Phonological Constraints on the Utterance of L2 Clusters by Saudi ESL Learners

The field of L2 phonology did not receive much research compared to the other linguistic domains. To add to the field and expand the current literature, the present paper’s goal was to examine the impact of syllable structure differences between Arabic and English in uttering L2 English consonant clusters. The following research question was aimed to be answered: Do the differences between two languages’ syllable structure cause production difficulties in the consonant cluster to Saudi Arabian learners of English? The subjects of this investigation were L2 English learners from Saudi with intermediate proficiency levels in English. Applying the descriptive correlational type of research model, the results showed that learners’ production is mainly influenced by their native language-specific phonological features. The learners’ production of targeted L2 consonant clusters seemed to mirror their underlying phonological system, and syllables structures were modified to match their native Arabic phonological system as a result of language transfer. These findings should be taken into account by L2 speech educators as such speech difficulty is anticipated.

Phonetic and Phonological Transfer from Northern Vietnamese to English in Consonant Clusters and Voiceless Final Obstruents

This article studies phonetic and phonological transfer from Northern Vietnamese to English observed in the production of consonant clusters and voiceless final obstruents. The pronunciation of a corpus of words in English produced by eight Northern Vietnamese participants has been obtained by means of two reading tasks and compared to the productions of two English speakers. The material has been auditorily and acoustically analysed following a descriptive approach and using a mixed methodology. The features that conform to phonetic and phonological transfer from Northern Vietnamese to English have been identified and analysed. Finally, some applications of this study have been proposed to help intelligibility in international contexts and to enhance the teaching of English to Northern Vietnamese students.

The Development of Labial Clusters in the Aśokan Rock Edicts

The original range of consonant clusters in Indo-Aryan reduced significantly over time, developing into geminates, homorganic nasal-stop clusters, and sonorant-h clusters in Middle Indo-Aryan. Early Middle Indo-Aryan, as represented in the Aśokan inscriptions, however, still maintained the original clusters, or what appear to be transitional stages of the extensive changes. Salient among those cluster changes that are observed in the Aśokan inscriptions are the changes tm, tv> tp and dv > db in Girnār in the west; sm, sv > sp in Shāhbāzgaṛhī and Mānsehrā in the north-west; and mh > mbh in Kālsī in the north and in Dhaulī and Jaugaḍa in the east. The idiosyncratic nature of these changes lies in the development of a stop from m or v, where the more usual changes would be loss or assimilation of m after a stop and of v after a stop or a sibilant, while sm and hm would normally change to mh. This paper examines the manner assimilation of the “labial” clusters (that is, the clusters with m or v that normally do not incur assimilation of the adjacent consonant) in the Aśokan Rock Edicts. It discusses the conditions, the motivation, the course of the change of m/v to a labial stop, and the dialectal differences associated with this change.

Not only size matters: limits to the Law of Three Consonants in French phonology

Grammont’s (1914) influential Law of Three Consonants (LTC) states that French schwa is obligatorily pronounced in any CC_C sequence to avoid three-consonant clusters. Later works have shown that schwa presence is also sensitive to the nature of the consonants involved, at least at the word and phrase levels. However the LTC is still generally considered as accurate under its original formulation to describe schwa-zero alternations at the stem level. The goal of the paper is to test whether the LTC should be relaxed even in this context. The paper presents two studies using judgment data to compare the behavior of schwa in derived words (stem-level phonology) and in inflected words (word-level phonology). The results of the two studies show that the nature of consonants involved in the CC_C sequence plays a role at both stem and word levels. Moreover, the same phonotactic asymmetries among consonant clusters are found in both contexts. The data therefore support a weaker version of the stem-level vs. word-level divide than what is usually assumed for French. This conclusion is strengthened by the results of a modeling study showing that a constraint-based grammar with the same phonotactic constraints across stem- and word-level phonologies provides a better fit to the judgment data from Study 1 and Study 2 than a grammar with different phononotactic constraints in the two morphosyntactic domains. The paper also replicates a number of earlier findings on the role of morphosyntactic domains, clash avoidance, and dialectal variation in schwa-zero alternations.

Phonological Constraints on the Utterance of L2 Clusters by Saudi ESL Learners

The field of L2 phonology did not receive much research compared to the other linguistic domains. To add to the field and expand the current literature, the present paper’s goal was to examine the impact of syllable structure differences between Arabic and English in uttering L2 English consonant clusters. The following research question was aimed to be answered: Do the differences between two languages’ syllable structure cause production difficulties in the consonant cluster to Saudi Arabian learners of English? The subjects of this investigation were L2 English learners from Saudi with intermediate proficiency levels in English. Applying the descriptive correlational type of research model, the results showed that learners’ production is mainly influenced by their native language-specific phonological features. The learners’ production of targeted L2 consonant clusters seemed to mirror their underlying phonological system, and syllables structures were modified to match their native Arabic phonological system as a result of language transfer. These findings should be taken into account by L2 speech educators as such speech difficulty is anticipated.

