Teaching the pronunciation of sentence final and word boundary stops to French learners of English: distracted imitation versus audio-visual explanations.

Studies on stop unrelease in second language acquisition have hitherto focused on the productions of Slavic learners of English (Šimáčková & Podlipský, 2015) and experiments on Polish learners of English; the latter show the tendency to release stops on a more regular basis depending on the type of stop combinations (Rojczyk et al. 2013). In the present study, we aim to test the efficiency of audio-visual explanations as opposed to distracted imitation in pronunciation teaching amongst French learners of English. While unreleased stops are rather frequent in French and English - especially in plosives clusters (Byrd, 1993; Davidson, 2010), unreleased plosives in final positions are less common in French (Van Dommelen, 1983). During phase 1 of the experiment, three groups of 12 native French learners of English (level A1/A2, B1/B2 and C1/C2) were asked to read idiomatic expressions containing both homogeneous and heterogeneous sequences of voiceless stops straddled between words, namely, in sequences like “that cat” [ðæt˺ kæt˺], and stops at the end of sentences like “I told him to speak” [tə spiːk˺]. In the second phase of the experiment, one half in each group was given a different task. The first group heard recorded versions of phase 1 sentences and before reading them out loud, counted up to five in their L1. Stimuli for imitation contained no release in the contexts under scrutiny. The other half had to watch a video explaining the phenomenon of unreleased stops with a production of phase-two expressions propped up by hand gestures. They were then asked to re-read the sentences given in phase 1. Based on these results the current study makes recommendations about what working environment should be prioritized in pronunciation teaching both in class and online (Kröger et al. 2010), and suggests ways to assess students and visually keep track of their progress

A sociophonetic analysis of Tyneside English in the DECTE corpus : the case of FACE, GOAT, PRICE and MOUTH

The present thesis offers both apparent-time and real-time analyses of two sub-corpora of the Diachronic Electronic Corpus of Tyneside English (DECTE) : one from the 1970s and another one compiled in the 1990s (Corrigan et al., 2012). It comprises two main parts: (1) an analysis of inter and intra-speaker variation in the lexical sets FACE, GOAT, PRICE and MOUTH (Wells 1982) based on a multiple factor analysis (MFA, Escofier 2008, Husson et al. 2011) (2) a dynamic acoustic analysis of formant trajectories of these vowels using Generalised additive mixed models (GAMMs, Wood 2015) followed by a static analysis of onsets in PRICE. The first part establishes the sociolinguistic profiles of 44 speakers from Gateshead and Newcastle based on the original phonetic transcriptions of the Tyneside Linguistic Survey (TLS, Strang 1968). Although the profiling analysis are based on the entire phonetic system transcribed by the original TLS team, the main focus is on FACE, GOAT, PRICE and MOUTH only. Results indicate that FACE the main determinant of TE speech. The symmetry between FACE et GOAT as found by Watt 1999, was also observed in PRICE et MOUTH among women. While middle-class