Transfer of prosodic representation

Abstract

This study examines the spoken suppliance of inflectional morphology by L1 Bengali speakers of L2 English in the phonological framework of the Prosodic Transfer Hypothesis (Goad, White, & Steele, 2003; Goad & White, 2004; Goad & White, 2006, et seq.). Data from a semi-spontaneous elicitation task suggests that, at lower levels of proficiency, production of inflection is partially conditioned by the stem vowel in terms of vowel length and the voicing status of the stem-final consonant. This finding is proposed to be indicative not only of transfer of L1 prosodic representations, but also transfer of L1 word minimality requirements and moraic structure below the level of the prosodic word. Evidence of such transfer is arguably visible when there is a mismatch between word minimality and the distribution of syllable weight in the L1 and L2.