English Phonetics Research Articles

O’SPEAK FOR ENGLISH PHONETIC AND PHONOLOGY CLASS: WHAT’S ON STUDENTS’ MIND?

In the era of Education 5.0, mobile applications for the teaching-learning process are proliferating. The mobile application also exists in English Phonetics and Phonology Classes. Its name is O’Speak. The use of O’Speak in English Phonetic and Phonology Class derives from the idea of technological development in this digital era. Virtues and hurdles of using O’Speak come out in students’ viewpoints. Therefore, this study is conducted to know the students’ perceptions toward the use of O’Speak in English Phonetic and Phonology Classes. The research method used in this study is a case study that focuses on the phenomenon of O’Speak. English Phonetics and Phonology students are the participants in this study. The finding shows that the students have several overviews toward O’Speak, such as students' concept of O’Speak, O’Speak designs, and O’Speak comments.

Evaluation of aspiration problems in L2 English pronunciation employing machine learning

The approach proposed in this study includes methods specifically dedicated to the detection of allophonic variation in English. This study aims to find an efficient method for automatic evaluation of aspiration in the case of Polish second-language (L2) English speakers' pronunciation when whole words are analyzed instead of particular allophones extracted from words. Sample words including aspirated and unaspirated allophones were prepared by experts in English phonetics and phonology. The datasets created include recordings of words pronounced by nine native English speakers of standard southern British accent and 20 Polish L2 English users. Complete unedited words are treated as input data for feature extraction and classification algorithms such as k-nearest neighbors, naive Bayes method, long-short term memory, and convolutional neural network (CNN). Various signal representations, including low-level audio features, the so-called mid-term and feature trajectory, and spectrograms, are tested in the context of their usability for the detection of aspiration. The results obtained show high potential for an automated evaluation of pronunciation focused on a particular phonological feature (aspiration) when classifiers analyze whole words. Additionally, CNN returns satisfying results for the automated classification of words containing aspirated and unaspirated allophones produced by Polish L2 speakers.

Insertion of vowels in English syllabic consonantal clusters pronounced by L1 Polish speakers

AbstractThe aim of this study was an attempt to verify whether Polish speakers of English insert a vowel in the word-final clusters containing a consonant and a syllabic /l/ or /n/ due to the L1–L2 transfer. L1 Polish speakers are mostly unaware of the existence of syllabic consonants; hence, they use the Polish phonotactics and articulate a vocalic sound before a final sonorant which is deprived of its syllabicity. This phenomenon was examined among L1 Polish speakers, 1-year students of English studies, and the recording sessions were repeated a year later. Since, over that time, they were instructed with regard to phonetics and phonology but also the overall practical language learning, the results demonstrated the occurrence of the phenomenon of vowel insertion on different levels of advanced command of English. If the vowels were inserted, their quality and length were monitored and analysed. With regard to the English system, pronouncing vowel /ə/ before a syllabic consonant is possible, yet not usual. That is why another aim of this study is to examine to what extent the vowels articulated by the subjects differ from the standard pronunciation of non-final /ə/. The quality differences between the vowels articulated in the words ending with /l/ and /n/ were examined as well as the potential influence from the difference between /l/ and /n/ on the occurrence of vowel reduction. Even though Polish phonotactics permit numerous consonantal combinations in all word positions, it proved to be challenging for L1 Polish speakers to pronounce word-final consonantal clusters containing both syllabic sonorants. This result carries practical implications for the teaching methodology of English phonetics.

TEACHING ENGLISH PHONETICS USING MODERN METHODS

The article discusses teaching English phonetics using modern methods. In the work, the following tasks have been solved: how to determine the preferred method of explaining and working out the phonetic features of the English language; write a methodology and plan for explaining and practicing the phonetic features of the English language; consider modern interactive methods for learners. Since teaching phonetics in English lessons at school is an integral and important factor in the development of competent oral speech. The phonetics of the English language should contribute to the formation and development of speech abilities and skills in speech activity.

