Errores e interlengua en la enseñanza-aprendizaje de los refraneros: paremiología animal contrastiva rumano-italiano-español
Errors and Interlanguage in the Teaching–Learning of Proverbs: A Romanian–Italian–Spanish Contrastive Study in Animal Paremiology

Summary/Abstract: The phraseological component has become, in recent years, an essential element in the teaching–learning of foreign languages. As we know, when learning a new language it is important to understand idiomatic expressions and sayings, as this allows us to enter the sociocultural heritage of a people and thus learn about their history, habits and customs, and ways of thinking and seeing the world. When we encounter a saying for the first time, we typically look for an equivalent in our own language; it is then that, due to interlanguage, we make mistakes. Romanian animal sayings share several similarities with Italian and Spanish sayings, as they have a common Latin base. Therefore, this article examines the mistakes Romanian students make when learning animal sayings in Italian and Spanish. In the first part, we discuss paremiology and its features, define the concept of phraseodidactics, and consider its role in foreign-language teaching. In the second part, we present a trilingual (Romanian–Italian–Spanish) corpus of animal sayings, taking into account both literal and conceptual correspondences. We show that, in most cases, the animal type is retained as the nucleus, while the verb or the element of comparison changes. These small semantic mismatches lead to errors. In conclusion, we argue that the mistakes Romanian students make when learning Italian and Spanish proverbs are largely due to interlanguage.

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