Personal and Spatial Deixes amid Foreign Students in Muhammadiyah University of Purwokerto

Abstract

This study aimed at investigating personal and spatial deictic expressions in the uses of Indonesian language by the foreign students in Muhammadiyah University of Purwokerto (UMP). These foreign students were the learners who came from various countries that learned Indonesian language in UMP. A descriptive qualitative method was used in this study. The findings indicated that the inappropriate uses of personal deixis in Indonesian language applied by the foreign students entailed: a) the incorrect uses of pronouns ‘saya’, ‘aku’, ‘Anda’ and ‘kamu’, b) the mistakes in sentence arrangement, c) the translation from English language which was dominantly used, and d) the incorrect uses of second person pronoun. In the meantime, the incorrect uses of spatial deixis were found in the words ‘ini’, ‘itu’, and ‘di sana’. The foreign students found it difficult to learn deixis in the light of various vocabulary choices of Indonesian language so that they ended up with confusion. The inappropriate uses of personal deixis were dominantly encountered because the foreign students were confronted with the difficulties in using the first person, second person, and third person of personal deixis in their daily Indonesian communication