Dialectal Background Research Articles

Influence of Dialect on the English Consonants Perception by English L2 learners: Evidence from Jiangsu Province for Chinese Native Speakers

The native language will have a negative transfer on the acquisition of second language. Dialects, as a branch of Chinese, also have an influence on English acquisition. The perception of consonants is one of the important foundations of English learning. This study will adopt discrimination as an experimental method to investigate whether there is a significant difference in the influence of different dialects on the perception of English consonants. Three major dialects in Jiangsu province will be taken as a study case to verify the hypothesis that there is a significant difference on the perception of English consonants in different dialects. This study will fill the gap in the overall research on the impact of three major dialects in Jiangsu province on the perception of English consonants, help English language learners with dialect background to reduce the influence of dialects on them and provide some teaching key points to teachers, especially for English language learners in Jiangsu province.

Lexical Variations in the Ewe Language Spoken In Ho in the Volta Region of Ghana

The study was conducted to investigate the lexical variances observed in the Ewe language spoken among the Ho group. This study aims to examine the observed variations in speech patterns among both indigenous individuals and immigrants residing in the vicinity of Ho, the capital city of the Volta Region. The data analysis used the application of Labov's variationist theory from 1996 and Giles' speech accommodation theory from 1973. Information was gathered from native communities and those who had migrated to the area under investigation. The research employed a qualitative methodology and utilized purposive sampling procedures. The data were acquired through the utilization of observational methods, interviews, and the analysis of live radio broadcasts. Investigations have uncovered substantial regional and social disparities in the Ewe language spoken in Ho, leading to the utilization of distinct linguistic characteristics in everyday communication. The dialects within the speech community exhibit lexical, phonological, and grammatical diversity. There are some lexicons that the three dialects share, while others are unique to only two of the three dialects. Additionally, there are certain lexicons that are different from one dialect to another. The study provides confirmation that the dialectal backgrounds of language users within the speech community do not have an impact on the issue of mutual understanding. This is evident from the fact that the Eedome, Aŋlↄ and Tↄŋu dialects can be considered as being mutually intelligible. Keywords: Lexical, variation, ewe language, Eedome and Tↄŋu or Aŋlↄ, Tↄŋu, Ho

Identifying the dialectal background of American Finnish speakers using a supervised machine-learning model

Abstract This study presents results of two experiments using supervised machine-learning models to examine individual Finnish speakers’ dialectal backgrounds. Data come from interviews conducted with heritage speakers of Finnish in northern Wisconsin and are compared to data from the Finnish Dialect Syntax Archive. The models were constructed and then, following successful validation testing, used to identify the dialectal background of five individual American Finnish speakers. Results showed individual variation in dialectal backgrounds and some correlation to speakers’ likely language input. Our approach offers a new methodological tool for examining speakers’ dialectal backgrounds in situations of language contact.

Speakers of different L1 dialects with acoustically proximal vowel systems present with similar nonnative speech perception abilities: Data from Greek listeners of Dutch

Previous evidence suggests that nonnative speech perception is modulated by the speakers’ first language (L1) dialect. This study aims (a) to examine the discrimination of Dutch vowel contrasts by Greek listeners , and (b) to determine whether listeners' L1 Greek dialectal background, namely, Standard Modern Greek (SMG) and Cypriot Greek (CG), affects the discrimination of nonnative contrasts. It has been proposed that crosslinguistic similarity between L1 and nonnative sounds can predict the perception of the latter sounds. For that purpose, discrimination predictions were developed using a linear discriminant analysis (LDA), which was based on the acoustic similarity between SMG/CG and Dutch vowels and which provided quantification of the classification of nonnative vowels in terms of the listeners' L1 categories. The participants of the perceptual study were adult Greek (SMG and CG) listeners of Dutch who completed an AXB test on a PC script. The results of the discrimination test showed that three out of four contrasts signaled good discrimination, while one contrast signaled less good discrimination. Although crosslinguistic acoustic similarity was a relatively good predictor of the listeners’ nonnative discrimination patterns, it failed to provide accurate predictions for some contrasts. Another important finding was that SMG listeners did not differ from CG listeners in the discrimination of Dutch vowel contrasts. Probably, the high acoustic proximity between the vowel systems of the two varieties led listeners to employ similar acoustic properties to discriminate nonnative sounds.

