Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

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AndyMeg
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby AndyMeg » Sun Oct 01, 2017 7:59 pm

1) Adult learners achieve native-like pronunciation less often than native-like other skills?

I would say yes. But I don't think the problem lies within pronunciation itself, but more in the way adult learners approach pronunciation. Many adults prefer to have an extensive vocabulary and "almost perfect" grammar, but feel satisfied with a "good enough to be understood" pronunciation. Also, many don't realize that individual words may sound different when they are part of longer constructions like sentences and they try to pronounce each and every word perfectly when actual native speakers don't do it that way. I don't see that as a bad thing, though. Different people have different priorities and diferent reasons and purposes for the foreign languages they learn. As long as their skills cover what they need them for, I think they are more than fine.

2) Pronunciation errors fossilize more quickly and are more resistant to reversal than errors in other skills?


We can usually say more (speak) in 1 minute that what we can write in the same amount of time. What I mean with this is that without noticing we may actually make more repetitions of spoken mistakes that of written mistakes just because speaking covers a lot more in the same amount of time than writing. Thus, it is easier to fossilize errors in the pronunciation (and the spoken language in general) because of the sheer number of repetitions we make while talking.

I think reversal is possible but requires focus, lots of intentional repetitions and paying attention to the flow and rhythm of the language when the words are connected in longer constructions.
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby reineke » Sun Oct 01, 2017 9:41 pm

Mike Swan

"These are personal views, derived from years of practical work, study, discussion and thought. Many of them are developed in more detail in my articles. I offer them for what they are worth.

correctness

Some language learners need a high level of correctness; some don’t.

Perfectionism can be very damaging. If you correct all your students’ mistakes, you may produce students who never make mistakes because they never say anything.

Native-speaker-like correctness is a completely unrealistic aim. Very few adults learn languages perfectly. Everybody makes mistakes, including teachers. It’s normal, and it doesn’t matter very much. Good enough English is good enough.

There are two good reasons for insisting on correct production of a language point: because it will make a difference to comprehensibility or acceptability.

‘English as a lingua franca’ is not a kind of English; it’s a use of English.

grammar

Grammar is many different kinds of thing which are learnt in many different ways.

Our job in grammar teaching is not to describe the language, as a grammarian does. It is to build a bridge from A (what the student knows) to B (what we want him/her to know next). If the bridge is too long it will collapse.

We shouldn’t try to tell the whole grammatical truth, even if we know it. We may need to sell some truth in order to buy simplicity and clarity.

Our grammar rules are necessary simplifications. The language won’t always obey them: it hasn’t read our little grammar books. Students need to understand this.

pronunciation

For some students, the main problem with pronunciation is not speaking but hearing. The words go by too fast, and listeners don’t catch what is said. Such students can benefit greatly from training in the perception of unstressed words and syllables."

http://mikeswan.net/some-things-i-believe/
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reineke
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby reineke » Fri Nov 17, 2017 5:53 pm

I like Luca.
Native accent


P is for Phonotactics

https://scottthornbury.wordpress.com/20 ... notactics/
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby reineke » Wed Mar 21, 2018 9:43 pm

Accents are Forever

By their first birthday, babies are getting locked into the sounds of the language they hear spoken

"She was born in the Philippines, began speaking English at 6, has lived in English-speaking Hong Kong and the United States for more than 30 years, holds a doctorate in education from Stanford, and still cannot easily twist her tongue around the English tz and ch sounds, which blend together in the Philippine languages she learned as an infant."

Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science- ... 5sqb3oL.99
Last edited by reineke on Wed Mar 21, 2018 10:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby DaveBee » Wed Mar 21, 2018 10:09 pm

reineke wrote:Accents are Forever

By their first birthday, babies are getting locked into the sounds of the language they hear spoken

"She was born in the Philippines, began speaking English at 6, has lived in English-speaking Hong Kong and the United States for more than 30 years, holds a doctorate in education from Stanford, and still cannot easily twist her tongue around the English tz and ch sounds, which blend together in the Philippine languages she learned as an infant."

Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science- ... 5sqb3oL.99
Give the gift of Smithsonian magazine for only $12! http://bit.ly/1cGUiGv
There's an american BJJ player called Mackenzie Dern who moved to Brazil, and her accent went the other way.

The Evolution Of Mackenzie Dern's Accent
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tastyonions
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby tastyonions » Wed Mar 21, 2018 10:45 pm

reineke wrote:Accents are Forever

By their first birthday, babies are getting locked into the sounds of the language they hear spoken

"She was born in the Philippines, began speaking English at 6, has lived in English-speaking Hong Kong and the United States for more than 30 years, holds a doctorate in education from Stanford, and still cannot easily twist her tongue around the English tz and ch sounds, which blend together in the Philippine languages she learned as an infant."

Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science- ... 5sqb3oL.99
Give the gift of Smithsonian magazine for only $12! http://bit.ly/1cGUiGv

Interesting. I know people that moved to the US from non-English-speaking countries between the ages of five and ten and would never have guessed that they were non-native.

While there does seem to be a universal developmental component to developing a native accent, I'm not sure how to judge how significant it really is, since accent outcomes in advanced adult L2 learners range all the way from people who have nearly eliminated any phonological trace of their origins (like Luca) to ones whose native language you can discern with the first word they say. Is it talent? Something psychological?

As an aside, I think using "baby" as if it were a proper noun must be the most revolting cutesy-language tick in all of English. Yuck.
Last edited by tastyonions on Wed Mar 21, 2018 10:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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reineke
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby reineke » Wed Mar 21, 2018 10:46 pm

DaveBee wrote:
reineke wrote:Accents are Forever

By their first birthday, babies are getting locked into the sounds of the language they hear spoken

"She was born in the Philippines, began speaking English at 6, has lived in English-speaking Hong Kong and the United States for more than 30 years, holds a doctorate in education from Stanford, and still cannot easily twist her tongue around the English tz and ch sounds, which blend together in the Philippine languages she learned as an infant."

Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science- ... 5sqb3oL.99


There's an american BJJ player called Mackenzie Dern who moved to Brazil, and her accent went the other way.

The Evolution Of Mackenzie Dern's Accent



She was born to Brazilian parents.
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DaveBee
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby DaveBee » Wed Mar 21, 2018 11:29 pm

reineke wrote:
DaveBee wrote:
reineke wrote:Accents are Forever

By their first birthday, babies are getting locked into the sounds of the language they hear spoken

"She was born in the Philippines, began speaking English at 6, has lived in English-speaking Hong Kong and the United States for more than 30 years, holds a doctorate in education from Stanford, and still cannot easily twist her tongue around the English tz and ch sounds, which blend together in the Philippine languages she learned as an infant."

Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science- ... 5sqb3oL.99


There's an american BJJ player called Mackenzie Dern who moved to Brazil, and her accent went the other way.

The Evolution Of Mackenzie Dern's Accent



She was born to Brazilian parents.
Yes, but the point being, she's changed the way she pronounces english to conform to the Brazilian pronunciation.

There's a brazilian lady on YouTube, who moved to Wales, and speaks english with a welsh accent.
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reineke
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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby reineke » Thu Mar 22, 2018 12:09 am

"Mackenzie Dern had a translator for her UFC 222 post-fight interview "

"Dern herself has said Portuguese is her primary language and she thinks and dreams in that language, not English"

http://www.mmamania.com/platform/amp/uf ... rge-gurgel

YouTube video entitled "MacKenzie Dern discusses fascination with her accent" is click bait.

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Re: Pronunciation – it’s a delicate skill.

Postby reineke » Sat Feb 09, 2019 5:15 pm

Brain Structure Predicts the Learning of Foreign Speech Sounds
http://www.researchgate.net/publication ... ech_Sounds

"Previous work has shown a relationship between parietal lobe anatomy and nonnative speech sound learning...

These results suggest that left auditory cortex WM anatomy, which likely reflects auditory processing efficiency, partly predicts individual differences in an aspect of language learning that relies on rapid temporal processing. It also appears that a global displacement of components of a right hemispheric language network, possibly reflecting individual differences in the functional anatomy and lateralization of language processing, is predictive of speech sound learning."

Born with an Ear for Dialects? Structural Plasticity in the Expert Phonetician Brain

"Are experts born with particular predispositions, or are they made through experience? We examined brain structure in expert phoneticians, individuals who are highly trained to analyze and transcribe speech. We found a positive correlation between the size of left pars opercularis and years of phonetic transcription training experience, illustrating how learning may affect brain structure. Phoneticians were also more likely to have multiple or split left transverse gyri in the auditory cortex than nonexpert controls, and the amount of phonetic transcription training did not predict auditory cortex morphology. The transverse gyri are thought to be established in utero; our results thus suggest that this gross morphological difference may have existed before the onset of phonetic training, and that its presence confers an advantage of sufficient magnitude to affect career choices. These results suggest complementary influences of domain-specific predispositions and experience-dependent brain malleability, influences that likely interact in determining not only how experience shapes the human brain but also why some individuals become engaged by certain fields of expertise."

https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... cian_Brain

Beyond bilingualism

"The multilingual brain implements mechanisms that serve to select the appropriate language as a function of the communicative environment. Engaging these mechanisms on a regular basis appears to have consequences for brain structure and function."

https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... ate_volume
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