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Library's collection Library's IT development CancelMaking errors in using a new language is not considered as a failure anymore.
Errors are placed in a higher position, that is as an indicator of progress. If a user uses
the language and he produces errors, it shows that he applies his previous knowledge to
produce further utterances. Therefore, as a student of linguistics, the writer was
interested in studying and investigating kinds of syntactic and morphological errors. She
was also eager to find out which errors most often occur in the subjects' utterances.
This research used a qualitative approach in order to study the data taken from six
tourist guides thoroughly. It applied some theories of errors as proposed by Littlewood,
Hendrickson, and Richards. As a guideline for the analysis, the writer used Politzer and
Ramirez theory of errors (cited in Dulay et.al., 1982) which discusses linguistic category
taxonomy and the error itself so that the analysis- could be accomplished, and the
problems were solved.
The writer found morphological errors with three major error types. They are
third person singular verb, simple past tense, and past paiticiple. In term of syntax, there
are seven major types of error, namely, noun phrase, verb phrase, verb-and-verb
construction, word order, passive sentences, some transformation, and auxiliary system..
The writer also found out morphological error, failure to attach -s (third person singular
verb) mostly occurs in the subjects's utterances, and substitution of singulars for plurals
(number in determiner), in terms of syntactic errors, are mostly produced by the subjects.
It can be concluded that errors are not considered as a signal of progress
anymore. It can be as slip of the tongue. Even though errors still occurred in their
utterances, the subjects still could maintain the conversation. Basically, they know the
rule, but errors still occur in their utterances.