Abstract

It had been noticed that level the medical staff and patients at the Biaka clinic and the General Hospital in Buea had difficulties in interrogations. In fact, these difficulties represent a handicap since it affects their expression in English and does not motivate them to use English as regularly as they should. In order to shed light on this problem, we conducted research that helped us to collect some data which, after analysis, revealed the intensity of these difficulties. The results of the data collected at the Biaka clinic and the General Hospital show that the staff and patients wrongly used the interrogations. We also noticed that the staff and patients also have difficulties in sentence structure and tenses. Finally, we noticed that the staff and the patients were victims of the phenomenon of interference of Pidgin to English.

CHAPTER ONE

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

Learning more than one language is today a challenge that many people want to face. In many bilingual countries, being bilingual means for people to be completely members of the whole community. That is to say that the ability they have to express themselves in the different official languages spoken in the country makes them feel they can merge their selves in any sociolinguistic situation and it is nothing but an advantage for them and for the society they belong to. Taking the case of Cameroon which is a country where the two official languages are English and French, this spirit of bilingualism is winning the minds of the youths. Some theorists of ESL and EFL stipulated that, the acquisition of a second language is due to many factors. It is based on these factors that one can estimate the degree of success that a learner can have in the course of learning and using a second language.

English and French, when opposed do not have the same status in the world in general. Studies have proven that English has been in the last decades and even nowadays the first language in the world. It is the language of communication, commerce, technology, science, business… many factors contribute to the justification of the status that English has today. This status gives to English more value and therefore motivates people to learn it more and more. It is the case of francophone students who, more than being impressed and motivated by the advantages that mastering English can offer, are also willing to practice it each day of their life. In fact, in the University of Buea in general and in the English and French department in particular, we have a group of francophone students who had for objective to become bachelors in bilingual studies i.e. in English and in French. Flowever, just as in any case of SLA, they are confronted to some difficulties in the course of learning, problems

which are reflected in their usage of this language. For instance, Lado.R (1957) says in his introduction to Linguistics across Cultures explained that, in the course of learning a second language, there are some variations that appear depending on the learner.