Developing English language skills for Vietnamese learners of English through raising their awareness of the contrastive linguistic features
By Pham Huu Duc, PhD & Nguyen Cong Dan, MA
Department of English
International University – Vietnam National University HCM

Introduction
- The knowledge of contrastive linguistic features comes as the essential complementary factor to the receptive skills and productive skills.
- Understanding contrastive linguistic features is closely associated with the use of a language, especially when English is used by the great number of non-native speakers in Southeast
Asian (Duong, 2012).

- To r aise Vietnamese learners’ awareness of linguistic features of
English and Vietnamese through comparison and contrast;
-To bring ideas from the conceptual frameworks and approaches together with contrastive aspects of English and
Vietnamese;
-To further research the second language acquisition theory (SLA) through contrastive analysis.

Limitations of the study
 Comparison and contrast are supposed to be mainly phonological, lexical, and syntactical;
 Referring to the linguistic features of the texts, excluding what forms of press, and article titles are;
 Considering language structures in lexicalgrammatical aspects through the metaphorical expression of grammar
(nominalization).

2.
Literature review
How people use language is the question of:
 How people interact naturally using the authentic speech and writing in certain social contexts.
 How language is structured, language users interact through sounds, words or sentences to make themselves understood and understand others. (Halliday, 1994; Martin,1992; Eggins,1993)

2.
Literature review
CONTENTS Semantics
(meanings)
Lexical-grammar
(words & structures )
EXPRESSION Phonology (sounds / letters)
Source: Eggins (1993: 27)

Contrastive linguistic features
Languages English
Inflectional language
Vietnamese
Isolating language
Subject Prominent
(S+V+O)
Stress
Theme prominent
(Theme/Rheme)
Tonal
Grammaticalized (lexicogrammar)
Limited pronouns (7)
Non - grammaticalized
Various pronouns

Contrastive linguistic features
 Krzeszowski (1991:10) indicated that contrastive linguistics describes similarities and differences in languages, which leads to the results that are related to the linguistic theory in the search for linguistic universals.

Contrastive linguistic features
-
-
-

3.
Methodology
Sample: the sample (N= 1000), 1000 English news texts and 1000 Vietnamese news texts, were compared and contrasted.

3.
Methodology
Materials: The source of 1000 texts in English and 1000 texts in Vietnamese covers the recurrent themes in the press coverage of social issues, culture to daily news.
The English texts were from the NBC, and the
Vietnamese texts from the Youth newspaper including articles written in the years 2005, 2006 and 2007, and from VNExpress.

3.
Methodology
Procedures: the analysis focuses on the comparisons and contrasts of sounds, vocabulary and grammar in the two languages.

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
Phonological contrastive analysis
From the phonological perspective, contrastive study is carried out in two aspects: a) segmental b) suprasegmental.

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
 Segmental
Phonemes English
Vowels 12
Semi-vowels 2
Diphthongs 8
Consonants 22
13
Total phonemes
44
Vietnamese
3
22 initial sounds & 9 final sounds
47
(Cao Xuan Hao, 1998: 96-102)

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected b) Suprasegmental
- Contractive linguistics deals with the suprasegmental phenomena such as: tone, stress, intonation.
- Vietnamese is a tonal language with six tones while English has stress or intonations.

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
English Vietnamese
Ghost
Mo ther
Ma
Má
Horse Mã
Young rice plant Mạ

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
Lexical contrastive analysis
Robert Lado (1957) identified three levels of lexical contrasts: form, meanings, and distribution.

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
1) Similar in form and meaning
These are usually the borrowings, for example,
“TV”, “radio”.
2) Similar in form and different in meaning
For example, “may (luck)” in English and “may” in Vietnamese

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
3 ) Different in form and similar in meaning both “eat” in English & “ăn” in Vietnamese means “to put food into the mouth, chew it and swallow.
”
4) Different in form and in meaning
“first floor” in American English & “tầng” in Vietnamese.
5) Different in morphological formation
“use up” ( verb + adverb ) English, & “dùng hết” (verb + modal particle) in Vietnamese .

