronounced by people especially Indonesian who are
not familiar with the symbol and who do not know how the symbol is sounded.

In phonology this symbol is classified in fricative (interdental fricatives) where the tip
of the tongue is either close to the edge of the upper teeth or slightly projected between the
teeth and the vocal cords do not vibrate.4

The other examples occur in the sentences. I have questioned seven students with four
questions by using a questionnaire and I found some mistakes in understanding of word
translation. The first sentence was “dia berlari dengan cepat”. For this translation 71 %
answered the question with “he runs fastly” and “he runs with fast”. Here, there was a
mistaken in translating the word “dengan cepat”. In English it is known as an adverb.

3
Galang Mulyono, Hanya 3 Langkah Mudah Menaklukkan Bahasa Inggris Secara
Otodidak, (Sleman : Real Books, 2011), p. 137.
4
Heidrun Dorgeloh, Companion to English Linguistics: Chapter II Phonetics and
Phonology, pdf, p. 10, accessed 06 September 2014), http://www.phil-fak.uni-
duesseldorf.de/fileadmin/Redaktion/Institute/Anglistik/Anglistisches_Institut/Anglistik_III/Read
er/Companion%20to%20English%20Linguistics.pdf
 Adverb is a word that describes or gives more information about a verb, adjective,
phrase, or other adverb. 5 Most adverbs are formed by adding ‘-ly’ to an adjective. For
example quite – quietly, quick – quickly, serious – seriously, careful – carefully, etc.6 This is
the reason why some of them answered the question “he runs fastly”, because they only
know that to make it become an adverb, only by adding –ly in the end of the word. This
interference is also not rare to be found, especially in students writing.
For another one who answered “he runs with fast”, it came from the influence of the
native language especially Indonesian which the word “dengan” is equivalent to “with”.
Indonesian student are used to say “dengan” by using “with”, even it is not always true.
Some adverbs also have the irregular form. For example good – well, early – early,
fast – fast, hard – hard, high – high, late – late, near – near, straight – straight, wrong –
wrong.7 Here, are clearly explained that not all adverb can be added by –ly, because some of
them are irregular adverbs. And fast is included in irregular adverb. That is why there is no
change in the word even the function has changed but not for the form of the word.
The other example is the translation of “ aku akan pergi kesana besok”. In this case,
57 % answered the question “I will go to there tomorrow” and “I will go in there tomorrow”.
Here, we can see that the English is interfered by the word “kesana”. Since Indonesian
students are used to express the prefix “ke” by using preposition “to” or “in”, so the
translation for “kesana” is followed by those preposition. Actually, to express
“kesana”,”kesini” “di sana”, and “di sini”, we just need to use “here” for “di sini” or “kesini”
or “there” for “kesana” or “di sana”, because those words can stand alone as an adverb
without preposition.

5
Cambridge Learner’s Dictionary 2nd Edition, (Cambridge University Press, 2004).
6
Rahmah Fitriani, English Grammar, (Bandung: Ciptapustaka Media Perintis, 2010), p. 89.
7
Ibid, p. 89.
 CONCLUSION
The first example is interference in syntax (sentence structure). The structure is interfered
by using “married” to say “menikah” in Indonesian; even the structure is simple future. The
second example is interference in pronunciation, which Indonesian are not used to pronounce the
symbol of theta “”. The third example is interference in morphology. People are used to put ‘–
ly’ as suffix for adverb. And the last example is interference in morphology also where people
are influence to translate the preposition in the native language to the second language.
 REFERENCES
Cambridge Learner’s Dictionary 2 Edition, Cambridge University Press, 2004.
nd

Galang Mulyono, Hanya 3 Langkah Mudah Menaklukkan Bahasa Inggris Secara Otodidak,
Sleman : Real Books, 2011.

Heidrun Dorgeloh, Companion to English Linguistics: Chapter II Phonetics and Phonology, pdf,
p. 10, accessed 06 September 2014),
http://www.philfak.uniduesseldorf.de/fileadmin/Redaktion/Institute/Anglistik/Anglistisches_Insti
tut/Anglistik_III/Reader/Companion%20to%20English%20Linguistics.pdf

Rahmah Fitriani, English Grammar, Bandung: Ciptapustaka Media Perintis, 2010.

Ridwan Hanafiah, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics: The Study of Language and Society,
Medan: Universitas Sumatera Utara, 2013.
Robert J. Jeffers and Ilse Lehiste, Principles and Methods for Historical
Linguistics, .Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1986.