women clearly favour a closing diphthong in FACE et GOAT and have a low onset in PRICE and MOUTH, working-class women tend to have higher frequency scores of pan-northern monophthongs in the first pair of lexical sets. They also exhibit more frequent raised onsets in in PRICE and MOUTH. In addition, the central monophthong GOAT is more often used by men with a less traditional accent in the 1970s corpus, which is in line with Watt’s findings for the 1990s corpus (Watt 1998).The second part analyses formant trajectories in FACE, GOAT and PRICE. The main aim was to compare the original phonetic transcriptions with the corresponding formant trajectories. Results confirm the pertinence of the transcriptions in the wordlist section of the corpora (TLS & PVC). Differences between the two main variants of PRICE ([aɪ] vs. [eɪ]) appeared to be strikingly different be in terms of both onsets / offset heights and trajectory shape.Cette thèse propose une analyse sociophonétique synchronique et diachronique de l’anglais de Tyneside à partir de deux sous-corpus du Corpus Diachronique de l’Anglais de Tyneside (DECTE) datant des années 1970 et de 1990 (Corrigan, Buchstaller, Mearns, & Moisl, 2012). Elle comporte deux grands volets : (1) une analyse de la variation inter et intra-locuteurs par le biais de transcriptions phonétiques des variantes linguistiques de FACE, GOAT, PRICE et MOUTH (Wells 1982) à l’aide d’une analyse factorielle multiple (AFM, Escofier 2008, Husson et al. 2011) (2) une étude acoustique des trajectoires formantiques de ces quatre ensembles lexicaux à l’aide de modèles mixtes additifs généralisés afin de vérifier la pertinence du codage (GAMMs, Wood 2015). Pour ce premier volet, nous proposons un profilage sociolinguistique de 44 locuteurs de Gateshead et de Newcastle, à partir de données phonétiques transcrites dans les années 1970 lors de l’Enquête Linguistique de Tyneside (TLS, Strang 1968). Bien que notre analyse porte sur la totalité des transcriptions du système phonétique des locuteurs, l’accent est davantage porté sur FACE, GOAT, PRICE and MOUTH. Selon l’AFM suivi d’une classification, FACE est l’ensemble lexical le plus déterminant dans la catégorisation sociolinguistique des locuteurs. La symétrie entre FACE et GOAT (Watt 1999), PRICE et MOUTH est plus nette chez les femmes : celles de la classe moyenne privilégient une diphtongue fermantes dans entre FACE et GOAT et une attaque de diphthongue ouverte pour PRICE et MOUTH, tandis que les femmes issues de classes plus populaires optent pour la monophtongue pan-régionale pour FACE et GOAT, avec une attaque davantage fermée et antérieure chez PRICE et MOUTH. La monophtongue centrale de GOAT la variante privilégiée par des hommes à l’accent local moins marqué, ce qui entre en cohérence avec les résultats de Watt (1998) dans le sous-corpus des années 1990 du DECTE.Le second volet analyse les trajectoires formantiques de FACE, GOAT et PRICE. Le but premier de cette analyse est de vérifier la correspondance des transcriptions avec le contour formantique. Les résultats confirment la pertinence du codage au niveau des liste de mots (TLS & PVC). Les différences entre les deux variantes principales de PRICE ([aɪ] vs. [eɪ]) se révèlent être foncièrement différentes tant sur le plan de l’attaque, de la trajectoire et de la cible