Acoustic distance effect on the perception of sibilants mergers between retroflexes and alveolars in Taiwan Mandarin

Studies in speech production and perception have found a tight link between the two processes. Sound properties in speakers' production repertoire strongly influence their perceptual spaceand exposure to another variant also shifts speech patterns in shadowing tasks. This suggests that diachronic sound change might be a result of it. Therefore, we tested whether categorical perception of sibilants is influenced by acoustic distance in the production of ongoing sibilants mergers in Taiwan Mandarin, where retroflexes are merging towards alveolars. Twenty-three native speakers produced 46 mono- or disyllabic Tone 1 words with onsets of /ts/, /ʈʂ/, /tsh/, /ʈʂh/, /s/, and /ʂ/, listened to 23 eight-step continuums of synthesized sibilants from retroflexes to alveolars pre-appended to vowels and codas, and answered a sociolinguistic questionnaire. As predicted, closer acoustic distances between categories predicted more high-CoG stimuli to be identified as retroflexes (more tolerance for high-frequency retroflexes). Step, sound, and social effects were significant. Sibilants' frequencies were lower than previously reported. Overall, this suggests that sibilant mergers diffuse to speakers with closer acoustic distances first, and the categories will collapse on language level in production before perception. They spread among speakers asynchronously and variably, depending on dialectal background and social attitude as well.

Effect of Speaker Age on Listener Perceptions of Word-Final /l/.

This study investigated an effect of speaker age on listeners' perception of word-final /l/ produced by child and adult speakers of Southern White Vernacular English, a dialect that shows higher rates of word-final /l/ vocalization than other dialects of English. Stimuli included children and adults' word-final /l/ embedded in monosyllabic words in two vowel contexts (/i, ɪ/ and /ɔ, ɑ/). A total of 25 monolingual adult listeners listened to each word and were asked to judge the /l/-likeness using a visual analog scale. Average listener ratings and three acoustic measures (F2 transition rate [F2 TR] and F2-F1 [Hz] values at 20% and 80% time points along the vowel-/l/ duration) were analyzed. Adult productions were rated more as correct /l/ than those of children in both vowel contexts, despite the similarity in their F2 TR and F2-F1 values at the 80% time point. Correlation between the acoustic measures and the average listener ratings were weak for all three measures for adults' productions. For children's productions, while the correlation with F2 TR values were weak, moderate significant correlations were found for F2-F1 values at the 20% and 80% time points. In terms of vowel context, word-final /l/ in the high front vowel context was rated more as /l/ than those in low back vowel context. Findings suggest that listeners are more likely to accept word-final /l/ as being correct when produced by adult speakers, regardless of their acoustic characteristics, but more likely to perceive an error when produced by a child and attend more to acoustic information for their perceptual judgment. This highlights the importance of considering children's dialectal background when judging word-final /l/, which is more likely to be vocalized in certain dialects and certain vowel contexts, and thus can be misjudged without such consideration.

Perception of Japanese singleton and geminate contrasts: A case of Chinese learners with different dialectal backgrounds.

