Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
CONTEXTUAL SUITABILITY
THESIS
Submitted by
SAIFULLAH ALI
The students of English Department
Faculty of Tarbiyah
Reg No : 239 911 070
FAKULTAS TARBIYAH
INSTITUT AGAMA ISLAM NEGERI (IAIN) AR RANIRY
DARUSSALAM~BANDA ACEH
2005
ABSTRACT
This paper describes the ability of the students in translating homographs suitably
to the context used in the sentence; a study was conducted to find out their ability
and their problems in understanding and translating homographs into Bahasa
Indonesia. Texts contained homographs were given as one of the instruments
(tests) in collecting the data besides some others instruments; observation and
questionnaires.
The data was analyzed in statistical analyzing. Determining Mean, Interval, Range
and Frequency to determine the percentage was the main work in analyzing the
data. Questionnaire showed that many students were still strange with the term of
homograph, but they are very enthusiast toward learning homograph. It also
informed that the students strongly agreed that the homograph become a sub topic
to be taught in the Translation class.
THESIS
By
SAIFULLAH ALI
The Student of English Department
Tarbiyah Faculty
Reg. No: 239 911 070
Approved by
Assalamu’alaikum wr wb.
who was created all humankind to always obey to him. Great of Allah who has
shown us his powerful authority of this world on Sunday morning 26th December,
2004 where many people were called their souls in Earthquake and Tsunami
disaster. Endless thanks for god who has saved us to be still alive in this world and
to obey all of his orders and obligation and to leave all of his prohibitions. Then
I would like to send my best gratitude and praying to the late Mr.
Muhammad Ilyas and my deepest thanks to Mrs. Nashriyah that has provided
much time to supervise and assist me that I could finish this writing.
and father, I could do nothing without them. My sisters and brothers for their
encouragement and motivations they gave for me. May Allah keep us together
Saifullah Ali
CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ........................................................................
CONTENTS ..............................................................................................
LIST OF TABLES ....................................................................................
LIST OF APPENDICES ...........................................................................
ABSTRACT ..............................................................................................
BIBLIOGRAPHY .....................................................................................
APPENDICES ..........................................................................................
AUTOBIOGRAPHY ................................................................................
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A. Background of Study
Homographs are the words, which have one spelling and sometimes
pronunciation but different in meaning and using. In some books Homographs are
which are spelled the same and sound the same but may function as different part
occur.1 For example, the word bank in a financial context will facilitate words like
money, robbery, and teller. However, in another context, it may have something to
Another example, consider the word run, it may function as noun, verb,
and/or idiomatic, which cannot be translated in the same meaning. Below are
In the first sentence from the above illustration, the word run means hole
or hollow, when the word is translated into Bahasa Indonesia, run here means
lubang. Then in the second sentence the word run means leave, go away or walk
fastly, here the word must be translated as lari in Bahasa Indonesia. For the third
1
Wiig and Semel, Language Assessment and Intervention for the Learning Disabled,
(Columbus: Bell and Howell, 1980), p. 267.
sentence, the word run means journey or tour, which is in Bahasa Indonesia
perjalanan. And in the last sentence run infers the meaning of amount where in
For each use of the word run in the illustration above, we can see that run
in each of sentence must have different meaning, the meaning of each sentence is
translated depending upon the context stated in the sentence. It means that context
which then becomes the problem – for the reader to comprehend and the translator
specify our discussion to the problem faced by the translators in their translation
From the above statement, we can see that translation is transferring ideas of a
language.
2
Brislin, Richard W,ed, Translation: Aplication and Research, ( New York: Gardnen
Press, 1976) p.1.
that occurs in the text translated.“ Context influences our use and interpretation of
information of the head of speaker of that language allows him or her to identify
the problem also lies, commonly, in the difficulty of how to analyze the real
context of the language, and specifically, the difficulty of how to find the correct
message of the source language mostly stated in Homographs by the author. And,
surely, the writer thinks that the problem happens because of the weakness of the
that the order of words in the resulting Target Language (the writer will use the
initial ‘TL’ for the term Target Language and ‘SL’ for term Source Language in
the next chapter or paragraph) is more often wrong than correct. As we have
known, it is sure that translation of English text into Bahasa Indonesia needs more
than semantical aspect, but there are still many other aspects that must be taken
such as the endings of nouns, adjectives and verbs, or basic syntactic sequences,
3
Lund, Nancy .J and Judith F Duchan, Assessing Children’s Languages in Naturalistic
Contexts, second edition, (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, 1983) p. 241.
4
Paul Gee, James, An Introduction to Human Language, Fundamental Concepts in
Linguistics, (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, 1993) p. 35.
such as noun-adjective and subject-verb relations are all aspects of language –
The difficulties are further complete in languages like English where many
words may function as nouns, verbs or adjectives without any formal distinctions;
e.g. control can be a verb or noun, green can be an adjective or a noun. The fact
that there can be stress differences, e.g. between the verb permit and the noun
permit, is not our concern although the discussion about it is also provided. This is
because we are talking about written genre, which does not recognize stress,
Like what just has already been mentioned above as the aspect of language
syntactic analysis is one way that may ease translator to detect the meaning of the
word, in case of Homograph, this will help one to determine appropriate meaning
and context. For instance; the endings ‘-ed’ and ‘-ing’ generally indicate
result of translation. The fact that there are many differences occurring in the
culture of one community with another is like what happens to the language itself,
..............................................................................................................................
Jami’ah Ar-Raniry is one of the state institutes of Islamic studies, which offer
many faculties that consist of many departments. English Department is one of the
departments at Tarbiyah faculty, which provides students with the extensive
practical and theoretical skills related to teaching English as Foreign Language.
Practically and theoretically, Translation is one of skills that developed in the
classroom in order that the students have ability in understanding foreign
language – English – textually. And surely, the writer believes that, as the
translator, the students will have many such obstacles stated above in their
classroom.
Based on the assumption above, through this research, the writer would
exist?
Homograph?