ADVANCING ADJUSTMENT IN THE PROGRESS OF ACHIEVE THE ENGLISH PHONOLOGICAL COMPONENT

The motivation behind this paper is to introduce the outcomes gotten from a mixed learning educational involvement with the English Phonetics and Phonology classes, at Facultad de Filosofía Humanidades y Artes, Universidad Nacional de San Juan, Argentina. In this experience, interests identified with the instructing at more elevated level schooling and the utilization of innovative assets combine. Two issues will be tended to: a) the utilization of the email and the execution of an interpersonal interaction site, Facebook, the two of them utilized for scholarly purposes; and b) the aftereffects of an overview which was controlled to understudies to assess their conclusions about the value of these assets. As college instructors, we are delicate to the progressions that our general public is encountering in regards to data and correspondence advances (ICTs). The consolidation of mechanical assets of the Web 2.0 to curricular units, some way or another produces disturbances to conventional learning conditions and opens up a scope of conceivable outcomes which make it simpler for understudies to fabricate and deal with information in an unexpected way.

The Capability of Pronouncing the English Diphthongs by the English Department Students, Faculty of Humanities, Udayana University

This study aims at investigating the capability of the English department students, Faculty of Humanities, Udayana University in pronouncing diphthongs. Diphthong is a glide from one vowel to another. English is very rich in words containing diphthongs, such as: / aI / in the word try / traI / buy / baI /; / eI /, in the words they / ðeI /, day / deI /, / eə / as in hair / heə /, chair /tʃeə/. Meanwhile, the number of diphthongs in Indonesian and Balinese as the mother tongue of the students is very limited. This difference certainly creates problems for students in pronouncing the English words consisting of diphthongs. The knowledge of English sounds is taught in the subject of English phonetics and phonemics in the fifth semester. This study examined the ability of new students who have not taken the English Phonetics and Phonemics subject to be compared with the ability of those who have got this subject, so that it can be seen to what extent this course can change student performance in pronouncing diphthongs. This research is a qualitative descriptive research supported by quantitative data. The population of this study was 50 new students and 50 sixth semester students, taken randomly. The research instrument was a list of English words containing diphthongs and questionnaires. The technique of collecting data was done through recording, and the data were analyzed descriptive qualitatively and presented formally and informally.

A Study of English Phonetic Teaching Strategies From the Perspective of Embodied Cognition

The mastery of language is inseparable from obtaining phonetic knowledge, and forming correct pronunciation is one of the necessary conditions for learning languages. Good English pronunciation can promote the learning of listening and speaking. English phonetic knowledge is so abstract to grasp that in primary schools, combining the characteristics of children’s cognitive development, English teachers should mobilize students’ body and mind to learn together, and construct embodied teaching situation to guide students to form standardized pronunciation gradually through the process of interaction between their body and environment. So that students will lay a solid phonetic foundation for their oral communication in the future, and the comprehensive development of their comprehensive English quality will be promoted.

A Brief Discussion on the Application of Contrastive Analysis Theory in English Phonetics Teaching

Contrastive analysis is an important theory in second language acquisition, which aims to compare the similarities and differences between the learner’s first language and the target language, so as to predict the difficulties in second language acquisition. Although the theory has its limitations, its role in second language acquisition is undeniable. Especially for English teachers, the transfer theory and Stimulus-Response-Reinforcement theory provide a lot of guidance for phonetics teaching.

Research on the Function of Visual Phonetic Software Praat in Vocational English Phonetics Teaching

Phonetics teaching is the most difficult part of English majors in higher vocational colleges. Many students are affected by their mother tongue pronunciation habits and the lack of systematic voice training at the middle school stage, resulting in weak phonetic foundations. There are problems such as inability to correctly distinguish between long and short vowels, voiced consonants, emphasized and light pronunciation, and intonation. To this end, the introduction of the visual speech software Praat, using its visual and intuitive image characteristics can assist teachers in class, help students find the pronunciation errors in time and correct them in time. Based on this, this article will combine the status quo of English phonetics teaching in higher vocational colleges and analyze the role of Praat phonetics learning software in phonetics teaching and its specific application implementation.

Perception experiments to try on your friends

This talk presents hands-on activities to give intermediate students experience conducting phonological perception experiments and deepen their grasp of categorical consonant perception. It focuses on two assignments in which students gather categorical perception responses from friends, graph them to reveal crossover points, form hypotheses about contributing cues, and apply Praat measurement skills to test them. In the first, students and naïve friends respond to online phoneme identification and discrimination tasks involving a synthesized /ba-da-ga/ continuum varying only in formant transitions. They tally and graph the pooled responses, identify crossover points, and answer interpretation questions. In the second task, students and friends identify words on a bad-bat continuum varying only in vowel length. They hypothesize which phonetic features might distinguish the words, then measure them in Praat to discover that vowel length cues final consonant voicing, not voice onset time as learned in previous lessons. These activities have been used successfully in an advanced introduction to speech science for speech-language pathology undergraduates with an introductory English phonetics prerequisite. They form many students’ first experience conducting experiments, and the hypothesis, deduction, and interpretation portions stretch their critical thinking skills.

