How the English accents have changed through history? What are the arguments for and against a non-native speaker pronunciation model? (página 2)

The accent which enjoys the highest overt prestige in England is known to phoneticians as Received Pronunciation. It is the most general type of educated British pronunciation. Socially it is characteristic of the upper and upper middle class, insofar as members of the latter class, sociologically defined, speak with an accent not localizable within England. Until the early 1970s, this was the accent demanded in its announcers by the BBC. By the end of the century everyone growing up in Britain may have some degree of local accent. Or, instead, some new non-localizable but more democratic standard may have arisen from the ashes of RP: if so, it seems likely to base on popular London English. (Wells, 1982:118).

However, this criterion is not analysed in the same way by other linguists who do not think it is quite significant in the present times. The author Graddol (1996:260) considers, "linguists now would claim not to attach the social and personal significance to RP (and RP speakers) that society in general appears to do. Most linguists treat RP simply as one of a variety of accents, neither better nor worse than any other accent of English. Yet RP surfaces silently as the basis of linguists" phonemic descriptions of English, and this had led to other accents being described in terms of their distance from an RP standard."

On the other hand, there is the criterion that, the Cockney accent has undergone favourable changes than other accents, differing in some aspects concerning to the RP. According to Wells (1991), "Cockney clearly has much more l-vocalization than does RP, and uses it in environments where it is more noticeable. In particular, Cockney uses it where RP would have a laterally released alveolar plosive, as little, middle, and across certain word boundaries where RP would usually have the 'clear' allophone."

Ladefoged (2005:93) points out a very good example when states, within Britain, a cockney English speaker might be heard as saying light when actually saying late. Many speakers of different kinds American English might get a pin when asking for a pen and this happens because there is no world-wide standard variety. Even within Britain or America there are differences that will cause problems for speech recognitions systems.

In general terms, it is difficult to study the English accents without analysing the ways in which they differ focusing on their dissimilar sounds or phonemes, the distribution of these phonemes and how they are pronounced in the present times. In addition, the classification of accents is also a very useful issue to be taken into account in order to have a better understanding of their variation.

Concerning this idea McMahon (2002: 94) argues that, accents may differ in three ways: systemic, realisational and distributional. "First, the systems of two accents may contain different number of phonemes, so different phonemic oppositions can be established for them: these are systemic differences. Second, the same phonemes may have different allophones: these are realisational differences. Finally, there are distributional differences, whereby the same lexical item may have different phonemes in two different varieties: or alternatively, the same phoneme may have a phonological restriction on its distribution in one variety but another." The same author refers also that, "The first and most obvious difference between accents is the systemic type, where a phoneme opposition is presented in one variety, but absent in another. Consonantal examples in English are relatively rare."

However, another criterion is analysed by the author Wells (1982: 76) when he agrees with the fact that accents may differ taking into account the phonotactic distribution. One fundamental division in English accent types depends upon a difference in phonotactic distribution of the consonant /r/.

Concerning the phonotactic distribution of the consonant /r/, if we compare the United Sates accents with the accents from England and from Jamaica, there will be some differences among them, because each of them corresponds to one of these classifications: rhotic, non-rhotic and semi-rhotic.

In the rhotic accents which belong to the United Sates, among other countries /r/ can occur, with an overt phonetic realization, in a wide variety of phonetic contexts, including preconsonantal and absolute-final environments, thus farm [farm], far || [far]. On the other hand in the non-rhotic accents /r/ is excluded from preconsonantal and absolute-final environments, thus farm

[fa : m], far || [fa :] and this accents include some countries such as England and Wales, including RP. (Wells, 1982: 76)

It has already been noted that English accents are divided between those which are rhotic (a postvocalic [r] is pronounced) and those which are non-rhotic. In the latter, the sound which corresponds to postvocalic r is often a vowel, [?].

There are some examples provided by Hawkins (1992: 250) that illustrate this point.

However, in the case of Jamaican accents they should be classified as semi-rhotic having lost preconsonantal /r/ but retaining it in certain word-final environments, this is the case of f?rm [fa: m] but far || [fa: r].

So, it is evident that the British and the American accent have some differences according to the phonotactic distribution, but it is not the unique issue that makes them different. Concerning Hawkins (1992: 240), "many of the differences between British and American accents can be classed as selectional, such as the American preference for /e/ rather than /i/ in ecological, amenable; for /e?/ rather than /?/in tomato; and for /?/ rather than /o?/ in progress. The phonemes /e/ and /i/, /e?/ and /?/, /?/ and /o?/ are found in the accents on both sides of the Atlantic, so there is no difference in the phoneme system: it is just a different choice of phoneme in certain words."

However, the selectional differences can not be predicted by the phonetic environment: a statement to the effect that American accents have /e/ word-initially, while British accents have /i/ is impossible; otherwise the Americans would have to pronounce easy as /ezi/. Nor could the rule be limited to "word-initially before /k/", otherwise in addition to /ek-/ vs /ik-/ in ecological, economic, etc., we would require eccentric with /ik-/ in Britain. The e/i alternation across accents is thus found in only a few words; it can not be explained on the basis of distribution, and will therefore be classified as selectional. (Hawkins, 1992: 241).

So, it is evident that there is a variety concerning the English accents which might affect the understanding and the communication efficiently between the people with different phonological backgrounds and this issue frequently happens to non native speakers who have to face this difficulty. Due to this aspect, the lecturer in sociolinguistics and phonology Jenkins (2000: 136) created a pronunciation model that "allows speakers plenty of scope to adjust their pronunciation in order to accommodate to their receivers" and this model is called Lingua- Franca core. One of the main goal of the LFC is to make simpler the learning task as far as is realistically possible.