It is widely accepted that the Japanese language is mora-timed, and the geminate obstruent, one of the three special morae in the Japanese language, forms one independent mora. Many studies have shown that perceiving Japanese geminates accurately is especially problematic for learners of Japanese. This study examines the perception of Japanese singleton and geminate contrasts by Chinese learners of Japanese (CLJ) from different dialectal backgrounds and contrasts their perception with Japanese native speakers (JNS). This study conducted two experiments. First, non-synthesized stimuli were used to test each group of participants' perceptual sensitivity of Japanese singletons and geminates. Second, the categorical perception was accessed by adopting stimuli in which the ratio of constriction duration to entire word duration (CD/EWD) was synthesized from 15 to 60%. Results show that, although learners of Japanese had significantly lower perception levels compared to JNS regardless of their group differences (e.g., L1 background, Japanese language proficiency, etc.), they still experienced some positive transfers of L1 to achieve better perception performance. The results also suggest that CD/EWD can be considered a reliable local cue for both JNS and CLJ in categorizing Japanese singletons and geminates. In addition, the results demonstrate that variables such as medial consonant type and the learner's Japanese proficiency affect the perception of Japanese singleton and geminate contrasts.

Pratt Software's Phonological Characteristics, Prosodic Features, and Importance

Pratt is computer software that helps phoneticians synthesize, edit, and analyse speech. Phoneticians, sociolinguists, as well as phonologists all utilize this software. With the aid of this software, one can perform spectral, pitch, formant, and intensity evaluations as well as detect jitters, shimmers, and voice breaks. It can change the form of files and enhance some of their existing qualities. A track's frequencies can be changed and it can be made stereo or mono with this Pratt software. With the help of this feature, one can produce high-quality illustrations for use in academic research articles. For speech analysts that favour in-depth research, it is a more effective instrument. The sound tracks are edited and can be changed to suit the preferences and needs. The Praat software's best feature, the scripting language, will help to automate the necessary tasks that it can carry out. The dialectal background determines whether learning a new language as well as its prosodic qualities is successful or unsuccessful. Intonations are influenced by pitch levels. Accent mispronunciation is solely caused by incorrect pitch patterns. The varying intentions are indicated by the variation in pitch levels. Linguistic and phonetic elements combine to form intonation. Tonal patterns serve a variety of linguistic purposes. The computerized learning utilizes phonetic acoustic hardware and software, concentrating on speech assessment patterns. The improvements in speech technology showed even better ways to reveal the prosodic intonation qualities. Software for computer-assisted language learning (CALL) allows for the visual representation of speech graphically the sound waveform and pitch contours. The visual displays and speech evaluations were presented by the software. The researcher's emphasis and area of interest were therefore the prosodic characteristics and intonation contours, which led to improved outcomes. It was found through research using the Praat software to evaluate intonation contour perception that conceptualizing pronunciation elements was extremely helpful. Speech is organized hierarchically by prosody, which is evoked by characteristics of suprasegmental acoustics. It has both phonetic and phonological characteristics. Features like stress, duration tone and, intonation, are determined by suprasegmental acoustic qualities. Praat is practical software that enables the user to alter and achieve the required phonetic and sound engineering values and levels.

Acoustic Correlates of English Lexical Stress Produced by Chinese Dialect Speakers Compared to Native English Speakers.

English second language learners often experience difficulties in producing native-like English lexical stress. It is unknown which acoustic correlates, such as fundamental frequency (F0), duration, and intensity, are the most problematic for Chinese dialect speakers. The present study investigated the prosodic transfer effects of first language (L1) regional dialects on the production of English stress contrasts. Native English speakers (N = 20) and Chinese learners (N = 60) with different dialect backgrounds (Beijing, Changsha, and Guangzhou dialects) produced the same stimulus including both trochaic and iambic patterns. Results showed that (a) all participants produced the stressed syllable with greater values of F0, duration, and intensity; (b) Native speakers of English employed an exquisite combination of F0, duration, and intensity, while the dialect groups transfer their native prosody into their production of English lexical stress, resulting in the deviation or abnormality of acoustic cues. Results suggest that L1 native dialect background is considered as a potentially influential factor which may transfer in L2 speech encoding and decoding process.

