KESALAHAN PENGGUNAAN ARTIKEL BAHASA INGGRIS OLEH MAHASISWA INDONESIA

This study aims to describe the misuse of English definite and indefinite articles by Indonesian students and the underlying contexts of the errors. The data was obtained by giving 100 Indonesian students, who were studying English as a foreign language, a 45 item multiple choice test. The data analysis was carried out by comparing the rules for using ‘the’ and ‘a’ with the students’ answers. Based on the analysis, two conclusions were obtained. First, the percentage of misuse of the definite article was higher than that of the indefinite article, being 39% and 23%, respectively. The high misuse of articles was likely due to the many grammatical rules concerning the use of ‘the’ and ‘a’ which are not a feature of the Indonesian language. Second, the misuse of the definite article appeared to be due to attending to the immediate contextual situations more than the overall contexts, whereas the misuse of the indefinite article appeared to be more due to errors in understanding the specific viewpoints of the sentences.departmental bulletin pape