The Effect of Some Aspects of Swati Grammar on the Conceptualization of the Structure and Functions of the English Noun Phrase by University Students

Abstract

Eswatini is a bilingual country with English and Swati as official languages. Speakers of other languages use English to communicate with the exception of many speakers of languages spoken in Mozambican such as Shangaan and Portuguese who tend to acquire Swati as soon as they interact with the locals and pick some English if they work for English-speaking employers. At the University of Eswatini, students in the Bachelor of Arts in Humanities programme have an option to study both Swati and English grammar in the Departments of African Languages and Literature and English Language and Literature respectively. Over the years, we noted that despite intensive teaching the constituent structure of the English noun phrase and its syntactic functions within the clause, many candidates still translate the syntactic functions of the Swati noun phrase when describing the English noun phrase. This study then determined to investigate whether the incorrect description of the syntactic functions of the English noun phrase was a result of negative transfer/interference; lack of focus, or an error learnt during the teaching and learning of the English noun phrase from the secondary school level. Using a linguistic analysis of students' responses to tests/examinations and an analysis of prescribed textbooks for teaching English Language in secondary schools, we found that the problems students had in describing the constituent structure and syntactic functions of the noun phrase were transferred from two sources. The first source is the errors identified in the content of prescribed textbooks used to teach English Language at the secondary school level and the second source is the transfer of the description and function of the noun phrase from Swati– a first language of the participants. The findings show the need to incorporate all pillars of linguistic competence: the organizational and sociolinguistic competences when designing materials for the teaching of English to enrich the input required for the optimal comprehension and use of the structural elements of a second language.