Prosody perception in older adults

<p id=C9><italic>Prosody</italic>, which is defined as the variance in loudness or volume, changes in tempo or timing, and movement in pitch and intonation, plays an essential role in speech communication. The ability of speech communication, however, changes across the life span. It has been found that while word knowledge and syntactic processing during comprehension are largely preserved with aging, older individuals have deficits processing multiple acoustic cues about the intention and emotion of speakers, which can interfere with their perception of linguistic and affective prosodic cues, resulting in poor speech comprehension. <p id=C10>Older individuals have a diminished ability to decode linguistic prosody. They have difficulty processing pitch contour, word stress, intonation, and speeded utterances. Recent fMRI, ERPs, and EEG studies have demonstrated that younger and older individuals activate different brain regions or neural sensitivity in linguistic prosody perception. Furthermore, aging impairs older adults’ abilities to process affective prosody, particularly for the speech conveying negative emotions. Age has tremendous effects on the automatic encoding of emotional prosody, and there is a general decline in emotion recognition with aging. <p id=C11>Moreover, age-related diseases could have specific pathologic effects on prosody processing. Age-associated progressive deterioration of neuronal and physical functions affects older adults’ abilities to process time-frequency signals, especially for those with Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, and tinnitus. Studies on older individuals with age-related diseases have obtained significant findings regarding the brain regions involved in prosody processing. It has been observed that the superior temporal gyrus in the right hemisphere is predominantly linked to the processing of affective prosodic cues and that damage to the left hemisphere can result in similar deficits. <p id=C12>Overall, current studies have carried out extensive explorations on prosody perception by older individuals, with considerable attention to the effects of different first languages and complex auditory environments. However, we thought that more in-depth studies should be conducted on the following topics. First, further explorations are needed to examine prosody processing in older adults with Mandarin and other dialect backgrounds. Specifically, given that Chinese is a tonal language with many dialects, it is unknown whether differences in tone and dialect can influence older adults’ linguistic and affective prosody perception. Secondly, more studies might be carried out to clarify the effects of complex auditory environments on prosody perception in older individuals. Previous studies have examined the impact of several noise types, which are merely part of the challenging conditions in daily communication. It is important to reveal older individuals’ prosody perception in specific situations of context, such as doctor-patient scenarios and family scenarios that they constantly experience. Thirdly, it is imperative to deepen our understanding of neural mechanisms underlying perceptual performance in complex prosodic tasks. Considering that there has been a multitude of neurological research on older adults with age-related diseases, more attention needs to be paid to the neurological performance of their healthy counterparts. Fourthly, further studies might also focus on prosody processing difficulties associated with age-related diseases, as it is still difficult to determine to what extent impairments of prosody perception in daily communication can predict age-related diseases. Finally, special attention needs to be drawn to the early intervention and the rehabilitation of prosody perception impairments in older individuals. It is still uncertain to what extent older adults, especially those with age-related diseases, can maintain or recover their abilities for prosody perception. A corresponding key issue is how to develop effective training methods for Chinese prosody perception rehabilitation. To sum up, future studies are expected to apply interdisciplinary theories and methodologies to explore prosody perception in older adults, which is of both theoretical and practical significance.

The Influence of Dialect on the Perception and Production of Lax-Tense Vowel Distinction in English Learning

This acoustic experimental study investigates the influence of dialectal background on the perception and production of lax-tense vowel distinction in English learning from the theoretical standpoint of language transfer. Previous studies usually regard the first language as a source of transfer, with few considering the influence of dialect in the process of transfer, while this study has taken account of participants’ dialects and biological genders and look at whether and how Chinese dialectal knowledge is transferred in English learning. A perception and a production experiment are conducted with two groups of participants -- Cantonese Chinese speakers and Mandarin Chinese speakers -- to respectively analyze their perception and production strategy for English lax-tense vowel pairs [I]/[i:] and [ʊ]/[u:]. The study finds out that dialect and gender cause statistically significant difference. The result shows that Cantonese speakers can effectively leverage spectral cues to differentiate English tense vowels from lax vowels, while Mandarin speakers rely heavily on durational cues. The two lingual groups have disparate production result, but no one group is overall better than the other in producing lax-tense vowels. Mandarin and Cantonese participants only differ in the F2 of the [u:] production. Moreover, when gender is considered, Mandarin females can produce native-like [ʊ]; Cantonese males and females can produce native-like [I], Cantonese females native-like [i:] and Cantonese males native-like [u:]. This study confirms that dialect should be considered in transfer study, and further points out that both dialect and gender are significant variables of the transfer mechanism in foreign language acquisition.