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
6) Similar in original meaning and different in derivative meaning
“cat” in English also means a “clever woman”, whereas
“mèo” in Vietnamese means “mistress”
7) Similar in meaning and different in geographical meaning
“petrol” is used in English, and “gasoline” is used in
American English

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
Syntactical contrast
-
-
Deals with the units of a language: words, sentences structures as well as other means of expressing relationship and grammatical category.
In written texts, the nominalization (turning a verb into a noun) is often used to make the writing more concise and exact. This is also considered information packing.

4. Results: Analysis and interpretation of data collected
English Vietnamese
Speech
(primary change)
Happiness
(secondary change)
Study
Bài diễn văn
Niềm hạnh phúc
( Việc) học

5. Discussion
For the phonological contrastive analysis:
- Both English and Vietnamese have /t/ sound, but that of
English is pronounced either in an aspirated way /th/or not in an aspirated way/t/ whereas that of Vietnamese is only pronounced as /t/.
- Vietnamese learners of English pronounce /t/ or /k/ with a closed mouth since Vietnamese has the sound: uc / Ɯ ʊk p /, ôc / ɤ w k p /, oc /ɑ w k p /.
- People whose native language is isolating and has such a phoneme as /tu/ may pronounce /t/ and /u/ at the same time
Cao (1985: 164). They may pronounce that phoneme as /tu/ or /ut/ at the same time, not in a linear way. → Vietnamese hardly pronounce the final sounds such as /t/ or /p/

5. Discussion
- The pronoun references in Vietnamese texts do not sometimes use pronouns "he / him “, but use
“the title + name”. If learners want to refer to a proper noun such as the leader's own name, then
“ title + name" must be used.
- The English pronoun "he" can be used to replace the name of the national leader, or the synonym, such as "the president", or just his/her name is used. e.g
“(President) Bush".

5. Discussion
For the syntactical contrastive analysis:
- In Vietnamese texts, the nominalization is formed: putting “sự” or “việc" before an adjective or a verb“; putting " cái" or "máy" before a noun.
Meanwhile, in English, the nominalization is formed: a) through the primary change of a verb: "to give" into a noun "gift", or "to speak" into "speech ”, etc.
b) through the secondary change by adding the affixes
(prefixes and suffixes).
c) putting "the" before the adjective, for example “the + poor ” (poor people).

CUP
COMMON
UNDERLYING
PROFICIENCY
L 2 L 1
C U P
Cummins (2000): "Conceptual knowledge developed in one language helps to make input in the other language comprehensible."

6.
Conclusion
-The study forms a prototype related to the comparison and contrast of the aspects of phonology, lexicology, and syntax between English and Vietnamese.
-This greatly helps to improve the progress of
Vietnamese learners ’ English language performance in developing and in achieving their language proficiency.
-The prototype indicates two features, each of which reflects one of the three meta-function of systemic functional linguistic theory - Interpersonal, Experiential
(using nominalization) and Textual, and also three modes of communication - Interpretive, Interpersonal and Presentational.

Implications of the study
The study will significantly contribute to:
1.
2.
Working out the appropriate methods to improve students’ weaknesses through the awareness of the distinctions of linguistic features, on which a system of language performance is built.
The theoretical framework that supports the processes of identifying language similarities and differences in SLA ,

Implications of the study
 The awareness of the distinctions of linguistic features can allow teachers and students to get more access to the solutions to language barriers while language learners of different systems learn each other’s languages
 The study may also serve as a model in exemplifying not only how research on contrastive linguistics affects the second language acquisition, but also how immersion programs and non-immersion programs can meet to form a seamless connection. It holds much promise for the future as our profession continues to advance in standards-based instruction and assessment.

References
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References
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Insights Into Contrastive Analysis.). John Benjamin Publishing Company.
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