Analyse sociophonétique de l’anglais de Tyneside dans le corpus DECTE : le cas des voyelles FACE, GOAT, PRICE et MOUTH

Cette thèse propose une analyse sociophonétique synchronique et diachronique de l’anglais de Tyneside à partir de deux sous-corpus du Corpus Diachronique de l’Anglais de Tyneside (DECTE) datant des années 1970 et de 1990 (Corrigan, Buchstaller, Mearns, & Moisl, 2012). Elle comporte deux grands volets : (1) une analyse de la variation inter et intra-locuteurs par le biais de transcriptions phonétiques des variantes linguistiques de FACE, GOAT, PRICE et MOUTH (Wells 1982) à l’aide d’une analyse factorielle multiple (AFM, Escofier 2008, Husson et al. 2011) (2) une étude acoustique des trajectoires formantiques de ces quatre ensembles lexicaux à l’aide de modèles mixtes additifs généralisés afin de vérifier la pertinence du codage (GAMMs, Wood 2015). Pour ce premier volet, nous proposons un profilage sociolinguistique de 44 locuteurs de Gateshead et de Newcastle, à partir de données phonétiques transcrites dans les années 1970 lors de l’Enquête Linguistique de Tyneside (TLS, Strang 1968). Bien que notre analyse porte sur la totalité des transcriptions du système phonétique des locuteurs, l’accent est davantage porté sur FACE, GOAT, PRICE and MOUTH. Selon l’AFM suivi d’une classification, FACE est l’ensemble lexical le plus déterminant dans la catégorisation sociolinguistique des locuteurs. La symétrie entre FACE et GOAT (Watt 1999), PRICE et MOUTH est plus nette chez les femmes : celles de la classe moyenne privilégient une diphtongue fermantes dans entre FACE et GOAT et une attaque de diphthongue ouverte pour PRICE et MOUTH, tandis que les femmes issues de classes plus populaires optent pour la monophtongue pan-régionale pour FACE et GOAT, avec une attaque davantage fermée et antérieure chez PRICE et MOUTH. La monophtongue centrale de GOAT la variante privilégiée par des hommes à l’accent local moins marqué, ce qui entre en cohérence avec les résultats de Watt (1998) dans le sous-corpus des années 1990 du DECTE.Le second volet analyse les trajectoires formantiques de FACE, GOAT et PRICE. Le but premier de cette analyse est de vérifier la correspondance des transcriptions avec le contour formantique. Les résultats confirment la pertinence du codage au niveau des liste de mots (TLS & PVC). Les différences entre les deux variantes principales de PRICE ([aɪ] vs. [eɪ]) se révèlent être foncièrement différentes tant sur le plan de l’attaque, de la trajectoire et de la cible.The present thesis offers both apparent-time and real-time analyses of two sub-corpora of the Diachronic Electronic Corpus of Tyneside English (DECTE) : one from the 1970s and another one compiled in the 1990s (Corrigan et al., 2012). It comprises two main parts: (1) an analysis of inter and intra-speaker variation in the lexical sets FACE, GOAT, PRICE and MOUTH (Wells 1982) based on a multiple factor analysis (MFA, Escofier 2008, Husson et al. 2011) (2) a dynamic acoustic analysis of formant trajectories of these vowels using Generalised additive mixed models (GAMMs, Wood 2015) followed by a static analysis of onsets in PRICE. The first part establishes the sociolinguistic profiles of 44 speakers from Gateshead and Newcastle based on the original phonetic transcriptions of the Tyneside Linguistic Survey (TLS, Strang 1968). Although the profiling analysis are based on the entire phonetic system transcribed by the original TLS team, the main focus is on FACE, GOAT, PRICE and MOUTH only. Results indicate that FACE the main determinant of TE speech. The symmetry between FACE et GOAT as found by Watt 1999, was also observed in PRICE et MOUTH among women. While middle-class women clearly favour a closing diphthong in FACE et GOAT and have a low onset in PRICE and MOUTH, working-class women tend to have higher frequency scores of pan-northern monophthongs in the first pair of lexical sets. They also exhibit more frequent raised onsets in in PRICE and MOUTH. In addition, the central monophthong GOAT is more often used by men with a less traditional accent in the 1970s corpus, which is in line with Watt’s findings for the 1990s corpus (Watt 1998).The second part analyses formant trajectories in FACE, GOAT and PRICE. The main aim was to compare the original phonetic transcriptions with the corresponding formant trajectories. Results confirm the pertinence of the transcriptions in the wordlist section of the corpora (TLS & PVC). Differences between the two main variants of PRICE ([aɪ] vs. [eɪ]) appeared to be strikingly different be in terms of both onsets / offset heights and trajectory shape

Dissecting morphemes to learn lexical stress in suffixed-words: A kinesthetic approach for French learners of English

International audienceWe suggest a kinesthetic approach that involves touching objects (cards) to improve awareness of lexical stress in English, in combination with a classical morphological approach (word endings determining the lexical stress) of the "French school". As a starting point, we present an experimental study on auditory perception of lexical stress in words with stress-imposing endings to determine the difficulties encountered by French-speaking learners. The results are compared with those of a paper test, in which participants had to choose the syllable bearing the primary stress among the syllables presented in orthography

Revisiting ‘stress-deafness' amongst upper intermediate learners of English in words containing stress-imposing endings