The Arabic dialect of Gaza City

Gaza City, with a population of over half a million residents, is the largest urban center and de-facto capital of the Gaza Strip, which itself has a total population of over 1.8 million. As of 2018, it is estimated that at least 1.3 million of the residents of the Gaza Strip are Palestinian refugees from other areas in historic Palestine, having fled to Gaza after the creation of the State of Israel in 1948. These refugee communities originally come from the many historic rural areas that surrounded the Gaza Strip, smaller towns and cities along the Mediterranean coast, as well as areas further afield such as Jaffa, 69 km north of Gaza on the coast, and Bir il-Sab‘, the largest city in the Nagab desert region (see Figure 1). Linguistically, many of these refugee communities are of Palestinian Arabic dialect backgrounds, although varieties of Arabic spoken in the Nagab are classified as originating in the Hijaz area of what is today Saudi Arabia (see Shahin 2007 on Palestinian Arabic and Henkin 2010 on Nagab Arabic).

Investigating speaker individuality in the Swiss Standard German of four Alemannic dialect regions: Consonant quantity, vowel quality, and temporal variables

While German-speaking Switzerland manifests a considerable amount of dialectal diversity, until the present day the phonetic interrelation of Alemannic (ALM) dialects and spoken Swiss Standard German (SSG) has not been studied with an acoustic phonetic approach on the speaker level.&#x0D; In this study, out of a pool of 32 speakers (controlled for sex, age, and education level) from 4 dialectologically distinct ALM areas, 16 speakers with 2 dialects were analysed regarding SSG consonant duration (in words whose ALM equivalents may or may not have a geminate), 8 speakers from the city of Bern (BE) were analysed for vowel quality, and 32 speakers were analysed for temporal variables, i.e., articulation rate (AR) and vocalic-speech percentage (%V).&#x0D; Results reveal that there is much intradialectal inter- and intraspeaker variation in all three aspects scrutinised, but especially regarding vowel quality of BE SSG mid vowels and temporal variables. As for consonant quantity, while intradialectal interspeaker variation was observed, speakers showed a tendency towards normalised SSG consonant durations that resemble the normalised consonant durations in their ALM dialect. In general, these results suggest that a speaker’s dialect background is only one factor amongst many that influence the way in which Swiss Standard German is spoken.

Differences in nasalance and nasality perception between Texas South and Midland dialects

While previous research has primarily concerned the dialectal influence on speakers' production of oral-nasal balance, quantitatively represented by nasalance, information on cross-dialectal variation in nasality perception is limited. This study investigated the effects of speakers'/listeners' dialectal background on oral-nasal balance characteristics estimated by nasalance, as well as nasality perception measured by direct magnitude estimation with modulus. Represented by two geographically distinct regions, Texas South and Midland dialects were of special interest given that the two dialects lie at opposite ends of normal nasalance variation [Awan, Bressmann, Poburka, Roy, Sharp, and Watts. (2015). J. Speech Lang. Hear. Res. 58, 69-77]. Mean nasalance of various speech stimuli and direct magnitude estimation ratings on synthesized vowel stimuli with varying degrees of simulated nasalization were obtained from 62 participants (31 Texas South, 31 Midland). The results revealed that the two dialectal groups significantly differed in nasalance scores and nasality ratings, with Texas South exhibiting higher nasalance for standardized passage readings and assigning higher nasality ratings on the synthetic auditory stimuli than Midland. These findings indicate that, in addition to production variations of oral-nasal balance characteristics, perceptual variations of nasality exist at a dialectal level.