The results and data collected of this study were reported in the theses
B. Terminology
5
Mustafa, AR, A Comparison of some Linguistic routines between English and Bahasa
Indonesia in terms of Language and culture perspectives, (Jurnal Ilmiah DIDAKTIKA, Fakultas
Tarbiyah IAIN Ar-raniry Darussalam Banda Aceh, September 1999). P. 62.
After we know the Background and the Aims of this study, we should
know some terms used in the title of this thesis in order to make it clear. Below
1. Ability
physically, good ability makes someone able to do something well what he/she
wishes to do. “An ability is thought to be something that is general and enduring.
It is trait affected by both learning and heredity”6. However, term ability that the
homographs.
2. Translating
first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style”.7 Translating that the
writer concerns in this writing is to transfer both meaning and style of words of
3. Homographs
6
Singer. N Robert, Motor Learning And Human Performance: An Aplication To Motor
Skills And Movement Behaviors (New York: MACMILLAN PUBLISHING CO.,INC and London:
COLLIER MACMILLAN PUBLISHERS, 1980) p.31.
7
Nida and Taber, Zuchridin Suryawinata, Terjemahan: Pengantar Teori dan Praktek
(Jakarta: Direktorat Jenderal Pendidikan Tinggi Proyek Pengembangan Lembaga Pendidikan
Tenaga Kependidikan, 1989).p.2
Homographs, from the Greek Homos which means Same and Graphein
which means to write,8mean the words that are spelled alike but differ in origin
sometimes you will find both of terms are used in the same way, with no clear
differences. Simpson states that “Homographs are written identically but sound
that is spelled the same as another word but differs in meaning and origin and
words that are spelled the same but different in origin, meaning and sometimes in
11
…The Heritage Illustrated Dictionary of English Language. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
n.d) p. 113.
1. To find out the ability of the third year students of English Department
Homograph.
D. Postulates and Hypotheses
1. Postulates
Postulate means an accepted principle and assertion to use the basic for
drawing inference.12 In this study, there are some postulates can be stated as
follow:
written genre.
sense.
language message.
2. Hypotheses
homographs is unsatisfactory.
12
Carter V. Good, Dictionary of Education,(New York: Mc Graw Hill Book, 1959)
p. 406
3. Some problems may lies in students interest in learning related
also lies in curriculum and class room (there is no item which talking
class room).
E. Methodology
The Field Research is conducted to collect the data needed; they are
a. Observation
The first step the writer done was observing the location of the study (in
the class room). This was done to recognize all aspects related to the object of this
study in Translation class. Here the writer tried to find out correct information
students and teacher in the classroom, and other things connected and supported
the study.
b. Test
and analyzing context in the text existing homograph, a writing test was given in
their Translation class. They were asked to take a test, the form which was
formulated in multiple choices (the text has been translated by the writer. They
were asked to choose the appropriate meaning of the certain words (homographs)
that were stated in the text), and an essay test. Here they were asked to translate a
The purpose of this technique was to know students’ obstacles and their
words. Therefore, the form of questioner used was Closed Questioner in which the
writer prepared the alternative answers that should be chosen by the respondents,
The data were obtained in two categories: Data about students’ ability and
data about obstacles faced by students. In determining the frequency of students’
ability and the amount of the students facing obstacles, the writer analyzed the
data quantitatively.
all of the third year students in English Department, who were in semester
five. The sample of this study was 28.5% of 95 students. It was 30 of males
and females students who were taking Translation-II, this means by the writer
A. HOMOGRAPH
a. Definition of Homograph
languages, which are rich of linguistic problem, there are many standpoints at
where many linguists can have a view to produce definitions, explanations and
discusses about the sense of the language, every word and sentence in a language,
Semantically, English has several types of word, for instance; synonym, antonym,
polysemes, homonym, homophones, homograph, and etc., which are very unique
in each of usage and function. Each of type has its own meanings depending on
These types of word have become an interesting topic for many people to
discuss in books, magazine, journals, seminars etc. In this chance we will focus
our discussion on type of word that has multiple meanings; called Homograph.
meaning. Homograph has more than one meaning for the same single word, a
homograph may have different sense and of course different understanding for
131
Mustafa, AR, A comparison of some Linguistic routines between English and Bahasa
Indonesia in terms of Language and culture perspectives, (Jurnal Ilmiah DIDAKTIKA, Fakultas
Tarbiyah IAIN Ar-raniry Darussalam Banda Aceh, September 1999). P. 62
12
different time and place of usage. There is contrastly different between
conduct,” and lead, n. /LED/, the name of the metal), while homophone in sound
of the word, it is pronounced alike but different but different in spelling and
meaning (to, two, and too). Simpson states that “Homographs are written
identically but sound differently”14, different from Homophones which tend to the
to the definition had been drawn by some linguist about it. Below are some
\Hom"o*graph\, n. [Gr. "omo`grafos with the same letters; "omo`s the same +
but having different derivations and meanings; as, fair, n., a market, and fair, a.,
beautiful.16
Homograph is a word that is spelled the same as another word but differs in
142
Simpson, J.M.Y, A First Course in Linguistics, (Edinburg: Edinburg University
Press,1979) p.179.
15
Ibid
16
........Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, (G. & C. Merriam Co.,1980). (Online)
http://www.hyperdictionary.com/search.aspx?define=spelled. Accessed on January21st, 2004.
17
…The Heritage Illustrated Dictionary of English Language. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin
n.d) p. 113.
3. Webster’s World University Dictionary:
Homograph is a word identical in form with another, but different in origin and
4. Dictionary of Education:
Homograph: a word that is the same in spelling as another word but differs in
origin, in meaning, and sometimes in sound, for example tear (differing in sound)
Definitions above show that Homograph is the word that has the same
spelling and form but very different in meaning. The differences of meaning in a
Lexical ambiguity occurs when a word posses more than one meaning. One
genre, although it is not impossible for a speaker to find homograph in his or her
because spoken language is usually happened in a real time and place, means that
spoken language has more distinctive context. A certain clear - context that
18
Taylor, Ralph C, Webster’s World University Dictionary, Illustrated Encyclopedic
Edition ,(Washington DC: Publisher’s, 1965) p.435.
