DEFINITENESS AND ENGLISH ARTICLES AS CHALLENGES FOR CROATIAN EFL LEARNERS
DEFINITENESS AND ENGLISH ARTICLES AS CHALLENGES FOR CROATIAN EFL LEARNERS

Summary/Abstract: This paper explores the challenges faced by Croatian native speakers - students of English- in acquiring the article system (a, an, the). Since the Croatian language does not possess a grammatical category of articles, students must learn an entirely new grammatical structure and the concept of definiteness/indefiniteness. Through a theoretical framework grounded in cognitive linguistics and an empirical error analysis based on a gap-filling task, the paper shows that students often perceive definiteness differently from native speakers. The results indicate that the strict application of rules leads to systematic errors, whereas a meaning- and context-based approach enables greater accuracy and understanding. The analysis of three student groups (students of English, computer science, and law) reveals that academic discipline affects success in article use, with English language students demonstrating the highest accuracy. The paper highlights the need for a balance between grammatical explanation and contextual practice in language teaching.

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