The Lingua-Franca core play a very significant role in terms of learners acquisition of the pronunciation, because of the fact that learners learn less issues concerning this aspect in comparison with a native speaker model.

There are some arguments in favour of it for instance, concerning the LFC"s position regarding substitutions of the fricatives /?/ and /ð/: Jenkins (2000: 138) argues that, they are not necessary for intelligible EIL pronunciation, "obviously, the decision as to whether it is worth making the effort to acquire the dental fricatives is one which can only be taken by individual learners according to their personal needs and wishes. It is thus crucial that teachers be aware of the factors involved in the L1 and L2 use of these sounds and in the L2 acquisition of them, so that they can help their learners to make informed decisions."

There is another RP/GA omission from the LFC related to a phonetic feature. This is the use of dark (velarised) /l/ or [?], syllabically (for example, in "little") and before a consonant sound (for example, in "milk"), or a pause. The production of dark [?] is problematic for most learners of English, and many never acquire it. The majority of RP speakers already pronounce pre-consonantal dark [?] as /?/ in non-careful speech, but concerning L2 speakers it seems unreasonable to have "higher" expectations. Jenkins (2000: 139)

Another important argument is the pronunciation of plosives /t/ or /d/, as in the words "little", "middle", "settle", and so on, because there is an added complication for learners because the plosives are now released laterally by means of lowering the sides of the tongue and this is a particularly difficult procedure for learners to imitate and as, with /?/ and /ð/, there is no pay-off for the immense effort involved in terms of ILT intelligibility. Due to these reasons, pre-consonantal and syllabic /l/ are not included in the LFC. Jenkins (2000: 139)

The next issue is the aspiration [h] following the fortis plosives /p/, /t/, and /k/ when they occur in initial position in a stressed syllable. As Jenkins (2000: 140) argues "without the help of this puff of air, a listener will find it more difficult to identify the sound as voiceless. Thus, an unaspirated /p/ may be mistaken for /b/, a /t/ for /d/, and a /k/ for /g/. This phonetic distinction is particular important for NBESs, since they have a narrower band of tolerance than proficient L1 or L2 speakers, and are therefore more likely o interpret a phonetic variant categorically or in other words, as a completely separate phonemes where such an alternative exists.

The Lingua-Franca core established new favourable changes in the pronunciation of the consonants. The same happened with respect to the vowels, mainly with diphthongs. The "LFC has opted for the rhotic variety of /r/, the diphthong inventory is already reduced from eight to five, as the three centring diphthongs /? ?/, /e ?/, and / ? ?/ are automatically excluded, and the schwa substituted with [?]" (Jenkins 2000: 145)

Concerning the lengthening of stressed (nuclear) syllables the author Jenkins (2000: 150) considers that it seems to be crucial to intelligible English pronunciation. With respect to this point "the majority of two-syllable nouns receive stress on the first syllable and two syllable verbs on the second; that certain suffixes, for example, -ee and –ese are stress-bearing unless the word modifies another (He"s ChinESE" as compared with "He"s a CHInese STUDent"); that some suffixes cause the stress to shift to the syllable preceding them."(Jenkins, 2000: 151). The same author adds that the nuclear stress production and placement occupy an important place in the LFC and for EIL, and especially for NBESs; the greatest phonological obstacles to mutual intelligibility appear to be deviant core sounds in combinations with misplaced and/or misproduced nuclear stress. And contrastive stress is particularly crucial in terms of the receptive-productive mismatch. (Jenkins 2000: 155).

In my view the Lingua-Franca core is very useful for non native speakers because its main goal is to give the learners the useful content avoiding unnecessary difficulties and keeping sounds as close as possible to orthography.

Despite the fact the Lingua-Franca core has many positive aspects; it presents some disadvantages, such as the simplification it provides to the pedagogic task by removing from the syllabus many time-consuming items which are either unteachable or irrelevant for EIL. (Jenkins 2000: 160). The influence of the society might be another disadvantage from my view, because sometimes the social factors define how a person must pronounce. It is necessary to consider also learners" motivation and interest towards the Lingua-Franca core and also the atmosphere learners have in the class, because it might contribute in a negative way to an effective acquisition of the pronunciation.

To conclude it can be said that due to different factors there is a great diversity concerning English accents. Even though there are some pronunciation models like the Lingua-Franca core, learners still face some difficulties in terms of communication. So, in order they can communicate properly and understand each other, they must know a general background the English accents in general. Although if they are able to communicate and being understood by other people, their English accent is not a fundamental issue.

Bibliography

Culpeper, J., (2005). History of English. Second Edition. Language Workbooks. London and New York: Routledge. Taylor and Francis Group.

Fennel, B., (2001). A History of English. A Sociolinguistic Approach. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd. Cowley Road.

Graddol, D., Leith, D., Swann, J., (1996). English history, diversity and change. London: The Open University.

Hawkins, P., (1992). Introducing Phonology. Great Britain. Hutchinson. co. (Publishers) Ltd.

Jenkins, J., (2000). The Phonology of English as an International Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Kachru, B., (1986). The Alchemy of English. The Spread, Functions, and Models of Non-native Englishes. USA Pergamon Press.

Knowles, G., (1997). A cultural history of the English Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ladefoged, P., (2005). Vowels and consonants. Second Edition. Blackwell Publishing. Copy righted material.

Available from: www.blackwellpublishing.com

[Accessed 9th December 2007]

McMahon, A., (2002). An Introduction to English Phonology. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Wells, J., (1982). Accents of English 1. An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Wells, J., (1991). The Cockneyfication of RP? Available from:

[Accessed 15th December, 2007]

Autor:

MSc. Yordanka Bunet Valle