19
Carter V. Good, Dictionary of Education,(New York: Mc Graw Hill Book, 1959)
p. 286
20
Sinclair, Linguistic Problem – Lexical Ambiguity 1987, (Online) http://www.fi. muni. cz/
usr/wong/teaching/mt/notes/node5.html.iso-8859-1. Accessed on Saturday, February 7th 2004.
happens in a conversation between two or more people will ease the people to
From the illustration above we can imagine two context illustrations that
may occur in their conversation: First; they meet in the down town while walking,
it takes place about one minute to the Central Bank in that town, and the
conversation is at 10.00 o’clock pm. By this illustration, we can see that the
ambiguity of the word “Bank” will never appear because Mr. A has got a clear
information that Mr. B wants to go to the Central Bank (more over if he points out
his destination).
In the second context illustration; we may imagine that there are two
people who meet on the way not so far from the river. Here the word “Bank” is
..............................................................................................................................
Another reason why spoken language has more easy identification of appropriate
meaning of homograph than in written is because of phonology. In speaking, the
speaker may use stress and intonation freely in each of word he/she pronounced.
Stress, rhythm and intonation usage in a conversation may clearly affect the
interpreting and understanding an utterance or even a word. Marianne Celce-
Muria, Donna M. Brinton, and Janet M. Goodwin state that:
"[Stress, rhythm, and adjustments in connected speech] allow the speaker
to turn the basic building blocks of the sound systems (i.e., the vowel and
consonant phonemes) into words, meaningful utterances, and extended
discourse. Command of these features is therefore as critical as command
of the segmental features … in achieving successful communication for
second language learners”.21
The writer thinks that every one must agree that stress, rhythm and
intonation have very big role in spoken language that ease every one in language
stress, rhythm and intonation also provide a very easy way in determining the
appropriate meaning for the word homograph, so that there will never found
ambiguity in their speaking. One can easily understand what the speaker means
when he/she find the word stress or intonation in the utterance clearly. For
B: Yeah..!! I think Joy Tobing and Delon will find a great record because
From the utterance above, we can distinguish two way of pronouncing the
word “Record” with stress in the front-stressed syllable and in the end-stressed
syllable. Each of way has its own meaning differently. The first way, when some
one pronounces “Record” with the stress in the end of the syllable (end-stressed)
21
Marianne Celce-Muria, Donna M. Brinton, Janet M. Goodwin. Teaching
Pronunciation: A Reference for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages. (Cambridge
University Press, 1996.) P. 172 (Online) http://www.betteraccent. com/papers/ quotes_on _
pronunciation.htm. Accessed on August2nd, 2004.
22
Higgins, J, ELT Journal 38,1, (Online) http://www.marlodge.supanet.com/wordlist/ho m
o g rph.html. Accessed on Sunday, February 8th, 2004.
/rikӘ’d23 It means that Joy and Delon, perhaps, one day will get a new record in
world idol because of their ability. And for second other way with front-stressed
/’rekəd/24 meaning that Joy and Delon (Surely, their songs) will be recorded in
rhythm and intonation, the main factor in understanding an utterance, only occur
in spoken genre.
Different from spoken, written genre (our focus in this theses) has more
written language, ambiguity is found literally that some reader cannot find
the language. Contextually, written language does not provide factual or real
context clearly, except for kind of descriptive writing, e.g. comics, some novels
and etc, it will be easier for the reader to understand the context because some
For example; in the comic usually mentioned the place and time where and when
the conversation occurs. By this, the reader will be easy to identify the context in
the conversation. As the result, there will none ambiguity in understanding the
language and also the homograph. For another kind of writing, for instance;
23
Echols, M. John dan Hassan Shadily. Kamus Inggris-Indonesia An English-Indonesian
Dictionary. (Cornell University Press). (Ithaca and London, Penerbit PT Gramedia Pustaka Utama
Jakarta. 1976)
24
Ibid
Narrative, Expositive, and so on, opportunity of ambiguity is more to occur, so
be identified. Such kind of writing is usually written in form of narration, its form
so that the readers find difficulty in analyzing the context in the writing.
Example:
Since man first became an intelligent being he has looked up into the
heaven from day to day, wondering and tying to predict what weather was
in store for him. He has experienced periods of rain, snow and hail, of
blistering heat and biting cold….
Weather and climate exercise a vital influence on all plant and animal life.
Anyone who gazes up into the heaven on a clear night cannot help but be
awed by a sense of vastness-vastness in distance, in size, and in
numbers…25
In the examples above, italic and bold words symbolize the ambiguity
words that are also called as homograph. Each of word in the paragraph may have
more than one meaning, let see one by one. Because we are discussing about the
translation of English into Bahasa Indonesia, here the writer also provides the
Learner’s Dictionary26 for more meaning in English and from Kamus Inggris
Indonesia27 for the meaning in Bahasa Indonesia. For the meaning in Bahasa
25
Djoko Sumitro English for Science and technology. Fakultas Sastra UGM (Gadjah
Mada University Press. 1986) p. 124
26
Hornby, AS, Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English (Oxford
University Press, 1974)
27
Echols, M. John dan Hassan Shadily. Kamus Inggris-Indonesia An English-Indonesian
Dictionary. (Cornell University Press). (Ithaca and London, Penerbit PT Gramedia Pustaka Utama
Jakarta. 1976)
Indonesia, the writer will symbolize with (*) in the end of the word. Below are the
explanations:
The word “since” can have the meaning as “after a date or during a period of
time”/“sejak, semenjak, sejak itu*” when applies as the adverb (adv) in one
context and can have the meaning as “because”/“karena*” when the word
may mean as “to be”/”adalah, menjadi, sedang, lagi*” when functions as the
and faith, it may mean “god providence, place of supreme happiness”/ “sorga,
“gerak badan, latihan*” (verb) in context of sport and means “make use of,
rasa*” (noun).
