The Use of English Articles by Non-Native Speaker of English

This paper aims to investigate the use of English articles by non-native speaker of English. An adult English learner whose native language was Chinese participated in this study. In order to examine how the learner developed the English article system, TLU analysis was adopted. The data was collected from several oral interviews along with retell or picture-cue tasks. All the interviews were tape-recorded. With respect to the indefinite article a, although the participant showed the indefinite article a(n) appropriately in many contexts, she presented several cases of oversuppliance of the indefinite article. With respect to the definite article the, she used the zero article or the definite article in the context where the indefinite article was needed. There were many appropriate production showing that she conformed to the rule that the definite article the should be used when referring to a certain item that hearer and speaker know, to a certain item premodified by superlative form or ordinal numbers. However, she exhibited a few cases of overgeneralization of the definite article the in specific contexts. In addition, she misused the other articles such as the zero article and the indefinite article in the context where the definite article the was needed.