Attitudes toward English phonetics learning: a survey on Indonesian EFL learners

Indonesian EFL learners face challenges in comprehending English phonemes as it becomes one of the significant predictors of English literacy. Hence, the English Phonetics subject is considered one of the most difficult ones, making the teaching and learning process less effective. Addressing Indonesian EFL learners’ attitudes toward English phonetics teaching is significant to improve phonetics teaching, yet, research on this has not received much attention. This present study was conducted to explore EFL learners’ attitudes toward English phonetic learning. A quantitative approach with survey design was employed involving 112 Indonesian EFL students. The researchers identified students’ attitudes using an adapted questionnaire from Lintunen and Mäkilähde (2015). Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 25 was utilized to analyze the data. The results indicate that Indonesian EFL students perform positive attitudes toward English phonetic learning, although they confess that phonetics is challenging. It implies that phonetics learning is potential and promising to support their English fluency; hence, lecturers need to make phonetics Learning more enjoyable, easier and participating in drawing the students' full engagement by considering their preferences and attitude toward phonetics learning.

Эволюция фонологической теории Д. Джоунза в современной английской фонологии

The paper aims to reveal continuity of D. Jones’s phonological theory provisions in development of theoretical base of the modern English phonetics. Scientific originality of the study lies in the fact that the researchers for the first time provide a comprehensive analysis of D. Jones’s phonological views which were further developed in the British phonologists’ works. The research findings are as follows: the authors identify the core principles of the phonetic system functioning and development discovered by D. Jones and clarified in his followers’ works.

IPAcman – or how to gamify introductory phonetics and phonology education

The article introduces a new educational browser-based game named IPAcman. The game is a didactic tool which can be used in introductory courses on English phonetics and phonology and teaches the description of conservative RP phonemes with the proper linguistic terminology, pertaining to places of articulation, manners of articulation, and voicing (in consonants) or vowel height, backness and roundedness. A short survey performed on three groups of students who were taught with IPAcman reveals that the attitudes towards the use of computer games in university coursework are overwhelmingly positive and that learning through playing a computer game is judged to be both enjoyable and highly effective.

Review of Carley & Mees (2020): American English phonetics and pronunciation practice

Review of Carley & Mees (2020): American English phonetics and pronunciation practice

Phonology and Phonetics of L2 Telugu English

The paper provides a partial phonological and phonetic description of the segmental structure of L2 Telugu English (TE). Previous research on the subject has been carried out in the context of a more general notion of Indian English (IE), so the properties of TE as distinct from other varieties of IE (e.g., Gujarati English) have largely remained unexplored. We have primarily focused on areas that previous research identified as prominent issues in the study of IE: vowel inventory and production, representation and realization of liquids, word-final obstruent phenomena, and allophones of /w/. To account for these aspects of TE, we have combined a generative approach to the study of an individual’s linguistic competence with linguistic fieldwork as a means of collecting first-hand data. On the basis of collected data, we have conducted a spectrographic analysis of TE vowels and a distributional analysis of TE consonants. The paper provides the first description of the acoustic spaces of TE vowels. We found that all vowels except [?] and [i] are more central in TE than in General American English. /r/ was realized as either [r] or [?] without a specific pattern, and occasionally as [?] in the intervocalic position. /l/ was realized as [?] in word-final position and as [l] elsewhere. TE displayed word-final obstruent devoicing for all obstruents except for /b/, which was consistently unreleased. /w/ was realized as [?] before front vowels and as [w] elsewhere. While previous research that concentrated on the broad notion of Indian English recognized the issue of /w/-allophony, it has not provided a principle that governs the exact distribution of /w/’s allophones. By combining the generative framework with linguistic fieldwork, we have accounted for this long-standing puzzle with a single rule: /w/ ? [?] / __ [–CONS, –BACK].