≪학봉김션생행장(鶴峯金先生行狀)≫의 서지와 언어

This article conducts a bibliographic and linguistic study on Hakpong kim sonsaeng haengjang (‘An Annotation of the Behaviors of Great Scholar Kim Hakpong’ 鶴峯金先生行狀), which is not a well-known source in Korean historical linguistics. The annotation book is a one-volume manuscript translated from Classical Chinese into Korean vernacular in 1770 by Kim Chuguk, the 7th eldest son of the eldest son’s family of Kim Hakpong. Evidence from the number of handwritings, types of misspelling and the use of a certain punctuation mark, however, indicates that the book is not the original version, but a copied one. According to some intra- and extra-linguistic evidence, the transcribers must be Kim Chuguk’s family members. Based on the bibliographic characteristics of the annotation, in order to reveal its linguistic value I have researched the following topics: its dialectal background; its orthographical, phonological, grammatical and lexical characteristics; and its translational aspect.

Cultural Differences, Dialect Feature and M&As

With a vast territory and a long history, China has a unique and diverse regional culture. Due to geographical, historical and political reasons, local dialects in different regions have become important carriers of Chinese regional culture. In other words, the unique linguistic environment, as an important part of regional culture and an informal system, exerts a profound influence on corporate governance. M&A events, involving a large number of participants and fierce competition of interests, represent the allocation and reorganization of resources. In the process of M&As, dialect background is a kind of corporate capital to facilitate its own action. Specifically, the same or similar dialect background is somehow a natural link between the acquirer and the target company, making it easier to mobilize resources, facilitate transactions and enhance post-M&A performance. Using the dialect data fromLanguage Atlas of China and manually matching the linguistic differences between the acquirers and the target companies, we identify acquisitions made by listed companies between 2000 and 2012. After controlling the geographic factors and various economic factors（transaction characteristic, characteristics of the acquirers and the target companies, etc.）, we find that the greater the dialect distance is, the less the shareholder value is. Further analysis shows that this correlation exists when the informal institutions play a complementary role or information asymmetry is serious, however, this correlation is weaker to some extent with the popularization of Putonghua. In view of the inherent problem of endogeneity in the study of culture and corporate governance, this paper takes some measures such as tool variable method, control missing variable and random effect model. Our studies provide the evidence that through specific corporate financial behavior, dialects have a significant effect on economic issues like corporate governance. Different from previous researches, this paper explores a new perspective on how to measure corporate cultural differences. We use the structure of Chinese dialects as our definition of corporate culture and match the linguistic distance between different companies manually. At the same time, this paper expands the discussion of dialects in corporate governance through digging into a specific corporate financial behavior. It also provides the micro evidence that dialects affect corporate economic performance. The research in this paper shows that the dialect, as an important representative of regional culture, exerts its influence on a company’s specific financial activities when playing its role of human capital and culture identity. The scope of such impacts may also be reflected in other economic decisions of enterprises, confirming the influence mechanism that informal institutions play an important role in economic development. This paper also has some limitations. Firstly, there are some controversies over the dialectal classification in China. The classification method adopted in this paper is mainly based on the Chinese Language Atlas compiled by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Its classification method is more authoritative, which can ensure the accuracy of dialect regional division. However, the dialect division in some disputed areas may still cause some controversies. Secondly, although this paper attempts to solve the endogenous problem in several ways, the problem still remains. Maybe one day it could be solved by the exogenous changes in future dialect policies or new research methods. Thirdly, the language mentioned in this paper plays the role of a cultural proxy variable, besides, its impact on thinking mode may have a more important position in future studies.