International audienceWhile French-learners of English are said to be ‘stress-deaf’ (Dupoux et al. 1997 for Spanish; Tremblay 2009 for French Canadian learners of English), the purpose of this experiment is to measure the degree in which upper-intermediate learners of English perceive lexical stress in words of three syllables or more, the majority of which containing a stress-imposing ending, and with varying F0 patterns.Native listeners of English are known to identify lexical stress through various acoustic parameters: fundamental frequency (F0), duration, intensity and vowel quality (Fry, 1955 & 1958; Lehiste, 1976). The use of such a combination of parameters is challenging for French- speaking learners of English since French has no lexically distinctive stress and the parameters used to cue initial and final phrase accents in French are mainly duration and F0 (e.g. Jun & Fougeron, 2000; Vaissi`ere, 2002).Are French-speaking learners simply ‘stress-deaf’ and insensitive to none of the prosodic parameters, or are they sensitive to some specific cues when identifying lexical stress in English? Do they also resort to segmental parameters such as the lack of reduction in vowels, be they lexically stressed or unstressed?Tremblay (2009) highlighted the difficulty of French-speaking Canadian learners of English in ‘hearing’ stress in non-sense words in isolation (AXB test), but to our knowledge, an auditory identification experiment of English lexical stress in natural speech has not been carried out amongst French advanced learners of English (cf. Frost, 2009 for a perception of stress in disyl- labic word-pairs using synthetic speech). Nor has it been conducted in long words containing a stress-imposing ending with varying F0 patterns.During the experiment presented in this paper, 30 second-year French university students majoring in English were asked to identify the primary stress of the last word in a carrier sentence after listening to one native speaker of English (young man, General American). Each of the 46 target words was presented twice with a different tone (cf. Wells, 2006): fall, rise and fall-rise (46 × 2 × 3 = 276).Participants were asked to select the syllable bearing primary stress of a word, after hearing it in the carrier sentence. The sentence was played only once. The target word appeared on the screen in the form of segmented written syllables.The present paper focuses on the results involving the impact of stress-imposing endings. Participants tended to select the stress either at the beginning of the word or at the end, re- gardless of the presence of a stress-imposing ending. Unreduced unstressed vowels (diphthongs) towards the end of the word seem to be interpreted as a cue for lexical stress amongst partici- pants.Such results suggest the importance to go beyond the opposition between reduced and unreduced vowels in the identification and production of unstressed / stressed syllables, especially in words deriving from French-Latin, which are more likely to be used by advanced French learners of English in an academic context.ReferencesArchibald, J. (1997). The acquisition of English stress by speakers of nonaccentual languages: lexical storage versus computation of stress. Linguistics, 35(1), 167-182. https://doi.org/10.151 5/ling.1997.35.1.167Archibald, J. (2005). Second Language Phonology as Redeployment of L1 Phonological Knowl- edge. Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue Canadienne De Linguistique, 50(1-4), 285-314. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008413100003741Dupoux, E., Pallier, C., Sebastian, N. & Mehler, J. (1997). A destressing ‘deafness’ in French? Journal of Memory and Language, 36, 406–421.Frost, D. (2009). The Perception of Word Stress in English and French: Which cues for native English and French speakers? EPIP1 (English Pronunciation: Issues and Practices), Universit ́e de Savoie, Chamb ́ery, France, 57-73.Frost, D. (2010). La surdit ́e accentuelle : d’ou` vient-elle et comment la gu ́erir ? Les Cahiers de l’APLIUT, APLIUT, 2010, Phon ́etique, phonologie et enseignement des langues de sp ́ecialit ́e - Volume 1, 24 (2), 25-43.Fry, D. B. (1955). Duration and intensity as physical correlates of linguistic stress. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 27(4), 765-768. https://doi.org/10.1121/1.1908022Fry, D. B. (1958). Experiments in the Perception of Stress. Language and Speech, 1(2), 126–152. https://doi.org/10.1177/002383095800100207Jun, S.-A. & Fougeron, C. (2000). A phonological model of French intonation. In A. Botinis (Ed.), Intonation: Analysis, modelling, and technology, 209–242. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Lacabex, E. G., Lecumberri, M. L. G., & Cooke, M. (2007). Perception of English vowel reduc- tion by trained Spanish learners. In New Sounds 2007: Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium on the Acquisition of Second Language Speech, 293-299.Lehiste, I. (1976). Influence of fundamental frequency pattern on the perception of duration. Journal of Phonetics, 4, 113–117. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0095-4470(19)31231-8Tremblay, A. (2009). Phonetic variability and the variable perception of L2 word stress by French Canadian listeners. International Journal of Bilingualism, 13, 35–62. https://doi.org/ 10.1177/1367006909103528Vaissi`ere, J. (2002). Cross-linguistic prosodic transcription: French vs. English. In N. B. Vol- skaya, N. D. Svetozarova & P. A. Skrelin (eds.). Problems and methods of experimental phonetics. In honour of the 70th anniversary of Pr. L. V. Bondarko, St Petersburg State University Press, 147-164.Wells, J. C. (2006). English Intonation: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

”nek d aqveyli!” Intergenerational transmission of the kabyle language in the paris area : a sociolinguistic study on Berber revivalism

International audienc

”nek d aqveyli!” Intergenerational transmission of the kabyle language in the paris area : a sociolinguistic study on Berber revivalism

