A STUDY OF ERROR MADE BY FIFTH SEMESTER STUDENTS IN

TRANSLATING INDONESIAN INTO ENGLISH TEXT: A CASE

STUDY AT ENGLISH DEPARTMENT OF MUHAMMADIYAH
UNIVERSITY OF PURWOREJO IN THE ACADEMIC YEAR
2011/2012
AMBAR RATNA DEWI
Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra Inggris FKIP
Universitas Muhammadiyah Purworejo
ABSTRACT
While learning a foreign language, the students cant be avoided from translation process
for understanding the meaning of the foreign language. Many experts have been stated the theory
and definition of translation, and the main idea of all translation theories is about transferring
messages from source language to target language.
Translation is one of the subject which is learned by English department students. The
writer is interested in studying about error made by the students in translating Indonesian into
English text, and intends to know about: (1) What type of error made by the fifth semester
students in translating Indonesian into English? (2) What is the method used by the students for
translating Indonesian into English? (3) How far is the students ability in translating Indonesian
into English? In this case, qualitative research is needed to answer this problems.
The writer analyzes the students error in translating Indonesian into English. The sample
of the population is 56. It represents 22.2% of the population. The writer uses documentation of
the students translation assignment for getting the data, and then analyzes them. The result of the
analysis is categorized excellent based on the lecturers assessment with the average of score is
85.57, although the writer finds some kinds of error, such as, ommision, addition, misformation,
misordering, mistyping, and other error. The error which is usually found by the writer is
misformation error. The percentage of this error is 35.52%. It is included grammatically error.
The writer analyzes that the students are still confused while they write complex sentence and
substitute the tenses (present tense to past tense). However, the students should have a good
motivation in learning and improving their English skill. Also, the lecturers should give clear
explanation about translation, grammar, and writing skill for having a good translation mastery.

I.

INTRODUCTION

All languages in the world to some extent are different one another. Each native speaker
can express words, phrases, clauses, and sentences to make certain meaning. Language is
basically a means of communication. Through language, all humans can communicate each
other, transfer and express some ideas, share with others, make some relationship, invent new
things, and so on. In other words, the language is widely used for some purposes, such as,
educational, judicial, governmental, trading, and even a literary one. Learning a language means
a study to communicate with that language both spoken and written. In order to communicate
correctly and appropriately, one should have good components of language that build up the
language. In communication, people use language, which consists of sentences. Thus, people
must be able to make sentences in communication. It means that sentences are the important
thing in communication among people. One of many languages which is admitted as
international language is English. In Indonesia, English becomes the foreign language.
Indonesian students may not feel strange to English because based on the new government policy

English has been introduced from elemantary school level. Through, enculturation process in
formal education institution, the way of translating English into their native language are
implanted into students brain. The intended result is that the students are expected to be able to
understand the meaning of English sentences.
Most of students always try to understand the meaning of English sentence by translating
it into Indonesian. Hawkes in Basnett-McGuire states that:
Translation involves the transfer of meaning contained in one set of language signs into
another set of language through competent use of the dictionary and grammar, the process
involves a whole set of extralinguistic criteria also (1991 : 13). Furthermore, Toury (2000:1)
says that, Translation is a kind of activity which inevitably involves at least two languages and
two cultural traditions.
As we know, we are English department students we have to know and produce English
fluently than the others. English department students not only can translate English into
Indonesian, but also can translate Indonesian into English. Becoming a translator has to master
both the source and target language. It feels difficult, but they have to do it for mastering English
well. The process of translating is not as simple and easy as people think. The students faces
many problems then get many errors. According to Ramelan (1994:4), if someone wants to learn
a foreign language, he will obviously meet all kinds of learning problems. Ramelan (2003:5) also
says that the difficulty encountered by the students in learning second language is caused by the
different elements found between his language and the target language. The teacher sometimes
tolerates the errors, but some error analysts take error as a deviant. It is no longer tolerable when
it reaches a level which is called fossilization. (Brown, 2000 : 231).
Therefore, they should know the problems concerning with two different languages.
Because of that, the writer wants to analyze the students errors in translating Indonesian into
English. Students should know about what mistake they have done, and the writer hopes that
they can solve their problem, and then improving their translation ability by learning from their
mistake they have done before.

a.

Statement of the Problem

The statement of the problem can be formulated in the following question:
What type of error made by the fifth semester students in translating Indonesian into
English?

b.

The Purpose of the Study

The purpose of the study is to find out kinds of error which made by the fifth semester
students in translating Indonesian into English.

II.

Theoretical Review
1. Translation

Generally, translation is an act, processs, or an instance of translating as a rendering from

one language into another. There are many theories proposed by some experts of linguistic
related to the definition of translation. They define translation from different point of view. In the
translation field, there are terms of translation and interpretation. Both of those terms are focused
on transferring messages from source language (SL) into target language (TL). Translation refers
to transferring both written and spoken messages, while interpretation refers to transferring
spoken messages only. Becoming a translator, he has to have a great responsibility and his work
is not easy. He should be able to comprehend messages in one language and express them in
another language. A translator also should master some basic skills. It is interesting to find out
what skills should be needed by translator. The writer thinks that the understanding of the experts
opinions of translation might help the readers a lot in comprehending this thesis and in
understanding basic theories of translation. That is why the writer would like to present some
experts opinion concerning translation activities.