It is the fact that Bahasa Indonesia has more meanings for almost all of
comparison to English itself. This fact brings about more problems for the
translator (English-to-Bahasa Indonesia Translation) in determining the
appropriate meaning when he/she does translation. Then, the fact that
equivalent of the SL both in meaning and style. This requirement demands the
Sociolinguistics.
b. Types of Homograph
Homographs, which arise caused by way of voicing the final consonant of the
word, called Voicing Homograph. The third kind is what that happens because of
inflectional variants; the words that are ended by -ATE and –MENT suffixes.
abbreviations are also a source of happening lexical ambiguity, all the results are
into some specific types of homograph which, then, behave as its own part of
speech e.g., as a noun, the word `minute' /‘minit/ means a unit for measuring
It is a fact that different place of stress (Front, mid, or end stress) in the
syllable of the words produce different meaning of the words. Higgins explains
that:
In most cases any adjective senses ally themselves with the noun and
exhibit front stress, but in one case, content, the adjective sense is end-
stressed and relates more closely to the verb than to the noun. The
adjective compact seems to occur both front-stressed and end-stressed
with no change of meaning, although the noun is always front-stressed and
the verb always end-stressed. All the other adjectives in the full list,
29
Jurafsky and Martin, Disambiguating English Homographs- types of Homograph.
(Online) http://andosl.anu.edu.au/andosl/general_info/ANDOSLphonemic.html. Accessed on
Sunday, February 8th, 2004.
30
Sinclair, Linguistic Problem – Lexical Ambiguity 1987, (Online) http://www.fi. muni. cz/
usr/wong/teaching/mt/notes/node32.html.iso-8859-1. Accessed on Saturday, February 7th 2004.
absent, abstract, compound, converse, frequent, perfect, present,
quadruple and second, were front-stressed31.
small space
Compoun (1) substance combining not linear in to make more
d
chemical elements progression complex
buildings
Converse Opposite to talk to someone
to talk to another
person
Content what is contained (to make) happy
frequent often occurring to visit regularly
Present gift, time now in this place to hand over
from the verb enter while the verb sense derives from the noun trance.
• The word deserts exists as two different nouns, one front-stressed meaning
'dry places', and the other end-stressed meaning 'what one deserves' and
occurring usually in the fixed phrase 'get one's just deserts'. This second
use has a homophone in the word desserts meaning 'sweet courses', which
31
Higgins, J (1984). ELT Journal 38, 1, (Online) http: //www. marlodge. Supanet. com/
Higgins.htm. Accessed on Sunday. February 8th, 2004.
• The word process exists as a noun with front-stress and as two different
verbs, one with front-stress with a meaning linked to the noun process and
There were two interesting words, which reversed the trend of this set,
words where the front-stressed form was the (3rd person singular) verb and a form
pronunciation varies with their position in the phrase, front-stressed before a noun
and end-stressed when final in the phrase, though without substantial change of
meaning. (Compare "an overnight bag" with "Are you staying overnight?")
There are a number of other English words which behave in the same way,
Probably only the word overall (with its secondary meaning of an item of
clothing) should be counted as a homograph, since in the other cases the change
Another kind of word that is also included into homographs are the set of
words ending with –ATE. All of them use the same stress pattern whether
noun/adjective or verb except for alternate and consummate which, puts the
stress at the front for the verb and later for the noun/adjective. Below are the
These words – set of words ending with -MENT – are almost the same as
what just happened to the –ATE words, but they are smaller in group:
32
Higgins, J (1984). ELT Journal 38, 1, (Online) http: //www. marlodge. Supanet. com/
Higgins.htm. Accessed on Sunday. February 8th, 2004.
b.2. Voicing Homographs.
Six words below are the words that the distinction of noun/verb or
Besides all kind of homographs we have discussed on, there is one another
kind of homograph which arises from abbreviating. Abbreviations that are usually
be found in writing cause ambiguity for the reader to choose the correct reference
33
Higgins, J (1984). ELT Journal 38, 1, (Online) http: //www. marlodge. Supanet. com/
Higgins.htm. Accessed on Sunday. February 8th, 2004.
Reg is pronounced /reʤ/ when it is short for Reginald or registration, as
in "a T-reg car". It is pronounced /reg/ when it is short for regulation as in
"Queen's Regs" (the British Army's rule book). Luckily the second form is almost
always plural and the first almost always singular, so there is little chance of
confusion. There are at least three cases where a Homograph arises between a full
word and an abbreviation. One is the Homograph of path, which is pronounced
/pɑƟ/ by speakers in its ordinary meaning as a place to walk, and /pæƟ/ when it
is an abbreviation for pathology, as in "we are waiting for the path reports";
another is the abbreviation Staffs /stæfs/ for Staffordshire against the verb staffs
/stɑfs/, which would be homograph in upper-case writing; and a third is the word
coax pronounced /kəʊks/ meaning persuade versus the abbreviation for coaxial
cable coax pronounced /kəʊɑks/34
34
Higgins, J (1984). ELT Journal 38, 1, (Online) http: //www. marlodge. Supanet. com/
Higgins.htm. Accessed on Sunday. February 8th, 2004.
B. SEMANTICAL PREVIEW
a. Role of Semantics.
In scope of Linguistics, there are three mains level of discussion that will
Phonologic and Grammatik are two terms of study that concern on the form of the
language and its contribution. Unlike both terms, Semantics discusses about the
sounds of word are the aspect what the five senses can detect, while contents are
From the time of Descartes up till at least the end of the nineteenth
century, there was a generally accepted psychological semantics,
according to which the meaning of a word is the idea (or ‘representation’)
that it creates in the minds of speakers and hearers, and the meaning of a
sentence is a combination of the ideas expressed by the words.35
In study of semantic, there are two kinds of meaning known as the root of
the meaning. Firstly, Lexical meaning, that is the sense, which contained by the
word itself. This kind of meaning is what usually we find in the dictionary with a
certain meaning for a certain word. Here means that the real meaning that showed
by the constituent itself. In this chance, the meaning describes the word itself. For
instance; the word Human, when ones pronounces the word, the listener must
have thought that it means ‘a kind of god creatures who has a thinking, sense, and
35
Wilfrid Hodges, The unexpected usefulness of model theory in semantics, (Queen Mary,
University of London). P.3. (Online) http://www. ncte.org/ library/ files/ Publications/ Journals
/vm/0111-sept03/VM0111Semanticstheory.pdf. Accessed on Sunday. February 8th, 2004.