Preferences and Attitude toward English Phonetics Learning: The perspectives of Indonesian EFL Learners

English learners should aware of English sounds, more specifically English phoneme, to comprehending the English language accurately. In order to completing the goal this research aimed to find out students’ preferences and attitude of English Education Program in Universitas Brawijaya. This was a descriptive quantitative research by using a survey design. The participants of this study were 103 (a hundred and three) students of batch 2015 to 2017 in English Language Education Program. The researcher used adopted questionnaire which consist of 8 items preferred themes and 19 statements of attitude in phonetic as the instrument by Lintunen and Makilahde (2013). This research was analyzed using SPSS program. The result of this study revealed student’s preference and attitudes toward phonetics learning. The most preferred topic chosen by the participants are the vowel systems (28.20%), speech rhythm and accent difference (27.20%), and intonation analysis (26.20%). The students performed a positive attitude toward English phonetic learning that can improve their skill in English especially in their pronunciation (98.1%). It is concluded that the students thought English Phonetics is important to increase their knowledge and their skill in learning English. The researcher suggested for future researcher, they can conduct the research by considering the correlation between pronunciation in English phonetics and speaking skill in English language.

Linguocultural approach as means of managing learning strategies when teaching a foreign language

The article deals with the survey conducted upon the basis of the Pedagogical University with the students learning English as a foreign language. The study is aimed at finding the correlation between applying the linguocultural approach and improving students’ leaning strategies implication. Thus, the study defined the positive impact of the linguocultural approach upon the frequency of learning strategies usage by the students. The study deals with such types of learning strategies as common, metacognitive, affective, and social strategies implemented by the students learning English grammar and phonetics. The authors of the article used a questionnaire method to assert the fact that linguocultural approach has positive impact upon the development of the students’ learning strategies depending upon their gender and national peculiarities.

The use of multimedia language laboratory in teaching English phonetics at the university

The importance of correct English pronunciation is growing due to its central role in communication and the speaker’s identity. Non-native English speakers lack a natural linguistic environment and tend to carry articulation rules and intonation from their mother tongue. Modern conditions of the fast-paced world require a revision of the forms and methods of the educational process. Teachers should engage students in independent and individual work at classes, increase the use of practical and research tasks. Information technologies in the teaching process at different levels of education (both school and university) change the roles of all participants in the educational process. Thus, teachers are given more opportunities to improve their work, and students are taught a foreign language at a higher level. The article aims to state the advantages of using multimedia technologies as an educational tool in teaching English practical phonetics and to find out university students’ attitude to it. The object of the research is the benefits of working in a language laboratory, equipped with Rinel-Lingo (a multimedia language programme to train phonetics of a foreign language of university students). The article analyzes the results of the survey conducted in Murmansk arctic state university.

“아학편(兒學編)” 영단어 발음의 한글 표기에 관한 소고

This article examines how English words pronunciations were transcribed into Hangeul (Korean letter) in Ahakpyeon, a multilingual lexicon which was originally written and compiled by Jeong Yakyong in circa 1804 and edited again by Ji Seokyeong & Jeon Yonggyu in 1908 with the addition of Korean, Japanese and English annotations for Hanja literacy education for children. It is revealed with many illustrations that English words pronunciations were transcribed into Hangeul in a systematic way that is based on close observation and profound understanding of both Korean and English phonetics and phonology: Firstly, broadly speaking, English voiced stops ‘b, d, g’ were transcribed into hapyong byeongseo ‘ㅅㅂ, ㅅㄷ, ㅅㄱ’, especially in word-initial position which were used for the so-called tense stops in Korean. This means that English ‘b, d, g’ were perceived and produced especially in word-initial position (sometimes erratically) as tense stops to Koreans. Secondly, English fricatives, most of which are not in Korean, were also transcribed into forms of hapyong byeongso again, but this time, as hapyong byeongseo in which o appears on the left side of the byeongso. Transcription of English liquids r and l into Korean is also achieved in a creative, witty and shrewd manner that makes use of positional variants of Korean liquid , that is, ‘으’ is epenthesized in front of a word-initial English ‘r’ but ‘을’ before Englis ‘l’.

Технология исправления фонетических ошибок у обучающихся среднего школьного возраста на уроках английского языка

The research objective includes developing a technique to correct secondary school pupils’ phonetic mistakes in the process of the English language teaching. The paper considers specificity when correcting middle-grade pupils’ phonetic mistakes. The authors analyse peculiarities of teaching the English phonetics, systematize difficulties arising in the process of phonetic skills acquisition, describe methodological techniques to prevent and correct phonetic mistakes. Scientific originality of the study involves introducing an effective technique to correct phonetic mistakes that allows improving children’s cognitive-communicative activity in the English classes. The research findings can be successfully applied when teaching English to middle-grade pupils.