Abstract
Previous language attitude studies indicated that in many countries all over the world, English language learners perceived native accents either American or British, more positively than the non-native accents such as the Japanese, Korean, and Austrian accents. However, in Malaysia it is still unclear which accent Malaysian learners of English tend to perceive more positively (Pillai 2009). The verbal-guise technique and accent recognition item were adopted as indirect and direct instruments in gathering data to obtain data to clarify the inquiry. The sample includes 120 Malaysian university students and they were immersed in several speech accent situations to elicit feedback on their perceptions. Essentially two research questions are addressed: 1) What are Malaysian university students’ attitudes toward native and non-native English accents? 2) How familiar are students with accents? The results indicated that the students had a bias towards in-group accent, meaning that they evaluated non-native lecturers’ accents more positively. These results supported the ‘social identity theory’ consistent with many previous language attitude studies of this nature. The Malaysian students were seen to be able to distinguish between native and non-native accents although there was much confusion between British and American accents.
Highlights
In Malaysia, different varieties of English accents are spoken because Malaysia is a multilingual and a multiethnic country
The results of this study indicated that the Malaysian university students tended to evaluate the four non-native lecturers’ accents more positively than the two native lecturers’ accents
These results are supported by the “social identity theory” that was developed by Tajfel and Turner in (1979, 1986) which suggests that people will show a preference for the variety of language or accent that is associated with their most salient in-group
Summary
In Malaysia, different varieties of English accents are spoken because Malaysia is a multilingual and a multiethnic country. According to Pillai (2008) “English in Malaysia is spoken in a multitude of accents characterizing different ethnic and socio-economic groups, education, language and geographical backgrounds (e.g. East and West Malaysia)” (p.42). In the case of Malaysians, they tend to accent-switch depending on the context. According to Pillai (2008) it is not unusual for Malaysians to accent-switch according to context which may be to construct a national identity, to express sense of belonging, solidarity, intimacy, and sometimes to make other people understand what they are trying to say, especially foreigners (p.42)
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