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Friday, July 5, 2013

APPLIED LINGUISTICS - CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS OF PREPOSITION IN ENGLISH AND INDONESIAN LANGUAGE


A.    Introduction
Preposition is a word placed before a noun or pronoun to define its relationship with  another word in the sentence. The name of preposition (pre + position) means “place before”. Prepositions usually come before another word, usually a noun or noun phrase.
In english, If a preposition does not come before another word, it is still closely linked to another word, for example: “Who did you insist on?”, “On whom did you insist?”, “I insisted on you.” However, many prepositions can be functioned as adverbs, for example: I am in class and please come in. The first sentence, the word “in” roles as a preposition but the second sentence, the word “in” roles as an adverb. A few prepositions can also be conjunctions, for example: All students did the assignment but you and I summoned him but he did not obey. The first sentence there is a “but” that functins as a preposition but the second “but” of the next sentence roles as a conjunction. While in Indonesian Language, the using  of preposition is almost the same as english, such as antara (between) like tidak ada hubungan khusus antara kamu dan dia (There is no special relationship between you and him), oleh (by) like surat itu di sampaikan oleh pak pos (the letter was delivered by the postman).
B.     Discussion
1.      Contrastive Analysis
According to Lado’s statement in Linguistics across Cultures about contrastive analysis is “predict”. When a systematic comparison of the two languages has been made, the similarities and differences are revealed. One can then predict the learner’s difficulties, because they will be in the area of differences between the two languages, and there will be no learning problems where there are similarities. The view of what contrastive analysis can contribute to language teaching has been referred to as the strong version of the contrastive hypothesis. (Kia, 1975: 86-87).
2.      Kinds of Preposition
Preposition itself can be devided into two characters, one-word prepositions and complex prepositions. One-word preposition like, before, into, on, etc. Complex preposition is a phrase of two or more words that function as one-word prepositions, for example: according to, in spite of, etc. Here are the examples of one-word preposition and complex preposition
One-word Preposition
Complex Preposition
In, On, At, Beside, Behind, Under, Between, Among, After, Before, With, Without, About, Along, Above, Below
By, To, For, From, During, Through, Toward(s), etc
According to, Because of, On account of, Owing to, In front of
In addition to, In spite to, In spite of, Instead of, On behalf of, A head of, Along with, A la (From French), Next to, As well as, Away from, etc

One-word preposition:                        Complex preposition:                         
a.       He is in the kitchen.                a. He is getting sick because of you.
b.      He can live without you.         b. She is standing in front of me.
c.       I am at home.                          c. According to Martin, Abdul was late.
Similarly, in Indonesian Language, the using  of one-word preposition is same as english, such as berada (right)
Ø  English      : he is right here.

Ø  Indonesian            : dia berada disini.

However, in producing the complex prepositions, many indonesians get difficulty on how to differenciate it.
See these sentences
No.
English
No.
Indonesian
1a.
His house is next to my house.
1b.
Rumahnya berada di sebelah rumahku.


In english, the preposition of “next” is “to”, however, in Indonesian Language “next to” means “di sebelah.” But for those who have difficulty in putting the complex preposition, they may say that “his house is next behind my house”, it is because in bahasa “behind means di sebeleah” however in english, there should be “to” after next. Both sentences have the same meanings but in english, the construction is different from bahasa. Then the preposition of “because of”, in bahasa ”because of” means “karena” and the meaning of “because (conjunction)” itself is also “karena”.
No.
English
No.
Indonesian
2a.
He lives because of you.
2b.
Dia hidup karena kamu.

The sentences “he lives because of you” and “he lives because you” both sentences if they are translated into Indonesian Language, they have the same meaning, however in english, the second sentence is wrong because in indonesian, the word “of” has no meaning while in english, there must be put “of” after “because” due to its a preposition.
The next example is that the preposition of “up to”.
No.
English
No.
Indonesian
3a.
The boxes must be filled up to the last.
3b.
kotak-kotak itu harus di isi hingga yang terakhir.
For those indonesian people who have not recognised the meaning of “up to”, in indonesian language, it can be meant that “up” is “on” and “to” is ”for”.
Then, the difficuly of using prepositon is not only in complex preposition but also the using of verb and adjective forms that are followed by certain prepositions. For example:
No.
English
No.
Indonesian
4a.
he laughed at me.
4b.
He laughed about me.

 The verbs followed by certain preposition: he laughed at me, there should be “at” after laughed, however indonesians get confused on what suitable preposition is after laughed. People may say “he laughed about me”. In Indonesian interpretation, the meaning is same but in english, the preposition after laughed itself is wrong. In bahasa, there is no preposition like that. “he laughed at me” means dia menertawakan saya.
Translation:          dia=>he,
 menertawakan=>laughed,
saya=>me,

the sentences above, it can be seen that “at” is meaningless in indonesian language. Another example is that “wait for” in sentence
No.
English
No.
Indonesian
5a.
Wait for me!
5b.
Tunggu saya!

 as it can be seen that indonesians mostly forget to put the preposition of “for” after the verb “wait.” In indonesian language, “wait” means “tunggu” and there is no preposition after “tunggu”.
The second example is that the adjective forms that followed by certain preposition like “afraid of” and “different from.
See these sentences
No.
English
No.
Indonesian
6a.
She is afraid of tiger.
6b.
Dia takut dengan macan.

 In Indonesian context, “afraid” means “takut” while “of” means “dari.” However if we translate “dari” into english, it means “from”. For indonesians, it may look strange that the preposition of “afraid” is “of” because the meaning will look wierd in bahasa. So they may replace it with “dengan”, in english, it means “with.”
Ø  She is afraid of tiger (english translation).
Ø  She is afraid with tiger (indonesian language translation).
In bahasa, the meaning of She is afraid with tiger is correct, however the construction of english preposition is not. It must be “she is afraid of tiger.”
Then another example is “Different from”.

            See these sentences
No.
English
No.
Indonesian
6a.
Ali is different from Ala.
6b.
Ali berbeda dengan Ala.
In bahasa “different” means “berbeda” while “from” means “dengan.” However, in indonesian translation, if we translate “from” based on the word itself, “from” means “dari”, while “dengan” means “with”.
Ø  Ali is different from Ala (english translation).
Ø  Ali is differenet with Ala (Indonesian Language translation).
 Indonesians often use the preposition “with” when have to say something different, like “Ali is different with Ala”. In indonesian’s translation, the meaning is correct, however in english, the preposition of “with” must be replaced with “from”. These differences preposition of both languages often make indonesians confused on how to distinguish which suitable preposition is.
C.    Conclusion
The using of prepositions in english for Indonesian learners depends on what kind of prepositions are. When they have to put one-word preposition, it may not be a problem, because the construction is mostly same as bahasa. However when they have to put complex preposition, verbs, and adjective forms followed by certain prepositions, it can be a problem because in bahasa, most words do not consist of certain prepositions at the beginning and at the end of the words.

D.     Reference
Marsudi and Darsono, Hendro. 2010. Panduan Praktis English Grammar.       Yogyakarta: Indonesiatera.
Ali, Faidlal. 2009. English Grammar. Yogyakarta: Pustaka Widyatama.
Essaberger, Josef. 2012. English Prepositions List. Cambridge: Cambridge university Press
Grubic, Bob. 2004. Those Problematic English Prepositions. California: Barkeley.
Electronic Source:
http://id.wiktionary.org/wiki/Kategori:id:Preposisi
      http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/between-versus-among.aspx

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