Grammatical Interference and Conceptual Transfer in the Written Indonesian of Arabic-Speaking BIPA Learners: A Cross-Linguistic Influence Perspective
BIPA, grammatical interference, Arabic speakers, conceptual transfer, cross-linguistic influence, learner writing
Abstract
Previous studies on BIPA learners who are native speakers of Arabic have tended to focus on phonology, pronunciation, pragmatic-cultural competence, and vocabulary acquisition, whereas grammatical interference in learner writing has received comparatively limited attention. This study aims to identify and explain forms of grammatical interference and conceptual transfer in the Indonesian writing of Arabic-speaking BIPA learners. It adopts a descriptive qualitative approach using document analysis. The data were obtained from ten Level 3 BIPA learners at the Indonesian Cultural Center in Cairo, Egypt. The corpus consists of ten essays on the topic of “Favorite Figure” and forty written responses to four open-ended questions. The analysis was conducted through close reading of the corpus, identification of grammatically deviant forms, determination of target forms in Indonesian, comparison with possible Arabic patterns, and classification of data according to interference categories. The findings reveal 22 forms of grammatical interference grouped into five categories: prepositional and grammatical relational interference; verb, affixation, and transitivity interference; passive construction interference; nominalization interference; and literal translation interference. Prepositional and grammatical relational interference constitutes the most dominant category. These findings show that interference in learner writing is not merely a matter of formal deviation but also reflects structural and conceptual transfer from Arabic into Indonesian within the interlanguage process. This study contributes to research on BIPA for Arabic speakers by demonstrating that learner writing is a crucial site for understanding cross-linguistic influence. Pedagogically, the findings highlight the need to strengthen writing instruction for Arabic-speaking BIPA learners in the areas of semantically based preposition use, verbs and transitivity, passive constructions, nominalization, and paraphrasing exercises to reduce literal translation.
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