Exploring Elision of Schwa of /ə/ in English Utterances by C &amp; U English Majors

Mao, Huaizhou; Chen, Huaying

doi:10.7575/ijalel.v.2n.1p.117

Cited by 5 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Demirezen (2010) says that Turkey has developed a fossilised articulation error because of the use of the schwa phoneme in their speech. Mao (2013) claims that the transfer of learners' mother tongues influences their Elision of Schwa in English. Bhide et al (2014) are of the view that Schwa sounds, both early and late bilinguals, spoke Spanish and English with varying degrees of fluency.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding Schwa Sound by ESL Learners: A Study of English Pronunciation in Pakistan

2023

JDSS

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Schwa Sound denoted by [ə] in the IPA system is a critical issue that must be addressed to improve the pronunciation competence of EFL learners in Pakistan. Pronunciation is essential for achieving fluency in English. To be clear, comprehensible, and impressive to their listeners, speakers must be able to deliver their speech with proper and clear pronunciation. With the status of the Schwa Sound in English pronunciation in mind, the current study sought to investigate the common difficulties experienced by EFL learners in perceiving and pronouncing it. An English learner must pronounce the words correctly in the same way that a native speaker would. The ability of a non-native English speaker or learner to resolve miscommunication issues becomes increasingly important as time passes. However, as it has been discovered and experienced, a non-native English speaker can't speak exactly like a native English speaker, despite strenuous efforts to achieve perfection in English pronunciation.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding Schwa Sound by ESL Learners: A Study of English Pronunciation in Pakistan

2023

JDSS

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“…For example, the pronunciation of the word phrase / ten players/ is changed from [tεn 'pleɪɚz] to [tem 'pleɪɚz] in running speech. Assimilation is absent in Chinese utterances and therefore poses a challenge for Chinese EFL learners in English speech processing (Mao & Chen, 2013). In Liang's (2015) study, 50 Chinese university sophomores majoring in English exhibited below-chance performances when identifying cases of assimilation.…”

Section: The Consistency Of Performances Across Phonological Processes Of Connected Speechmentioning

confidence: 93%

“…This process is often evidenced in word phrases such as /iced tea/ (its citation form is /aɪst 'ti/), which is pronounced as [aɪs 'ti] (similar to /ice tea/). The process of elision is also absent in Chinese utterances (Mao & Chen, 2013). In a study conducted in Taiwan, Chinese EFL sophomores with low, mid, and high English proficiency levels correctly identified only 44%, 69%, and 77% of elision cases, respectively (Kuo, 2012).…”

Section: The Consistency Of Performances Across Phonological Processes Of Connected Speechmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Differential Effects of Subtitles on the Comprehension of Native English Connected Speech Varying in Types and Word Familiarity

et al. 2020

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Connected speech produced by native speakers poses a challenge to second language learners. Video subtitles have been found to assist the decoding of English connected speech for learners of English as a foreign language (EFL). However, the presence of subtitles may divert the listeners’ attention to the visual cues while paying less attention to the speech signals. To test this proposal, we employed a bi-modal audio-visual listening test and examined whether EFL listeners were able to correctly identify the connected speech when misleading subtitles were present. We further tested whether connected speech with words of lower frequency further reduced the accuracy rate. Twenty-eight adolescent EFL learners, all with more than 10 years of experiences in learning English in schools, were tested with three major types of connected speech phonological processes, namely assimilation, elision, and juncture. The results of statistical analyses showed that matched and mismatched subtitles facilitated the comprehension of both familiar and unfamiliar connected speech. Error analyses revealed the degree of item-specific variations across the three types of connected speech processes as well as across the three subtitling conditions. This research provides insights on the immediate and long-term impact of subtitles on the decoding of English connected speech.

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“…Meanwhile, other studies only focused on analyzing error pronunciation (e.g. Mulatsih, 2015;Awan et al, 2016;Ganie et al, 2019;Ombat & Kirigia, 2020), schwa (Mao & Chen, 2013), and English diphthongs (Donal, 2016). In Bahasa Indonesi, thera are terms of additional prefix, language interferences, phonological variation, phonological change that form in phonemes and consonants.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Phonological Change Processes of English and Indonesian

Diani

Azwandi

2021

J. appl. linguist. lit.

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Phonological change is a language phenomenon that occurs because language users change the distribution of phonemes in a language. The aims of this study are to explain the phonological processes that occur in English and Indonesian and to explain the differences in phonological forms between English and Indonesian. The method used in this study is a contrasting-descriptive method by comparing two languages, namely English and Indonesian. The data were taken from the speech of students taking Indonesian and English courses at the University of Bengkulu, totaling 40 students in the first semester. The results show that five types of phonological change processes occurred in English and Indonesian, namely assimilation, metathesis, epenthesis, epithesis, and deletion. The phonological change in English often occurred when two vowel phonemes meet, such as /ea/ shift to /e/, or /i/, phoneme /y/ shift to /i/. Phoneme /e/ was pronounced when two vowel phonemes meet, such as /s/ and /n/ becomes /sen/. Phoneme /g/ is pronounced multiply when it meets the sound/ng/. Phoneme /u/ is pronounced when it meets phoneme /o/ + a consonant. Phoneme /h/ is unpronounced when it meets a vowel phoneme or more vowel phonemes in the words. Meanwhile, phonological changes in Indonesian often occurred from consonant phonemes to other consonant phonemes that have almost the same sound such as phoneme /z/ shift to /s/ and /j/. Phoneme /k/ was pronounced after phoneme /u/ and phoneme /h/ is pronounced after phoneme /a/at the end of words. Phoneme /y/ was pronounced between phonemes /i/ and /a/. Phoneme /h/ was unpronounced when it meets phonemes /a/, /i/, and /u/ in words. In conclusion, the process of phonological change that occurs in English and Indonesian is due to the influence of adjacent phoneme sounds that resemble nearby sounds.

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Exploring Elision of Schwa of /ə/ in English Utterances by C & U English Majors

Cited by 5 publications

References 9 publications

Understanding Schwa Sound by ESL Learners: A Study of English Pronunciation in Pakistan

Understanding Schwa Sound by ESL Learners: A Study of English Pronunciation in Pakistan

The Differential Effects of Subtitles on the Comprehension of Native English Connected Speech Varying in Types and Word Familiarity

Phonological Change Processes of English and Indonesian

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