Pronunciation acquisition patterns of learners with different starting levels

This study described the results of an investigation into the effect of an intensive 12-week pronunciation course in British English which 30 Dutch female 1st-year university students of English took. They read out the same text before and after the course. Each student’s ‘before’ and ‘after’ tests were recorded. Before analysis of their results, students were split up into three groups on the basis of their general starting level: high, intermediate and low. The analysis involved a before- and after comparison of the pronunciation of eleven different phonemes: /æ, ɒ, ɔː, ʌ, ʊ, d, θ/, medial /t/, coda /r/, and syllable-final /d, v/. The analysis was done by means of both auditory and acoustic analysis. Four degrees of success (or lack thereof) were defined. The results show that the consonants required the least effort, as they were already relatively acceptable before the course started. This was true of students in general, regardless of initial starting level. The three levels of students are most distinguishable on the basis of the development of the consonants during the course. The weaker students’ consonants in particular benefitted from the course. The research revealed that initial level can be used to predict the trajectory of improvement. A general conclusion is that teachers may recognise types of students before the course starts and subject them to different types of teaching

The double-edged sword of RP: the contrasting roles of a pronunciation model in both native and non-native environments

The observations I make are largely based on my MA research, which is now being modified for the purposes of my Ph.D. I asked undergraduate students of English in England and the Czech Republic to evaluate seven voices ranging from the clearly regional to the unquestionably RP. The objective was to discover which sounds are considered to fall within the scope of RP by students in both countries, which approach avoids treating RP as though it were to include only the sounds ‘allowed by a preconceived model’ (Upton 2000: 78). Further, the respondents were asked to comment on the most salient features in the recordings: what they opted to comment on reveals a marked difference in the role of RP as a model accent in the given countries. Societies which lack a prestigious non-regional accent are often oblivious to the social connotations RP carries. Whilst it seems technically impossible to replace the model accent in all teaching materials all over the world, creating awareness of the fact that a rather outmoded model of RP found in many textbooks may not always be the best option is a necessary step towards ensuring that non-English speaking students are not only understood but that their speech will attract no adverse judgements

The diachronic emergence of retroflex segments in three languages

The present study shows that though retroflex segments can be considered articulatorily marked, there are perceptual reasons why languages introduce this class into their phoneme inventory. This observation is illustrated with the diachronic developments of retroflexes in Norwegian (North- Germanic), Nyawaygi (Australian) and Minto-Nenana (Athapaskan). The developments in these three languages are modelled in a perceptually oriented phonological theory, since traditional articulatorily-based features cannot deal with such processes

A role for the developing lexicon in phonetic category acquisition

Infants segment words from fluent speech during the same period when they are learning phonetic categories, yet accounts of phonetic category acquisition typically ignore information about the words in which sounds appear. We use a Bayesian model to illustrate how feedback from segmented words might constrain phonetic category learning by providing information about which sounds occur together in words. Simulations demonstrate that word-level information can successfully disambiguate overlapping English vowel categories. Learning patterns in the model are shown to parallel human behavior from artificial language learning tasks. These findings point to a central role for the developing lexicon in phonetic category acquisition and provide a framework for incorporating top-down constraints into models of category learning

Improvement of English Pronunciation of Russian Learners in a Russian School with the Estonian Language Immersion

’Kuulaja-sõbraliku’ (st. kuulajale kergesti arusaadavat) hääldamise omandamine on üks võimalustest olla arusaadav ja see eeldab edukat suhtlemist. Käesolev töö pakub hääldamise õpetamise meetodite ajaloolist ülevaate. Käesoleva töö peamine eesmärk on välja selgitada, kuidas venelaste inglise keele hääldamist parandada eesti keele hääldamise kaudu eesti keele kümblusega koolis. Magistri töö peamine eesmärk on teada saada, kas on mõttekas kasutada eesti keele vokaalide omadusi vene õpilaste inglise keele vokaalide hääldamise parandamiseks, kuna eesti ja inglise keele vokaalidel on palju ühiseid jooni. Kuulamisel tehtud diktaatide ja kriitilise kuulamise (õpilased ise loevad sõnu, teksti) testide alusel kogutakse vastavad andmed ja tehakse järeldused. Töö esimene osa annab ülevaate eesti, vene ja inglise keele vokaalide süsteemidest. Samuti on antud põhjused, miks on pööratud tähelepanu ainult teatud vokaalide hääldamise parandamisele. Töö eine osa tutvustab uuringu küsimusi, meetodeid, osavõtvate õpilaste arvu ja uuringu toiminguid, mida kasutatakse käesolevas töös. 22-liikmeline grupp 8. klassi õpilastest eesti keele kümblusega Tartu Annelinna gümnaasiumist jaotatakse kahte rühma ja mõlemad rühmad võtavad osa katsetest (diktaadid) nii alg- kui ka lõppstaadiumis, mis korraldatakse septembris 2013 ja märtsis 2014. Vahepealseid harjutusi teeb aga ainult üks rühm. Viidete osa sisaldab 53 allikat ja 5 lisa esitavad näitematerjali ja linke

Cross-Linguistic Influence in the Bilingual Mental Lexicon: Evidence of Cognate Effects in the Phonetic Production and Processing of a Vowel Contrast.

