“To Be Good on English” An Analysis of Cross-Linguistic Influence on Written L2 English Produced by Swedish Secondary School Students

Abstract

This study examines a corpus of essays written in English by Swedish secondary school students from a cross-linguistic perspective in order to determine the extent to which the written form of English by these students is influenced by their native language. This is done through a qualitative/quantitative approach where lexical, syntactic and grammatical mistakes along with collocation choices are analysed in relation to Swedish, and in the latter case compared to LOCNESS, a corpus consisting of English essays written by English native speakers. The study finds that although there are numerous statistically verifiable patters which point toward cross-linguistic influence, the overall proficiency of native-like English appears to be high due to relatively few errors and collocation congruity. Therefore, the possession of Swedish as a native tongue may provide numerous advantages in acquiring English although it remains unproven without comparison to other L1 groups. The specific implications of these findings, alongside their potential value in pedagogical contexts, are outlined toward the end of the study.