This final project is descriptive analysis on the use of language switch and literal translation as communication strategies by students at Ta’mirul Islam Boarding School. The aims of this study are to find out language switch and literal translation used by students in their daily conversation and to describe in what context and to what extent they use both strategies.
The population of this study was the year XII students who always used English as their daily language in their school and dormitory. There were ten students involved in the conversation. Questionnaire and recording daily conversation were used to collect the data.
The result of the study shows that there were 8 language switches and 25 literal translations occurred during the conversation, 24% of language switch and 76% of literal translation. It means that literal translation was used more than language switch. I also found that although they used many language transfers, the communication could run well.
Based on result above, it is suggested that all studentss minimize the use of language switch and literal translation and start to construct grammatical English utterances. Second, the teachers need to pay more attentions to the use of the students’ communication strategies and to motivate them to avoid constructing ungrammatical utterances.