Perception of phonetic imitation of Southern American English by Midwesterners

Phonetic imitation has been observed across regional dialects in English, French, and Mandarin. This cross-dialect imitation is affected by social factors, including dialect prestige and social salience of the linguistic variables. The goal of the current study was to explore the perception of phonetic imitation of Southern American English by native speakers of Midwestern American English in a word shadowing task. The magnitude of the Midwesterners’ phonetic imitation was assessed using an AXB perceptual discrimination task, in which a different group of Midwestern listeners was asked to identify either a baseline read token or a shadowed token as more similar to the model token. The results of the AXB task revealed evidence of overall imitation, consistent with acoustic measures of imitation in word durations, vowel formant frequencies, and vowel formant trajectories. Moreover, perceived imitation was weaker for shadowers who were told where the model talker was from (i.e., Louisville, Kentucky) than for shadowers who were not provided with any information about the model talker, suggesting that explicit information about the model talker’s dialect background can shape the magnitude of cross-dialect phonetic imitation. The specificity of this cross-dialect phonetic imitation across acoustic domains and vowel variables will be discussed.

A NYELVJÁRÁSOK TÉMAKÖRE NÉHÁNY MAGYARORSZÁGI ÉS VAJDASÁGI KÖZÉPISKOLAI TANKÖNYVBEN

A magyar anyanyelvű gyerekek több mint fele nyelvjárási hátterű, mely tényt a magyartanárok nem hagyhatják figyelmen kívül. Az anyanyelvoktatás a köznyelvi normát részesíti előnyben, de emellett az is célja, hogy a dialektusok jelentőségteljes szerepére rámutasson, és pozitív nyelvjárási attitűdöt alakítson ki a diákokban. A tanulók egyrészt a pedagógusok által, másrészt a tankönyvekből szerezhetnek ismereteket a sztenderdről és a nyelvjárásokról mint nyelvváltozatokról. A tankönyvek ugyanakkor a tanárok számára is támaszt nyújtanak a tanításhoz. Dolgozatunk tárgya a magyar nyelvjárások témakörének megjelenése középiskolai tankönyvekben. Vizsgáljuk, hogy milyen elméleti ismereteket és gyakorlati feladatokat kínál a tanulóknak, valamint azt is kutatjuk, hogy a tankönyv hozzájárul-e a pozitív nyelvjárási attitűd kialakításához. Tanulmányunk a Magyarországon, valamint a Vajdaságban leginkább használatos középiskolai tankönyveket öleli fel.

Improving English Pronunciation Teaching and Learning via Speech Corpora of Learners with Dialectal Backgrounds

Speech corpora play an important role in phonetic research and have been applied in daily life. Their application can be found in pronunciation teaching and learning. This article takes Jianghuai mandarin, a transitional dialect between northern and southern dialects in China, as an example to illustrate the necessity and procedures about the construction of an English speech corpus of learners with dialectal backgrounds. It shows that such corpus can be applied to help improve English pronunciation teaching and learning with its technical power in saving large audio data and its annotation with voice editing and analyzing software. It assists, when working together with Praat, to visually demonstrate spectrogram of similarities and differences between English and native language. It also functions to raise pronunciation awareness and help improve learners’ pronunciation. It is expected to be useful in stimulating teachers and learners to study pronunciation based on data analysis of physical features of recorded audio sound.

Redefining ‘Chinese’ L1 in SLP: Considerations for the assessment of Chinese bilingual/bidialectal language skills

Purpose: Language assessment of bilingual/bidialectal children can be complex. This is particularly true for speakers from China, who are likely to be bilingual and bidialectal at the same time. There has been, however, a lack of understanding of the diversity of Chinese languages as well as data on bidialectal children’s L1 syntactic development and the development of L1 bidialectal children’s L2 acquisition.Method: This paper provides information on the complexity of the language system for people from China. It will present illustrative examples of the expressive language outputs of bilingual and bidialectal children from the perspective of bilingual, bidialectal linguists and speech-language pathologists. Then it will outline why appropriate assessment tools and practices for identification of language impairment in bilingual Chinese children need to be developed.Result: Considerations include that Chinese bilingual children may differ in L2 performance because of lack of exposure in the target language or because of their varied L1 dialectal backgrounds, but not necessarily because of language impairment.Conclusion: When evaluating morphosyntactic performance of bilingual children, a series of reliable threshold indicators for possible language impairment is urgently needed for SLPs to facilitate accurate diagnosis of language impairment.