International audienc

Variabilité des syllabes réalisées par des apprenants de l’anglais

International audienceThis paper suggests an alternative method to classify native and non-native rhythmic realisations. Learner phonetic output has been automatically aligned on a native template of English syllables. Syllables have been classified according to positional, distributional and accentual properties. These syllable types differ significantly in their realisations between native and non-native speakers of English.Cette contribution analyse la segmentation syllabique des francophones du corpus d’apprenant d’anglais ANGLISH (Tortel 2009). A partir d’une méthode d’alignement par alignement forcé, on montre la pertinence d’une analyse de l’interlangue fondée sur la comparaison des durées des syllabes. La comparaison des réalisations est ici centrée sur une typologie des syllabes fondée sur des propriétés distributionnelles, accentuelles et où l’interlangue tient sa place (risques d’isosyllabicité les plus manifestes pour les réalisations des francophones). La variabilité des réalisations des syllabes est appréciée en fonction des propriétés positionnelles, accentuelles et structurelles des syllabes. L’étude démontre l’intérêt d’une approche fonctionnelle des syllabes, plus pertinente que les intervalles interconsonantiques et intervocaliques inspirés de Ramus et al. (1999) pour la discrimination du niveau des locuteurs

To [h] or not to [h]? L2 production of /h/ in semi-spontaneous speech by French leaners of English and of German.

International audienceThe present study investigates the production of /h/ or lack thereof in semi- spontaneous L2 speech amongst two distinct groups of French native speakers learning either English (FE) or German (FG). Second languages that differ in phonotactics and prosodic organization from the first language (L1) present a challenge to the articulatory and perceptual habits of the learners (Flege, 1995, Weber & Cutler, 2006). Both English and German have the voiceless fricative /h/ in their inventory, unlike modern French, whose is only present orthographically. It is therefore considered as a “new” phone using Flege’s (1995) terminology.Previous studies have shown that French learners of English and of German often drop the /h/ or resort to h-epenthesis in hiatuses or vowel-initial words (English: Kamiyama et al. 2011, Exare 2021, Capliez forthcoming; German: Quiehl 1906, Wottawa 2017). John and Cardoso (2009) remark that h-deletion is a “stigmatized” feature of francophone speech in English. As a result, “francophones devote considerable effort to overcoming the problem” (2009, p. 120). Quiehl’s early twentieth-century book on the pronunciation of French accented German also comments on French learner’s difficulty in pronouncing the /h/ in German due to the unpronounced in their L1 (Quiehl 1906, pp. 100-101).While German rarely has instances of h-deletion in grammatical words, English speakers often reduce the auxiliary have to /ǝv/ and pronouns his, her, him to [ɪs], [ǝ], [ɪm]. This may impact French learners’ pronunciation and their underlying representations of /h/ in English vs. German. In addition, John and Cardoso (2009) for English L2 and Wottawa (2018) for German L2, both indicate that task has an impact on the pronunciation of /h/ amongst learners.This study draws on Wottawa’s methodology (2018) using a picture description task by first-year university French learners of German (n=15) to measure proficiency in pronunciation and extends it to learners of English (n=12). Picture description is language independent, so the same picture was used for both learner groups. The key elements in the picture elicited words containing word-initial /h/ in both languages, e.g hopscotch in English and Himmel un Hölle in German. Several studies selected reading tasks to measure the pronunciation of /h/ in L2 speech (Kamiyama et al. 2011, Capliez forthcoming), while others used both reading and informal interviews (John & Cardoso). Fortkamp (2000) and Sample & Michel (2014) use picture description tasks to measure fluency but to our knowledge, little has been made to compare segmental pronunciation difficulties in two L2s in semi-spontaneous speech.Preliminary results of our study show that FE and FG produce about 75% of word-initial /h/ as [h]. A more careful examination of the production indicates that some learners tend to avoid choosing words containing a word-intial [h]. The above-mentioned high percentage may be misleading: the degree of lexical diversity and the strategic selection of words not containing /h/ to describe the picture must also be factored in. The study investigates whether this avoidance is linked to low vocabulary size and thus low L2 proficiency (Ovtcharov et al., 2006) or if it is an individual choice of avoiding segments that are linked to production difficulties, being the result of potential trade-off effects on the working memory (Skehan 2009, Bygate 2009)

”nek d aqveyli!” Intergenerational transmission of the kabyle language in the paris area : a sociolinguistic study on Berber revivalism

International audienc