Native speaker perceptions of accented speech: The English pronunciation of Macedonian EFL learners
Journal
Research in Language
Date Issued
2010
Author(s)
Anastazija Kirkova-Naskova
DOI
10.2478/v10015-010-0004-7
Abstract
The paper reports on the results of a study that aimed to describe the vocalic and
consonantal features of the English pronunciation of Macedonian EFL learners as
perceived by native speakers of English and to find out whether native speakers who
speak different standard variants of English perceive the same segments as non-native. A
specially designed computer web application was employed to gather two types of data: a)
quantitative (frequency of segment variables and global foreign accent ratings on a 5-
point scale), and b) qualitative (open-ended questions). The result analysis points out to
three most frequent markers of foreign accent in the English speech of Macedonian EFL
learners: final obstruent devoicing, vowel shortening and substitution of English dental
fricatives with Macedonian dental plosives. It also reflects additional phonetic aspects
poorly explained in the available reference literature such as allophonic distributional
differences between the two languages and intonational mismatch.
consonantal features of the English pronunciation of Macedonian EFL learners as
perceived by native speakers of English and to find out whether native speakers who
speak different standard variants of English perceive the same segments as non-native. A
specially designed computer web application was employed to gather two types of data: a)
quantitative (frequency of segment variables and global foreign accent ratings on a 5-
point scale), and b) qualitative (open-ended questions). The result analysis points out to
three most frequent markers of foreign accent in the English speech of Macedonian EFL
learners: final obstruent devoicing, vowel shortening and substitution of English dental
fricatives with Macedonian dental plosives. It also reflects additional phonetic aspects
poorly explained in the available reference literature such as allophonic distributional
differences between the two languages and intonational mismatch.
Subjects
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