According to Nababan (2008, 13), Translation is not a pure science, but it is a kind of
applied science. Translation is a kind of interdiscipline science, because it also receive many
science indeed like linguistic, psycholinguistic, sociolinguistic, communication science, filology,
etc. The analyze of source language text become the main topic in translation theory which
should be understood by the translator.
Catford in Hartono (2009:2) says, Translation is the replacement of textual material in one
language (SL) by equivalent textual material in another language (TL). Catford emphasize the
equivalence of the source language text message to the target language text. However, it is not
easy to translate the text to be really equivalent because of limitation which is caused either by
cultural untranslatability or by linguistic untranslatability.
Nida (1982:12) states that Translation consist of reproducing in the receptor language
the closest natural equivalent of the source language message, first in terms of meaning and
secondly in terms of style. Nida also emphasize the importance of meaning, that is the
importance to produce the closest natural equivalent messages in the source language text and
the target language text. Moreover, he adds that it is also important to make equivalence in style
whenever it is possible. It is certain that the most important thing is to make equivalence in
meaning; however, the equivalence in style is also needed to consider.
Newmark (1981:7) states that translation is a craft consisting in the attempt to replace a
written messsage or statement in one language by the same message or statement in another
language. He also says that translation has its own excitement, its own interest. A satisfactory
translation is always possible, but a good translator is never satisfied with it. It can usually be
improved. There is no such thing as a perfect, ideal or correct translation (1988:6).
Larson in Hartono (2009:2) says, Translation is transferring the meaning of the source
language into the receptor language. This is done by going from the form of the first language to
the form of the second language by way of semantic structure. It is meaning which is being
transferred and must be held constant.
Hartono (2009:6) made his own definition about translation named Tripartite cycle
model. He said that translation is reading the authors will and purpose in the form of message
which contains both denotative and connotative meanings that exist in the source text that must
be reproduced by translators into the receptors language. This process runs in simultaneous
cycle.
Based on those explanation above, it can be concluded that translation is the process of
transferring message from one language (Source Language) into another language (Target
Language).
Although, there are many translation theory which have stated by the expert, but
translation theory does not give a solution for all problem in translation process. Translation
theory is not always relevant with the translation practice. According to Lauven-Zwart,
producing a better translation is not the main purpose of translation theory.
Translation theory is just a reference for translator while he does his duty in translating
something. His skill and his carefulness in applying translation theory will determine his
successful in translation.
Types of translation
1) Word-for-word translation
2) Free Translation
3) Literal Translation
4) Dynamic Translation
5) Pragmatic Translation

2. Error

Errors are the flawed side of learner speech of writing. They are those parts of
conversation or composition that deviate from some selected norm of mature language
performance. Error analysis has yielded insight into the L2 acquisition process that have
stimulated major changes in teaching practices. Perhaps its most controversial contribution has
been the discovery that the majority of the grammatical errors second language learners make do
not reflect the learners mother tongue, but are very much like those young children make as they
learn a first language. It has been found that like L1 learners error, most of the errors L2 learners
make indicate they are gradually building an L2 rule system. Among the most common errors
are:
Omitting garmmatical morphemes, which are items that do not contribute much to the meaning
of sentences.
Example: He hit car
Double marking a semantic feature (e.g. past tense) when only one marker is required.
Example: She didnt went back.
Regularizing rules, as in womans for women.
Using archiforms one form in place of several such as the use of her both she and her.
Example: I see her yesterday.
Her dance with my brother.
Using two or more forms in random alternation even though the language requires the use of
each only under certain conditions, as in the random use of he and she regardless of the gender of
the person of interest.
Misordering items in constructions that require a reversal of word-order rules that had been
previously acquired, as in what you are doing?, or misplacing items that may be correctly
placed in more than one place in the sentence, as in they are all the time late. ( Dulay,
1982:138-139)

Types of Error
1)
2)
3)
4)

III.

Ommision
Addition
Misformation
Misordering

DATA ANALYSIS

The data which have been collected should be analyzed. Theoretically this research uses
qualitative method. This method uses since the data of the research that is errors Indonesian
English translation made by the fifth semester students of English department in Muhammadiyah
university of Purworejo. In this research, the writer focuses on descriptive qualitative research.
Briefly, to know the detail about Indonesian-English translation made by the students, the
writer uses descriptive qualitative research design by taking a students assignments from
Indonesian-English translation lecture. The writer gives more attention on what kinds of errors
made by the students then analyze them.

IV.

FINDINGS

The highest percentage of all error is misformation error with the percentage is 35.52%.
ommision error is 22.15%, addition error is 21.7%, misordering error is 19.76%, and the other
error is 0.85%.
Kinds of error and the classification based on the observation result:
1. Ommision

a. Ommiting word
b. Ommiting article and preposition
c. Ommiting to be
d. Ommiting subject and predicate
e. Ommiting mark
f. Ommiting suffix -ed for regular verb in past tense, suffix -ing and -s or -es
2. Addition
a. Simple addition
b. Double marking
c. Regularization addition
3. Misformation
a. Archie form
b. Regularization misformation
c. Alternating form
4. Misordering
a. Misordering Sentence
b. Misordering To be
The other error also found while doing the observation, they are:
1. Mistyping
2. Unproper Word
3. Combine Error (Alternating Form and Misordering)
4. Untranslated Word
5. Translating the Name of Something
6. Using Foreign Language

V.

CONCLUSION

After analyze the whole of the research finding, the writer finds some error made by the
students, then it can be analyze as the students ability in translation. The cause of error which
are made by the students frequently:
1. Using unproper words,
2. Their sentence sometimes unstructured,
3. Misordering the sentence