Perceptual Impact of Speech Melody Hybridization: English and Czech English

The current paper examines the role of intonation in the perception of foreign-accented speech. In order to assess how difficult it is to mentally process native, non-native and modified speech melodies, four conditions were analyzed and compared: native English, native English with Czech melody, Czech English with native melody and Czech English. The method of reaction times measurement in a word monitoring task was employed, in which 108 Czech listeners heard English sentences in the explored conditions and pressed a button when hearing a target word. Speech melody turned out to have a relatively weak but discernible impact on perceptual processing. Interestingly, Czech English proved to be more difficult to process than native English, although the listeners were Czech. The implementation of English F0 contours on Czech English speech slightly alleviated the cognitive load, however, the second hybrid, native English with Czech melody, pointed to the opposite direction. The causes of this discrepancy were investigated, particularly higher degrees of collocability in certain expressions

Developing Unbiased Teacher Identity in Pluri-Accent Reality: Research-Based Classroom Activities

In the current pilot report, we draw on and further develop our previous research examining pre-service teachers’ attitudes and beliefs about accents, in which we proposed a pedagogical intervention reflecting certain aspects of our research outcomes, mainly the positive trend of embracing one’s non-nativeness. A set of four classroom activities, namely Nativeness perception test, Four corners, Bank of experiences and Sociodynamic teacher, were incorporated into three different online graduate courses in the winter and summer semesters 2020/2021 at the Department of the English Language and Literature, Faculty of Education in Prague. The piloting process was partly replicated in face-to-face classes of the following academic year. The overarching goal was to raise awareness of accent variation, especially in such a linguistically homogenous country as the Czech Republic and cultivate future teachers’ ability to address accent-related issues confidently, objectively and sensitively. The subsequent scrutiny of participants’ recorded discussions, written and/or oral feedback, submitted tasks as well as teachers’ observations indicated increased awareness of accent variability and a raised level of pedagogical confidence in approaching accent in the classroom context. Particularly, the respondents proved to be highly creative when devising adequate and supportive reactions to imagined negative comments related to accents or preventing them by specifically designing their lesson plans. Furthermore, the pedagogical intervention was appraised by the participating graduate students in their reflective assessment one year later

Elements of High-Quality Teaching in Learner Autonomy Development: a Case of Undergraduate Online Linguistic Courses

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The Impact of Rhythmic Distortions in Speech on Personality Assessment

The perennial question as to how perceived otherness in speech projects into listener assessment of one’s personality has been systematically investigated within the field of foreign accentedness, vocal communication of affective states and vocal stereotyping. In the present study, we aimed at exploring non-native listeners’ capacity to respond to differences in natural and modified native speech, particularly whether the manipulation of temporal structure in both stressed and unstressed syllables gives rise to any changes in the perception of the speaker’s personality. The respondents’ intuitive judgements were captured in the domain of the ‘nervousness category’ taken from the five-factor model of personality. Our results indicate an effect of temporal modifications on the listeners’ judgements. Analysis of variance for repeated measures confirmed a highly significant shift of personality evaluations towards the undesired traits (e.g., nervousness, anxiety, querulousness). Several interesting interactions with the semantic contents of the utterances and with the intrinsic qualities of the speakers’ voices were also found. We argue that the effects of accented speech go beyond conscious willingness to accept “otherness” and suggest a method for studying them

Speech Melody Properties in English, Czech and Czech English: Reference and Interference

Two major objectives were set for the present study: to provide reference data for the description of Czech and English F0 contours, and to investigate the limits of the ‘interference hypothesis’ on Czech English data. Altogether, the production of 40 speakers in 2392 breath-group F0 contours was analyzed. The speech of 32 professional speakers of English and Czech provides reference values for various acoustic correlates of pitch level, pitch span and downtrend gradient. These values were subsequently used as a benchmark for a confirmation of the interference hypothesis through comparison with a further sample of 8 non-professional speakers of English and Czech-accented English. The native English speakers of both genders produced significantly higher pitch level indicators, wider pitch span and a steeper downtrend gradient than the reference native speakers of Czech. Although the pitch level of the Czech-accented material lies in between the two reference groups, the pitch span of this group is the narrowest, which indicates that factors of foreign-accentedness other than simply interference are in effect