Secondly, Grammatical meaning, is the meaning which appears because of
grammatical rule influence. In the first sentence, the word ’book’ as the noun and
‘is’ as the verb indicates that the sentence is used in singular form. Different case
for the second sentence, which indicates that the sentence is in plural, it is because
of the ‘books’ (with –s) as the noun and ‘are’ as the verb (plural form).
b. Contextual Orientation.
Context is the unit which sets the meaning a border that interpreter may
not interprete the sentence or utterance as he/she wishes. Context gives the limit to
36
Mey L. Jacob, PRAGMATICS An Introduction. (Oxford UK&Cambridge USA:
Blackwell Publisher, 1993). p.38.
utterance or a sentence, reader or listener has to agree with the context which has
According to Syahwin, there are, at least, three factors which ones must
1. Ones must know the meaning of each word in the sentence or in the
utterance.
3. Ones must know the context of the language (where and when the
understand the sentence above ones must firstly know the meaning of all words in
the sentence. Secondly, ones has to understand the fact of the object talking about.
And finally ones must realize the context of the utterance or the sentence. Below
37
Varol Akman, Context as a Social Construct. (Department of Computer Engineering
and Information Science Bilkent University Bilkent, Ankara Turkey), (Online)
Http://www.CsBilkent.Edu.Tr/~Akman/Conf-Papers/Fss97/Node9.Html. Accessed 24th.2004.
38
Nikelas Syahwin, PENGANTAR LINGUISTIK UNTUK GURU BAHASA (Jakarta:
Depdikbud Dirjen Pendidikan Tinggi Proyek Pengembangan Lembaga Pendidikan Tenaga
Kepandidikan, 1988). p. 222.
a. The teacher was absent for a week and the students are happy
teacher is in class” will mean that the teacher has come back to
b. The teacher usually comes into the class late, so the students usually
spend their five minute first out side the class. In fact today, the
that the teacher will punish them who are still out sides of class.
c. The teacher is behind the cup board seeking for something, none of
students can see him, so that they are in noise, then one of them
c. Cultural orientation
of foreign language does not mean that we have understood the message in that
cultural aspect is directly involved. For example; when an American tells to you
the sentence, “She is a chick”, then you may not interpret that the guy is telling
that the girl is a chicken (an animal). But you must, firstly, know that in their
culture word “chicks” is another word for whore or prostitution. Another example
kantor”. When you plan to translate this sentence, you may not instantly change
the meaning literally word for word; “Don’t believe it! They’re all the mice of the
with the expression “tikus-tikus kantor “-) and in other country will differentiate
d. Context Analysis.
translators work on interpreting and transferring the ideas and messages from one
language (Source/SL) into another (Target/TL). A translator has a very big role in
conveying the messages of the author in SL into TL, so that the reader, who has
ability only to understand his/her mother tongue, may know, use or, even, adopt
all important messages proposed by the author. This big responsibility needs all
translators to realize that there are many aspects that they have to prepare in order
that the responsibility is fulfilled. Contextual and Cultural orientation are two
examples what the translator must firstly pay their attention when they start their
work on translation.
language when the translator has an easy paragraph to translate. He/she may,
calmly, do his/her work well without any problem. But when he/she is faced to a
kind of verb (Homograph, Homonym, Polysemes, etc.), which is, lexically and
Countering this problem, it is needed for the translator to have basic skill in
which a translator must prepare as the basic knowledge of the context, are; (i)
World Knowledge and (ii) Knowledge of Language. In case of (ii), the many
Context includes all situations; time when the language is used, place
where the language is produced, people who uses the language, and reason why
the language is used. In short, probably, we can say that context is what refers to
four Ws; Who, When, Where, and Why. Let see a simple sentence as the
example:
The sentence above may has multi meanings depending on Who, When,
Where and Why the sentence is uttered. Sentence “you may shoot now” has
contrastly different meaning when it is uttered by a soccer athlete, when the ball is
near to enemy’s goal post in the field (means to kick the ball to the goal quickly),
they are ready exactly in front of enemy’s house and they can see the enemy are
39
Harris, Wendell V, Interpretive Acts: In Search of Meaning, (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1988) (Online) Http://www.Cs.Bilkent.Edu.Tr/~Akman/Conf-Papers/Fss97/Node9.Html. Accessed
on February 24th. 2004.
CHAPTER III
its knowledge. Each of branches of the knowledge are taught and studied in
develops the students to have ability and skill in teaching, lecturing, tutoring and
Biology, Islamic Studies, Arabic and Islamic Education. All of departments are
Especially for Department of English, the students are not only prepared
for being the teacher but also they are hoped to be good writer, interpreter or
the students to be a good teacher and to have another skill in English, English
Department has many programs provided for the students during their study
Speaking, Writing, Listening and Reading, and there are more subjects are taught
in the classroom. Translation is taught in two levels; Translation I for the first
level (for the students in semester fourth) and for next level is Translation II (for
the students in semester fifth). Translation I&II is taught to fulfill students ’ ability
produced many good teachers and writers that spreading out in many universities
and schools. They also wrote in many magazines, journals, and papers. It also has
produced many interpreters and translators who work for NGO’s and International
Organizations.
b. Object of study
Let’s back to our focus, like what has been stated in the chapter I that the
Aceh. The respondents were the students of English Department at fifth semester,
the writer included all of students who take Translation II subject as the
population, this meant because most of them had taken Translation I at semester
four. There were three classes opened for this subject, the writer took about ten of
..............................................................................................................................
