Masaryk University Faculty of Arts

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3.1Methodology

3Research section

In this part, the thesis will be focusing on evaluating the speech of six French speakers of English. It will confirm or disprove the hypotheses that were made in the previous section about the difficulties the French respondents might experience in the pronunciation of English, concerning both segmental and suprasegmental features. Moreover, the speakers’ age will be taken into account. In his research, James Emil Flege deals with, among other issues, the effect of age on the pronunciation of second language in the Italian speakers of English and with the amount of influence of native-language use on the pronunciation of the second language.

In one of his papers, he discusses the Critical Period Hypothesis. His colleague, Patkowski, suggested that a “strength of foreign accent increases greatly if learning of the second language starts after the age of 15”, and another phonetician, Long, concludes that, ideally, the learner should start before the age of 6, as very little foreign accent is perceivable (Flege, 1997, p. 169). This theory implies that the ability to pronounce certain features of a second language is probably lost after the critical period (Flege, 1997, p. 170).

In his other works, he proposes that second language learners may rather have perceptual problems. Canadian French speakers seemed to experience difficulties with distinguishing /ð/ from /θ/, and /ð/ from /d/, and further on, he mentioned that European speakers of French may substitute these sounds with corresponding stops, but also fricatives, for instance /v/ (Flege, 1995, p. 6).

His conclusions were usually in favour of the younger generation of foreign speakers of English, for example, in his study of the way the Italian pronounce English consonants, Flege (1995) noted that adults “are more analytic in their processing of the new language” (p. 22) and that “beyond a certain age, L2 learners may have difficulty at a motoric level in modifying pre-established patterns of articulation” (p. 21), pointing out that pronunciation issues may arise from both motoric and mental (perception, habit formation) differences.

In this thesis, the theory will be applied to the French speakers of English, arguing that the older generation of the French will pronounce the English segmental and suprasegmental features in a significantly more imprecise manner than the younger one, assuming that the respondents over 30 years old have started to learn English after the critical period (or later than the younger ones).

3.1Methodology

In order to prove whether my hypothesis based on Flege’s research is correct, six French speakers of English were interviewed, three of whom were younger than 30 years old and the other three older. Both read and spoken English has been evaluated. A short satirical article about the French has been used; the respondents were asked to read the article and react and comment on it. Their speech was recorded, and compared and contrasted with a recording made by a native speaker of English. Moreover, the two generations of the French speakers have been compared and the differences in their pronunciation were noted. Using the outcome of the theoretical section, the mistakes predicted have been searched for in particular, and also, it has been attempted to determine to what extent their mother tongue influenced their pronunciation of English. The French speakers were also given a questionnaire in which they self-assessed their level of English and confidence about their pronunciation. This part of the research has been designed in order to find out whether they were aware of the shortcomings of their English pronunciation.

The article was chosen to examine participants’ pronunciation, as there are many difficult sounds and consonant clusters to pronounce correctly. It was also meant to arouse a long conversation, so that their spontaneous English could be evaluated as well. The article treated the relations of the English and the French, but it also spoke about the faults the Parisian French have. The respondents were asked to react to it. The correct RP pronunciation of the article transcribed into IPA (the transcription of article read by an RP speaker) is to be found below, the article itself is listed in Appendices.

[waɪ dʊ ðɪ 'ɪŋgliʃ heɪt ðə 'frent͡ʃ

ɪts 'præktɪklɪ ə 'fækt əv 'laɪf hɪər ɪn 'ɪŋglənd / laɪk 'reɪn 'hɑ:f ðə 'sʌmə / 'p^heɪnfəlɪ kən'dʒestɪd 't^ʃju:b̥¹⁶ 'træfik / ən ̩kɒnvə'seɪʃənz ə'baʊt ðə 'weðə / ðɪ 'ɪŋglɪʃ 'heɪt ðə 'frent͡ʃ

bɪ'k^həz ðə 'frent͡ʃ ə 'ru:d

ðɪ 'ɪŋgliʃ ə 'kwɪk tə prə'dju:s 'evɪdəns əv̥ 'frent͡ʃ 'ru:dnɪs / ɪn 'lʌndən 'restərɒnts / ɪt 't^heɪks ən 'ævrɪd͡ʒ əv 'θri: p^hoɪnt 'fɔ: 'mɪnɪts tə get ə 'glɑ:s ə 'wɔ:tər ɑ:ftə ðə 'weitər əz bɪn ə'lɜ:t / kəm'p^hæd̥ tə sevən't^hi:n p^hoɪnt 'naɪn 'mɪnɪts ɪn 'p^hæris / 'menɪ 'frent͡ʃ 'p^hi:pl 'dəʊnt 'kli:n ʌp 'ɑ:ftə ðeə 'dogz / 'li:viŋ ə'raʊnd 'sɪks 'θaʊzənd 'fɔ: 'hʌndrəd n 'θɜ:tɪ eɪt ju: es 't^hʌnz ə 'k^heɪnaɪn 'kræp ɔn ðeə 'stri:ts 'i:t͡ʃ 'jɪə / en wiθ 'sʌm / 'ðe:z n 'əʊdə 'prɒbləm / 'fɔ:tɪ pə'sent ə 'frent͡ʃ 'men / ən 'twentɪ faɪv̥ pə'cent ə 'wɪmɪn / 'dəʊnt 't͡ʃeɪnd͡ʒ ðeə'r ʌndəweə'r evrɪ 'deɪ / n əʊnlɪ 'fɔ:tɪ sevn pə'sent 'beɪð 'evrɪ 'deɪ

'ðɪ 'aɪdɪə ðæt 'frent͡ʃ 'p^hi:pl ə 'ru:d həz bɪ'kʌm 'səʊ ɪn'dɒktrineɪtɪd ɪn 'iŋgliʃ 'k^hʌlt͡ʃə / ðæt ə 'ri:snt 'ri:meɪk əv ðə 'mɪstə 'men 'k^hɑ:tu:nz / mɪstə 'grʌmpɪ / mɪstə 't^hɪklz / 'fi:t͡ʃəd ə 'k^hærəktə neɪmd̥ mɪstə 'ru:d / hu: 'fɑ:ts / 'bləʊz 'rɑ:zberɪz / ən 'spi:ks wɪθ ə 'frent͡ʃ 'æksənt / əʊ 'snæps

ən ðen ðeəz ðə 'fækt / ðæt 'ðeə z ən 'ækt͡ʃʊəl 'rekəgnaɪzd 'medɪkl 'sɪndrəʊm / dɪs'kraɪbiŋ ðə ̩saɪkə'lɒd͡ʒɪkl 'breɪkdaʊn ðæt ə'kɜ:z / wen ə 'fɒrən 'trævələ tə 'p^hæris dis'kɒvəz ðæt ðə 'sɪtɪ əv 'rəʊməns n 'laɪt 'iznt 'ɔ:l ɪts krækt 'ʌp tə bi: / its cɔ:ld̥ 'p^hærɪs 'sɪndrəʊm / ən it ə'p^hɪəz tə pə't^hɪkjələlɪ ə'fekt ̩d͡ʒæpə'ni:z 't^hɔ:rɪsts / nɒt ə'k^hʌstəmd̥ tʊ ə sə'saɪətɪ / weə ɪts ə'kseptəbl fər ə 'weɪtə tə 'jel ət ə 'k^hʌstəmər ɪf ðeɪ 'dəʊnt 'spi:k 'flu:ənt 'frent͡ʃ]

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