The thesis can be pided into five parts. In the first part, this thesis first introduces the current situation of English writing in China, and then presents the purpose and significance of the study on language transfer in English writing. The second part focuses on the literature reviews and turns to the design of the research based on the theory of Error analysis. The third part presents data collection of research. The research is an experiment presented with subjects and instruments. And the fourth part of the thesis is the analysis of errors. The last part includes findings of the thesis, some suggestions for teachers and students and the limitations of this study.

2. Literature Review

Language transfer means that writers or speakers apply their native language to a second language, which often happens between different languages to a certain degree. But its impact may be positive or negative on second language acquisition. It is related to our English learning, so the thesis will go over theoretical background and the latest development about language transfer.

Language transfer was put forward by American linguist Lado in the book Linguistics across Culture. He holds that negative transfer is the main obstacle during the acquisition of second language (1957). Chinese students learn English based on the mastery of native language. Thus, the process of learning English will be affected by Chinese and Chinese culture. Contrastive Analysis, based on the negative transfer theory and behavioral theory, had a huge effect on the foreign language teaching in that era. However, because of the limitations of Contrastive Analysis Theory, the linguists have begun to analyze the errors of students since the 1960s and the language transfer was criticized theoretically and pratically. This theory holds that not all the errors that the foreign language learners made are caused by the interference of native language. Then cognitivism challenged the behaviorism. The Error analysis and Inter-language Theory took the place of language transfer in the late of 1960s. As a result, the linguistics tried to explain the phenomenon of language transfer according to inter-language.