Observation was firstly done by the writer to see the situation in the classroom
directly. In order to have best clear information, the writer had to have opportunity
to do short dialogue to the sample; it was to find out their opinion about teaching-
learning process.
c. Test
After the observation was finished, the writer gave test to the sample; test
was given all at once meeting. Each of the students was asked to answer the
The test was drawn in two types: multiple choice and essay. In the first
type, the students were only asked to determine the correct meaning (translation)
of the word of English (Homograph), which had been translated into Bahasa
Indonesia. The answers were provided in the icon; a, b, c and d. The questions
were the sentence that contained word of homograph, the sentence was also
provided with the context (situation of the sentence, including time and place).
For one word of homograph (e.g. Bank) was formulated in two different
sentences with different context. This aimed to find out students ’ ability in
determining the meaning of the word suitably to the context of the sentence where
1. If you want to get there earlier, go straight, then you should choose
right way.
a. Kanan b. Permainan
c. Pilihan d. Benar
2. If you want to be saved in this world and here after, you should choose
the right way.
a. Kanan b. Permainan
c. Pilihan d. Benar
3. After taking some money, you may wait for me in the bank that will be
easy for me to find you.
a. Bank b. Tepi sungai
c. Pasar d. Persimpangan.
4. They wait for us in the river bank before they move to the jungle.
a. Bank b. Tepi sungai
c. Pasar d. Persimpangan.
To interpret the data obtained from the test, the writer firstly analyzed the
scores resulted from the test. In analyzing all of the score of the test given, there
R = Hs – Ls
R
I=
K
K = 1+3,3 log n
x =
∑ fi.xi
∑ fi
fi: Frequency
xi: the score
answering the test. For the score 86-100 (A) means that the students are excellent
then the students who got the score 72-85 are categorized in very good, means
that they are also quite good in finishing homograph test. For those who got 60-71
are classified in good level, which means they are also good in translating
homograph. And finally for those who yielded the score between 0-59 (0-49 and
50-59) are categorized into enough and fail students ’, it means that they are still
applied in order to be easier to find out the Mean of the score. The formula used
is:
X=
∑ fi.xi
∑ fi
In this case, xi represents “middle point” of class interval. The first step
what the writer did was to determine the range of the test result, this aimed to find
the difference between the highest scores and the lowest one.
In the space below, we will see the students’ score for the test given (choice
test):
96 84 82 78 70 64
94 84 80 78 70 62
92 82 80 72 70 58
92 82 80 72 68 56
90 82 80 72 64 56
R = Hs – Ls
= 96– 56
= 40
purposed to arrange the table with the intervals. The formula used is:
R
I=
K
K = 1 + 3.3 log n
= 1 + (3.3) log 30
= 1 + (3.3) (1.477)
= 5.87 = 6
40
I= = 6.67 = 7
6
Based on the result yielded above, it resulted 7 as class interval to arrange a
Scores Fi xi fi . xi
1 2 3 4
50-56 2 53 106
57-63 2 60 120
64-70 6 67 182
71-77 3 74 222
78-84 12 81 972
85-91 1 88 88
92-98 4 95 380
Total 30 - 2070
The mean for the data drawn in the table above can be obtained by using
∑ fi.xi
x =
∑ fi
2070
=
30
x = 69
Based on the calculation above, we can find the mean resulted for
Finally, all of the above formula would be used in the same way for the
next calculation.
Below are the students’ raw for the test of the essay:
94 78 75 69 58 44
88 76 73 68 57 40
88 75 72 68 56 38
86 75 72 67 48 35
78 75 70 67 46 33
..............................................................................................................................
From the above raw score we found the highest and the lowest score for the essay
test, it allows the writer to determine the range and find out the class interval.
R = Hs – Ls
= 94 – 33
= 61
R
I=
K
61
I=
6
= 10.1
The class interval of the test resulted is 10.1, so that it could be considered 10 as
From the score listed above, the mean for linking sound test can be obtained
X=
∑ fi..xi
∑ fi
1945
=
30
X = 64.83
The mean obtained for the essay test is 64.83. This is lower than the mean
obtained for the choice test (69). Therefore, writer concluded that the students’
To prove the statement above we can observe the test results, which were
presented in the students’ score list above. For essay tests there was only 1
student got score 96, 3 students got the score between 81-90, 10 students had
score between 71-80, 6 students got the scores between 61-70, then 3 students
got scores between 51-60, 3 students got scores between 41-50 and 4 students
While from the choice test, there were 2 students got the highest scores, it
was between 92-98, only 1 student got score between 85-91, 12 students obtained
scores between 78-84, 3 students got score between 71-77, 6 students had scores
between 70-64, 2 students yielded scores 57-63 and 2 students got scores between
50-56.
Having good score in the choice test does not mean that they are also got
good score in the other test. The students who are in very good (B) and good (C)
position in the first test do not get good marks in the second test. Most of them got
The test result indicates that the students were able (even though not so
was proved by the fact that they got good scores in this test. This fact could be
influenced by the format of the questions (in choice) drawn by the writer were
easy. It was purposed by the reason that the homograph was not taught as a sub
While for the essay test, they got lower scores than for the choices tests. It
means that the student still have problem in translating a text containing
homograph in a whole text (essay) could be more difficult than what happened in
the choice.
B. Questionnaire Result and Discussion.
- The questionnaire with any mistaken is not used as the source of the data,
Based on the criteria above, there are only two questionnaires from 30
f
was determined using the formula: P = , in which, P = Percentage, f =
N
Table 3.1. About students’ preference on writing skill among three other skills
(For four of skills in English (Speaking, Reading, Writing and Listening), do you
like writing?)
Frequenc
Answer option Percentage %
y
a. Strongly like 22 78.57%
b. Like 2 7.14%
c. Dislike 4 14.29%
d. Strongly dislike -
Totals 28 100%
The percentage above shows that there are only 2 students (7.14%),
who have more passive interest in studying Writing. There are 22 students
(78.57%) who like most in studying Writing and 4 students (14.29%) who
dislike studying Writing. This fact, surely, has a very crucial effect toward
homograph.
