Article and demonstratives as difficult elements in learning English and Japanese as a second language

Abstract

The purpose of this paper firstly is to provide a general overview of these difficulties concerning English and Japanese language learning. Secondly, I intend to focus on grammatical difficulties only, and give a more detailed description and analysis of more specific points, namely the English article system and the Japanese demonstratives in discourse deictic function that are commonly considered as possible areas of difficulty for the learners of these languages. As a basis of the analysis a self-made research was carried out with Hungarian, English and Japanese speakers.