Linguistic ideologies are informed by social stereotyping (Fiske et al. 2007) to maintain the standard variety, which is often interpreted as morally superior to nonstandard varieties (Hill 2008). Consequently, these ideologies racialize nonstandard varieties (Rosa 2016), leading to even more negative stereotypes (Giles & Watson 2013). One outlet of such stereotypes can be observed with accentism. This study examines whether seeing a White or a South Asian face impacts listeners’ perception of American, British, Indian English and to what extent listeners’ social network diversity plays a role in predicting their perception of speech. Results showed that intelligibility scores decreased and accentedness judgments increased for all varieties when speech was paired with South Asian faces. However, listeners who have racially less diverse social network have the highest accentedness judgments. Currently, there is a pressing question to understand how to account for the emergence of different English varieties and their differing pronunciations. Results here shed light on to how these varieties are perceived. The implications will be discussed in light of language teaching and linguistic practices.
The Impact of Race on Speech Perception and Accentedness Judgments in Racially Diverse and Non-Diverse Groups