Table 3.2. About students’ agreement that translation is part of skill in writing
(Do you agree that Translation is one part of skills in writing?)
Frequenc
Answer option Percentage %
y
a. Strongly agree 21 75.00 %
b. Agree 6 21.43%
c. Disagree 1 3.57%
d. Strongly Disagree -
Totals 28 100%
determining exactly which part of skill the Translation is. 1 of them (3.57%)
in writing because there is, actually, another term for the same meaning
Referring to this idea, probably, it caused students to have the opinion that
translation is not absolutely included in writing. But (based on the table) there
were still many students think that translation is one part of skill in writing.
Table 3.3. About students’ interest in learning homograph (Are you interested
in learning translation?)
Frequenc
Answer option Percentage %
y
a. Strongly interested 20 71.43%
b. Interested 5 17.86%
c. Uninterested 3 10.71%
Strongly uninterested - -
Totals 28 100%
The data in the previous page shows that not all of the students, with their own
reasons, did like learning Translation. The table shows that there are 3 students
The above paragraph provides the conclusion that there were more
than half respondents have willing to learn about homograph. This evidence
Table 3.4. About when is the first time the students learn about homograph
(When is the first time you learn about Translation?)
learn about Translation when they were in school. While the students who
learn about Translation when they come to the college are 18 students
(64,29%). This result describes that more than half of the students learn
Table 3.5. About Types of translation usually used by the students (What type
of Translation do you usually use?)
The table above shows that there were 6 students (21.43%) like Full
students (50%) like Free Translation. Here, the percentage describes that half
writer agrees that Free Translation provides more simply way to transfer the
process that is not depending on each word produced in one language, but it
Table 3.6. About kind of problem faced by the students in translation (What
kind of problem do you usually face when working in translation?)
Answer option Frequenc Percentage %
y
a. Pronoun reference 2 7.14%
b. Meaning ambiguity 13 46.43%
c. Strange word meaning. 12 42.86%
d. Active-passive meaning 1 3.57%
Totals 28 100%
Table above shows that there are 2 students (7.14%) who usually faced
Based on the results shown in the table, it can be assumed that many students
The tables 3.7 above shows that 16 students (57.14%) preferred to analyze
the context of the text when they have the problem of meaning ambiguity, then 4
students (14.29%) tend to identify Structural clues to solve the problem of
ambiguity, and 8 students (28.57%) have another way to solve this problem. In the
questionnaire, the writer provided a space for the respondents to have their own
idea to solve the problem of ambiguity. From 8 students who had another idea,
almost all of them chose (with different expression of language but they have the
same point) “to determine the main idea”, except there are two students who
Table in page 48 shows us that the number of students who did not ever
hear about the term Homograph is 19 students (87.86%) and the students who
ever did that is 9 students (32.14%). The data above indicate that there are many
students who do not know about the term homograph yet, although in fact, they
Table 3.9. About students’ knowledge of homograph (How far do you know about
homograph?)
Table 3.9 was telling us about number of the students and their knowledge
about homograph, it was no student (0%) who knew about homograph exactly
(knowing everything about the term), 25 students (89.29%) who knew about
homograph but they did not perfectly understand the term, then there are 2
students (7.14%) who did not know about homograph, but they thought that they
had ever found such homograph word. And there was also 1 student who has no
The data in the table 3.10 shows frequency of the students who faced the
classroom, 7 students (25.00%) told that their obstacle is hard to find the book that
has explanation about homograph. And 10 students (35.71%) admitted that there
homograph by various methods used. There were 12 students (42.86%) that used
the homograph word as the methods to ease them mastering homograph. And
there were 6 respondents (21.43%) who like to learn about the word’s stress to
Table 3. 12. About students’ opinion about the importance of learning homograph
(What is your opinion about homograph in terms of its importance to be learned?)
crucial advantages to learn homograph or not, and 1 student (3.57%) claimed that
it is not important to learn about homograph. This explanation allows us to see
that there are more than half the students who stated that homograph is needed to
Table 3.13. About the advantages got by students from learning homograph (In
prediction, what advantages would you get from learning homograph?)
..............................................................................................................................
Table above describes the frequency of students who gave the opinions about the
advantages of learning homograph. From the table we can see that there was 10
respondents (35.71%) agreed that learning homograph could allow translators to
have accurate translation. 11 respondents (39.29%) had a thinking that learning
homograph will make translator easier to translate text containing homograph.
And 7 respondents (25.00%) agreed that learning homograph would prevent
inappropriate transferring of the idea.
Table 3. 14 About students’ opinion and their agreement that homograph would be
introduced in the classroom. (Do you agree that homograph must be introduced in
the classroom (Translation Class)? Why?)
..............................................................................................................................The
table in page 53 describes that 19 students (67.86%) agreed that homograph to be
included into the syllabus (Translation subject), and 9 students (32.14%) who
disagreed if homograph to be included into the syllabus.
..............................................................................................................................
Based on the above paragraph, it may be concluded that many students did agree
that homograph would be a small topic in the syllabus by the reason in order that
learning homograph will be more formal (because has been included in the
syllabus) to study.
CHAPTER IV
A. CONCLUSIONS
After we have long discussions about the theory and the research in
previous chapter, now the turn to have some conclusions. Finding out whether the
students have the ability to translate homograph appropriately with the context
where the homograph is attached is the main goal of this study, besides there are
two other aims; about their ability in recognizing the context of text containing
homograph and about their opinions toward teaching and learning process,
because they do not know, even they never heard, will never allow them to have a
very good and perfect result of translation. Having no topic items of homograph in
syllabus for translation subject is also one obstacle for the students that they have
no knowledge in homograph.
Test results show us that many students had good ability in determining
the meaning of homograph in the choice test. It proves through their correctness in
the questions. Although some of the students got not so high scores but mostly all
of them got high scores for choice test. For essay test, the students seemed faced
more difficult problems. It was shown by their results. Almost all of them yielded
low scores. It was under 50% of students who were in high level of scores.