The present study examines cognate effects in the phonetic production and processing of the Catalan back mid-vowel contrast (/o/-/ɔ/) by 24 early and highly proficient Spanish-Catalan bilinguals in Majorca (Spain). Participants completed a picture-naming task and a forced-choice lexical decision task in which they were presented with either words (e.g., /bɔsk/ "forest") or non-words based on real words, but with the alternate mid-vowel pair in stressed position ((*)/bosk/). The same cognate and non-cognate lexical items were included in the production and lexical decision experiments. The results indicate that even though these early bilinguals maintained the back mid-vowel contrast in their productions, they had great difficulties identifying non-words and real words based on the identity of the Catalan mid-vowel. The analyses revealed language dominance and cognate effects: Spanish-dominants exhibited higher error rates than Catalan-dominants, and production and lexical decision accuracy were also affected by cognate status. The present study contributes to the discussion of the organization of early bilinguals' dominant and non-dominant sound systems, and proposes that exemplar theoretic approaches can be extended to include bilingual lexical connections that account for the interactions between the phonetic and lexical levels of early bilingual individuals

Speech vocoding for laboratory phonology

Using phonological speech vocoding, we propose a platform for exploring relations between phonology and speech processing, and in broader terms, for exploring relations between the abstract and physical structures of a speech signal. Our goal is to make a step towards bridging phonology and speech processing and to contribute to the program of Laboratory Phonology. We show three application examples for laboratory phonology: compositional phonological speech modelling, a comparison of phonological systems and an experimental phonological parametric text-to-speech (TTS) system. The featural representations of the following three phonological systems are considered in this work: (i) Government Phonology (GP), (ii) the Sound Pattern of English (SPE), and (iii) the extended SPE (eSPE). Comparing GP- and eSPE-based vocoded speech, we conclude that the latter achieves slightly better results than the former. However, GP - the most compact phonological speech representation - performs comparably to the systems with a higher number of phonological features. The parametric TTS based on phonological speech representation, and trained from an unlabelled audiobook in an unsupervised manner, achieves intelligibility of 85% of the state-of-the-art parametric speech synthesis. We envision that the presented approach paves the way for researchers in both fields to form meaningful hypotheses that are explicitly testable using the concepts developed and exemplified in this paper. On the one hand, laboratory phonologists might test the applied concepts of their theoretical models, and on the other hand, the speech processing community may utilize the concepts developed for the theoretical phonological models for improvements of the current state-of-the-art applications

Understanding English Minimal Pairs of Vowel

This research explores the importance of studying English minimal pairs of vowels and their impact on language learners' pronunciation skills. The discussion highlights the significance of differentiating vowel sounds through the analysis of minimal pairs, which consist of words sharing consonant sounds but differing in vowel articulation. By focusing on specific minimal pairs such as [iː] / [ɪ], [æ] / [ʌ], [ɑ:] / [ɔ], [ɛ], and [ɒ], learners can refine their ability to recognize and produce the distinct vowel sounds accurately. Mastering these minimal pairs enhances phonemic awareness, enabling learners to differentiate between similar vowel sounds, thereby improving overall pronunciation accuracy. Furthermore, the study of minimal pairs contributes to word differentiation, listening skills, and spelling and reading proficiency. It empowers learners to grasp the subtle nuances in vowel pronunciation, thereby enhancing their ability to comprehend and communicate effectively in English. In conclusion, a comprehensive understanding and application of English minimal pairs of vowels are vital for language learners striving to achieve optimal pronunciation proficiency.   English minimal pairs of vowe

The Articulatory Basis of the Alphabet

The origin of the alphabet has long been a subject for research, speculation and myths. How to explain its survival and effectiveness over thousands of years? One approach is in terms of the practical problems faced by the originator of the alphabet: another would examine the archaeological record; a third might focus on the perceptual process by which the alphabet makes rapid reading possible. It is proposed that the alphabet originated in an intellectual sequence similar to that followed by Alexander Bell and Henry Sweet in constructing their Visible and Organic Alphabets.The originator of the alphabet used the same kind of introspective analysis of his own speech sounds and of the manner in which they were articulated. This was the vital step. The next step was to represent the articulatory differences in terms of visual patterns. One way to understand what might have been involved is to attempt to replicate the process oneself