Influence of Selected and Systematically-Used Methods for the Teaching of Pronunciation on the Perception and Production of schwa by Czech Pupils of English

TITLE: The Influence of Selected and Systematically-Used Methods for the Teaching of Pronunciation on the Perception and Production of Schwa by Czech Pupils of English AUTHOR: Mgr. Kristýna Poesová DEPARTMENT: Department of English Language and Literature SUPERVISOR: doc. PhDr. Jan Volín, Ph.D. ABSTRACT: This dissertation thesis explores the theme of teaching English pronunciation in the Czech educational environment. Its aim is to reveal whether the development of phonetic awareness has positive effects on one's pronunciation skills. Specifically, whether explicit teaching of pronunciation can induce any improvement in Czech pupils' perception and production of vowel reduction predominantly realised as the English mid-central vowel schwa. The theoretical framework of the work is provided by the latest findings in English phonetics and phonology, didactics of foreign languages and second language phonology acquisition. The research was carried out as a three-month experiment using the technique of parallel groups at a lower secondary school in Prague. The level of perception and production of the target feature was measured in an expressly devised test in the initial and final phase of the experiment during which experimental groups underwent dedicated schwa training while control groups did not take part..

Influence of Selected and Systematically-Used Methods for the Teaching of Pronunciation on the Perception and Production of schwa by Czech Pupils of English

TITLE: The Influence of Selected and Systematically-Used Methods for the Teaching of Pronunciation on the Perception and Production of Schwa by Czech Pupils of English AUTHOR: Mgr. Kristýna Poesová DEPARTMENT: Department of English Language and Literature SUPERVISOR: doc. PhDr. Jan Volín, Ph.D. ABSTRACT: This dissertation thesis explores the theme of teaching English pronunciation in the Czech educational environment. Its aim is to reveal whether the development of phonetic awareness has positive effects on one's pronunciation skills. Specifically, whether explicit teaching of pronunciation can induce any improvement in Czech pupils' perception and production of vowel reduction predominantly realised as the English mid-central vowel schwa. The theoretical framework of the work is provided by the latest findings in English phonetics and phonology, didactics of foreign languages and second language phonology acquisition. The research was carried out as a three-month experiment using the technique of parallel groups at a lower secondary school in Prague. The level of perception and production of the target feature was measured in an expressly devised test in the initial and final phase of the experiment during which experimental groups underwent dedicated schwa training while control groups did not take part..

The Impact of Rhythmic Distortions in Speech on Personality Assessment

The perennial question as to how perceived otherness in speech projects into listener assessment of one’s personality has been systematically investigated within the field of foreign accentedness, vocal communication of affective states and vocal stereotyping. In the present study, we aimed at exploring non-native listeners’ capacity to respond to differences in natural and modified native speech, particularly whether the manipulation of temporal structure in both stressed and unstressed syllables gives rise to any changes in the perception of the speaker’s personality. The respondents’ intuitive judgements were captured in the domain of the ‘nervousness category’ taken from the five-factor model of personality. Our results indicate an effect of temporal modifications on the listeners’ judgements. Analysis of variance for repeated measures confirmed a highly significant shift of personality evaluations towards the undesired traits (e.g., nervousness, anxiety, querulousness). Several interesting interactions with the semantic contents of the utterances and with the intrinsic qualities of the speakers’ voices were also found. We argue that the effects of accented speech go beyond conscious willingness to accept “otherness” and suggest a method for studying them

Proceedings of the 7th International Conference English Pronunciation: Issues and Practices (EPIP 7): [on line]

This is the online, compiled proceedings from the 7th International Conference English Pronunciation: Issues and Practices (EPIP 7) which was held May 18–20, 2022 at Université Grenoble-Alpes, France. It includes 23 double-blind, peer-reviewed chapters written by authors from several countries, an introduction and a thematic index, and is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. (To view a copy of the license, please go to: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

Proceedings of the 7th International Conference English Pronunciation: Issues and Practices (EPIP 7): [on line]

This is the online, compiled proceedings from the 7th International Conference English Pronunciation: Issues and Practices (EPIP 7) which was held May 18–20, 2022 at Université Grenoble-Alpes, France. It includes 23 double-blind, peer-reviewed chapters written by authors from several countries, an introduction and a thematic index, and is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. (To view a copy of the license, please go to: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.