An Optimality Theory-Based Approach into the Phonotactic Constraints of English Spoken by Broadcasters in Nigeria

<p style="text-align: justify;">One of the observations in the English spoken particularly in Nigeria is phonotactic constraints. The constraints pin down the generalization which guide the articulation of sequences of phonemes. The paper examines the patterns of English consonant clusters articulation of Nigerian broadcasters in the onset and coda positions against Received Pronunciation English. The study is conducted within the framework of Optimality Theory (henceforth OT). 20 radio and television broadcasters from 4 electronic media were selected as participants. Data were obtained by means of production test and OT was employed for the analysis. The findings revealed that the participants used epenthetic vowels to break-up consonants clusters in the onset and consonant deletion to simplify clusters in the coda. The subjects’ productions can be captured by ranking Markedness constraints higher than Faithfulness constraints.</p>

The Sonority Sequencing Principle and the Structure of Slovak Consonant Clusters

The Sonority Sequencing Principle and the Structure of Slovak Consonant ClustersIn line with the Sonority Sequencing Principle (SSP), the centre of the syllable is the most sonorous sound and the sonority of the other segments in the syllable drops towards the syllable edges. Nevertheless, in many languages, there are syllable onsets and codas that violate this principle of sonority. Following the functional approach proposed by Jerzy Kuryłowicz, types of word/syllable-initial and word/syllable-final clusters in standard Slovak were delimited. A sonority-based analysis of those clusters revealed that almost 40% of the common initial consonant sequences violate the SSP. The situation with the final clusters is similar. These findings indicate that the creation of consonant clusters in a language does not depend solely on the sonority of the individual segments but also follows other phonological and/or perceptual regularities connected with the process of communication. Zasada sekwencji sonorności a struktura zbitek spółgłoskowych w języku słowackimZgodnie z zasadą sekwencji sonorności (Sonority Sequencing Principle, SSP) jądro sylaby jest dźwiękiem o najwyższej sonorności, a sonorność pozostałych segmentów sylaby maleje wraz z odległością od jądra. Niemniej jednak w wielu językach występują nagłosy i wygłosy, które naruszają tę zasadę. Przyjmując podejście funkcjonalne zaproponowane przez Jerzego Kuryłowicza, wyróżniono typy zbitek w nagłosie i wygłosie w standardowym języku słowackim. Ich analiza pod względem sonorności wykazała, że prawie 40% sekwencji powszechnie występujących w nagłosie narusza zasadę sekwencji sonorności. W przypadku wygłosu wynik był podobny. Ustalenia te wskazują, że tworzenie zbitek spółgłoskowych nie zależy wyłącznie od sonorności poszczególnych segmentów, ale również od innych prawidłowości fonologicznych i/lub percepcyjnych związanych z procesem komunikacji.

The Impact of Using Cell Phones on the Pronunciation of English Consonant Clusters among Saudi Female Secondary School Students

<p class="0abstract">This research attempts to find out the impact of using cellphones on the students’ pronunciation with an emphasis on consonant clusters. The sample of the study was 40 female secondary school students divided into two groups control and experimental. The study attempted to answer one question: <span lang="EN-IE">Will the use of pronunciation videos on cell phones help to improve Saudi female secondary students' pronunciation of English consonant clusters occurring in the onset position? To achieve this, the researcher conducted a pre-test and a post-test to test students’ pronunciation of selected vocabulary from the English Inventory of consonant clusters. After the pre-test, the experimental group used video to practice these sounds while the control group practiced that in traditional classes. The findings showed that both groups improved. However, the excremental group, having utilised cell phone videos, made significant improvement by 7.05% in the correct production of consonant clusters.</span></p>

The Capability in Pronouncing the English Final Consonant Clusters by the English Department Students, Faculty of Humanities, Udayana University

This study attempts to describe the ability of the English Department students, Faculty of Humanities, Udayana University in pronouncing English final consonant clusters. Consonant clusters are groups of consonants that can occur initia lly (onset) and finally (coda) in the syllable structure. The features of consonant clusters in each language are highly dependent on the language itself. In English, the number of consonants at the beginning of a syllable can be up to three such as: structure /strʌktʃə/, spring /sprIŋ/, while the number of consonants that forms a cluster in the coda can be up to four as in sixths /siksθs/, texts /teksθs/. While, Consonant clusters in Indonesian and Balinese as the mother tongue of students are very limited in number and only exist initially in the words. This difference, obviously, creates problems for students in pronouncing English words containing these consonant clusters The knowledge of the English sound system is taught in the English phonetic and phonemic course in the fifth semester at the English Department, Faculty of Humanities, Udayana University. This study examined the ability to pronounce consonant clusters by the second semester students who have not taken English Phonetic and Phonemic courses to be compared with student s who have taken the course, so that it can be seen to what extent the course can change students’ performance in pronouncing the consonant clusters. This research is descriptive qualitative research, supported by quantitative data. The research population was 20 second semester students and 20 sixth semester students randomly taken. The research instrument was a list of English words containing consonant clusters and questionnaires. The data collection technique was done through recording, and the data were analyzed descriptive qualitatively and presented formally and informally.