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4 Analysis of Lexical and Grammatical Errors.7
4.1 Errors of Lexis....7
4.1.1 Errors of Noun.7
4.1.2 Errors of Verb8
4.1.3 Errors of Conjunction10
4.1.4 Errors of Article.11
4.1.5 Errors of Collocation.12
4.2 Errors of Grammar14
4.2.1 Errors of Subject-Verb Agreement14
4.2.2 Errors of Tense.15
4.2.3 Errors of Clause.16
4.3 Summary.17
5 Conclusion..18
Bibliography..20
1 Introduction
Fossilization, as is considered a common phenomenon in second language acquisition (SLA), has long been studied since its first being proposed by Larry Selinker (1972). In accordance with Selinker and many other linguists’ view, fossilization, in most cases, is presented in form of interlanguage (IL), which is the intermediate stage between target language (TL) and native language (NL). Before one has totally mastered a language, he or she is likely to commit errors, again and again, as a permanent part of the way a person speaks or writes a language. Errors resulting from fossilization of second language (L2) learners occur in ways of aspects.
Among five major skills of linguistic competence, i.e. listening, speaking, reading, writing and translating, writing is featured as an integrated skill which calls for a relatively higher ability. It is undeniable that fossilization still occurs more or less in L2 learners’ writing. And the quality of writing, which in a sense, refers to the frequency of fossilization, directly reflects a person’s aptitude for language learning. The lower the frequency is, the better one masters English.
However, it seems, especially nowadays in China, a country in which English is taken as a foreign language rather than a second language, that English is more of a tool for communication, which means, as long as people reach an agreement, certain errors could be ignored. While English majors, the professional learners of English, are required to have an excellent command of English that can distinguish themselves from others. To get rid of the interference of their first language and to avoid the formation of fossilization in English, causes are to be dug out, and problems are to be tackled with.
In this thesis, based on Selinker’s theory of fossilization, the author tries to analyze the lexical and grammatical fossilization in English majors’ writing. To be objective and faithful, 113 samples of professional English writing assignments respectively from Tongji University, Shanghai University of International Business and Economics, Shanghai Normal University and Shanghai Institute of Technology are collected and analyzed in support of the thesis. Firstly, the author makes an empirical investigation on the existence of fossilization as well as the causes of fossilization among the subjects, namely students of English major. The study lays emphasis on the fossilization in English writing. By analyzing the samples collected from different universities, common types of errors and frequencies of errors can be found out. By making error analysis (EA), the author testifies the existence of fossilization among English majors. After that, the author categorizes the errors occurred in the compositions into several kinds to identify the causes of fossilization.
This thesis aims to (1) testify that fossilization among English majors does exist; (2) figure out the common errors committed by English majors from different colleges and universities; (3) seek for the causes of fossilization by analyzing the errors after their being categorized; (4) put forth some feasible solutions to de-fossilization.
This thesis falls into five chapters. The first chapter takes the role of introduction, which is about the background, the purpose and the essence of this study. The second chapter, literature review, inducts the previous study related to the definition of fossilization, the categorization of fossilization, as well as the causes that lead to the occurrences of fossilization. The third chapter involves error analysis as well as an empirical study on the causal factors. In chapter four, some feasible strategies will be put forward to help students overcome fossilization. Chapter five concludes the whole study for the thesis. Major findings, pedagogic implications, limitations and suggestions are all within this chapter.