This result is, actually, amazing because questionnaire reported that almost
all students realized that they did not know what homographs is, and even more
than half of them had never heard the term. Homograph was still strange topic to
discuss for the students, even though some of them had ever heard but they did
not know exactly what it is. However, many students gave good appreciations
toward learning homograph and they supported the idea that homograph would be
included into the syllabus because it would be more formal to be learned. Mostly
B. SUGGESTIONS.
In order to obtain our goal in teaching learning process and to produce our
excellent quality of our ability and development, there are some suggestions that
we may take into consideration to our bright future. It is hoped that learning
translation is not only to learn how to substitute or how to replace the meaning of
a word in source language with the meaning in the target language but also to
introduced) in the classroom, so that the students may have valuable knowledge in
field of translation.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anonymous, The Heritage Illustrated Dictionary of English Language. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin, n.d.
Brislin, Richard W,ed. Translation: Aplication and Research. New York: Gardnen
Press, 1976.
Carter V. Good. Dictionary of Education. New York: Mc Graw Hill Book, 1959.
Djoko Sumitro. English for Science and technology; Fakultas Sastra UGM.
Bandung: Gadjah Mada University Press. 1986.
Landav, I. Sidney and Ronald J.Bogus. The Doubleday Dictionary (for Home,
School and Office). New York: Doubleday, 1975.
Mustafa AR, MA. A comparison of some Linguistic routines between English and
Bahasa Indonesia in terms of Language and culture perspectives, Jurnal
Ilmiah DIDAKTIKA, Banda Aceh: Fakultas Tarbiyah IAIN Ar-raniry
Darussalam Banda Aceh, September 1999.
Wiig and Semel. Language Assessment and Intervention for the Learning
Disabled. Columbus: Bell and Howell, 1980.
Table page
Table I. Students ’ tests scores .......................................................... 37
Table. II. Distribution frequency of choice test. ............................... 40
Table. III. Distribution frequency of Essay test score. ...................... 42
Table 3.1. About students’ preference on writing skill among three
other skills (For four of skills in English ......................... 44
Table 3.2. About students’ agreement that translation is part of skill
in writing .......................................................................... 45
Table 3.3. About students’ interest in learning homograph ............... 46
Table 3.4. About when is the first time the students learn
about homograph ............................................................. 46
Table 3.5. About Types of translation usually used by the students. . 47
Table 3.6. About kind of problem faced by the students
in translation ..................................................................... 47
Table 3.7. About students’ trick in solving problem
of meaning ambiguity....................................................... 48
Table 3. 8. About their experience on homograph ............................ 49
Table 3. 9. About students’ knowledge of homograph ...................... 49
Table 3.10. About students’ obstacles in understanding
Homograph ................................................................... 50
Table 3.11. About the method used by students in learning
Homograph ................................................................... 50
Table 3. 12. About students’ opinion about the importance
of learning homograph .................................................. 51
Table 3.13. About the advantages got by students from
learning homograph ...................................................... 52
Table 3. 14 About students’ opinion on their agreement that
homograph would be introduced in the classroom ........ 52
Table 3.15. About students’ agreement if homograph
is included into the syllabus ............................................ 53
Questionnaires
Petunjuk Umum
Kuisioner ini terdiri dari tiga bagian; Bagian A tentang latar belakang Anda,
bagian B tentang sikap Anda terhadap Bahasa Inggris secara umum, dan bagian C
tentang mata kuliah Translation (berkaitan dengan permasalahan dalam
translation, khususnya permasalahan homograph).
16. If ‘Yes’, do you agree that homograph will be a sub topic in the syllabus
(of Translation class)? Why?
b. Mother
Name : Rahmani Faridan
Occupation : Teacher
Address : Jl.Medan-Banda Aceh Ds.Peurupok.
Kec. Syamtalira Aron, Lhoksukon A.Utara
Yours Truly,
(Saifullah Ali)
Curriculum Vitae
Mobile : +6285260016327
E mail : saiful_education@yahoo.com
Date of Birth July 2nd, 1980 Peurupok, North Aceh
Sex Male
Nationality Indonesian
Education Background
College Faculty of Islamic Teaching Studies (2004)
Department of English
State Institute of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry, Darussalam
Banda Aceh, NAD Indonesia.
Work Experience
2005-2006 Education Program Officer
Nov – now Save the Children Aceh AERA Program, Lhokseumawe Office,
NAD Indonesia
2005 Translator
Jan – Feb Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) Indonesia.
2004 Teacher
Jan – Dec Islamic Senior High School (MA) Banda Aceh, NAD Indonesia.
2003 English Instructor
Feb – Nov YEC (Youth Education Centre) Banda Aceh, NAD Indonesia
2003-2004 Computer Operator
Jan’03 – Dec’04 ERC Computer, Darussalam Banda Aceh.
Volunteer Experience
• Department
o Member of English Department Students Association, State
Institute of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2000-04)
o Committee of EDSA Anniversary, Department of English,
State Institute of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2002).
o Committee of English Olympiad, Department of English,
State Institute of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2003).
• Faculty
o Member of Student Senate, Tarbiyah Faculty, State Institute
of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2002-04)
o Committee of BKO I&II (A Month Activities of Sport), Faculty
of Tarbiyah, State Institute of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry
(2002, 2003)
• University
o Member of Sanggar Seni (Student Activities Unit of Arts),
State Institute of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2000, 2004)
o Member of BEMA (Student Executive Council), State Institute
of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2002-03)
o Committee of Acehnese Arts and Culture Contest, State
Institute of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2002)
o Committee of Panel Discussion on “Mempersiapkan Generasi
Muda da’wah yang Beriman dan Berkwalitas”, State Institute
of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2002)
o Committee of Acehnese Tradional Culture Exhibition, State
Institute of Islamic Studies of Ar-raniry (2003)
Language skills
Knowledge of software
Microsoft Office
Hobbies
Guitar, Soccer, Game.