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Mimicry of Non-Distinctive Phonetic Differences Between Language Varieties *

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Mimicry of Non-Distinctive Phonetic Differences Between Language Varieties * Mimicry of Non-distinctive Phonetic Differences Between Language Varieties * James Emil Flege Ro bert M. Ham mond Unil'l![sifyof Alabama. Birmingham Miami·Dade Community College 1\ delayed mimicry paradigm w.as used to assess speakers' ,awareness of non-dlSlLnCf!Vc phonetic differences which in part dislinguisn I:mguagcs, . The notion of " rho no logIcal fillu­ Lng" IffiroheS ttur second Lmsuagc learners may not be lIblc to perceIve: phonetic differences between thCIT native language and :01 fOrf:.gn langua~ unless the phonetic differences arc linguistically relevant in the nallve bngu2gc. If cross-bogulIgc phoncuc differences arc In fact perceIved poorly, It is unlikely [hal phon.::!;\; mod,ficallon , ..,II OCcur .n Ihc course of nalUu.hsllc second language acqu15iuon. In th.s study natlvC' English speakers familiar Wllh Spamsh·accentcd English ulempted to lead sentences With a Spamsh accent. Acoustic mC::l5Uremc:nts showed thai twO phonellc characlens!!cs of Engllsh-Ihe long VOT values aSSOC iated '''llh 'p, t, kI and hnal-syll:Jble lengthening- were altered In the direction of Spanuh anu Spanish.accented Enghsh. These results prOVide tentative eYldence that nOn -dlStlnCIIVe rhonetle differences between languages arc detecuble by I:lnguage learners and thus do nO! present an msupeuble bamer to phonetIC learning in second 1:lOgU .. gc "cqulsHlun For several decades phonologists have believed that "phonological fillering" con· tnbutes Importantly to the presence of foreign accent In the speech of second languagc learners ITrubct;:koy 1969:5 1 ffI. Having acquired the phonology of one language, the language learner will tend to mterpret sounds heard in a foreign language in terms of phonological umts found In the native language. For phonolog­ ic:.a l filtenng to occur phonological unllS III two different languages must ~ iudged to be the "s:.ame" or "Slmil:.ar" IWetnreich 1953:71. A maJor problem for COnt3Ct analyses In general and contrastive analyses, in particular, IS 10 determme how such equlv:.alencies are est:.ablished by bi linguals, and at what levellsl of an.. lysls the process of tnterlingual identification IS best descnbed. Most tnvestigations of second-language phonology h:.ave used either the allophone or the distinctive feature as Ihe prllne uni t of analysiS. Work done Wlthlll 1\ structural phonemic framework le.g., Weinreich 1953; Shen 1959: Moulton 1962) has focused on between-language differences in phonemic inventory and their effect on the system of linguistically relevant contrasts, on the distribution of allophones, and on constraints affecting permissible sequences of surface phones. In the words of Robert Lado 11957: J II. we tend to "transfer ... our phonemes and their variants" when leamlOg a foreign language. Between-language differences Involvmg non-segmental characteristics of speech such as stress, intonation, and Juncture have also been handled wlthm a framework of phonemIC contrast. 2 Swrues in Second um.ruoge Acqulsllion. 5. No. I, 19H2 Orner approaches have made use of tbe distinctive feature as the prime unll of analysIs. Ritchie (1968) proposed tJut.a perceptual hierarchy of distinctive fC2turCs could be used to predict which native-language phone would be used In plat'! of a foreign-l.anguage phone absent from the leamer's native-language Inventory !e.g., l tJ or(sl for English /BII. Eckman (I977)proposed that markedness, as establi shed by cross-language implicational n:Jations (typological markedness), might be used to predict how and where phonological contrasts Will be neutralized by language learners. Stili other investigations have focused on rules or processes relating surface phones to underlying phonological categories and their possible effect on pronunciation of fortlgn-Ianguage words (Lovins 1975 1 Eckman 1981 1. An assumption that often setms to be madt is that inter-lingual contact can be adequately describtd in ttrms of :I small number of discrete linguistic categorics: i.e., allophones, phonemes, or segmemal changes describable in tenns of distinc­ tive fe.lltures. Relatively little importance has been attached to the phonetic sub­ stance of surface phones found in the tutive and target languages In many th,"-'Oreu­ ul accounts, except for its possible role in influencing which phonemes will be considered the "same:" in the tWO languages. Once assigned a structural phone:mlc description, a target-language: phone is exptcted to be replaced by a phonetically similar allophont of the: corre:sponding native language: phone:me: o r, if no such allophone: e:XIStS, to be phone:rically approximated. For e:xample:, learners rn:lY substitute: the: alveolar StOp of the: native language for a dental Stop which occurs in a foreign language, or replace the uvular III of a language: they arc Icarning with the approximate Irf they learned as a child IWeinreich 19531. It may be Important, howe:ver, to pay somewh.u closer ancorion [0 the rhonetlc chaucteristics of sounds in the native and foreign language (B riere 19661. Cross­ language interference at the phonetic level probably contnbutes .:I great deal (Q what is pc=rceivtd as foreign accent. Phonetic Implementation of comparable phonological unIts in two languages may differ in Important ways IFromkin 1979; Laddoged 1980). In such cases it appears that articulatory habits pre:vlously estab­ lished torealite phonological units in tbe native languagt: will be used to producing a fort:ign language: IFlegt: 1981; Flege and Pon 1981). Phonological filtering may be at least partially responsible for cross-language phonetic tnte:rference, for knowledge of the native-language phonology may lead a second-Ianguagt: learner to ignore purely phonetiC differences between languages.' Bloomfitld fI933:79l, for t:xample, proposed that spc=ake:rs learn to attend to JUSt those features of speech that are linguistically distinctive, ignoring other purely phonetic differences which are " redundant" or non-distinctivt: (see also GIbson and Levin 1975, for a more recent statement of this position). If this is true, language lea.rners may fa tl to modify pre-existing phonetic habits when faced With cross­ language differences that are nOt linguistically disonctlve: in their native language because they do not puce:ive such differences. For example, an Ameriun may make the phonemically long vowels of Swedish much shorter than do most Swedes- producmg them with relatively shorter durations which approXimate the durations of spectr.dly Similar [ng.ll~h vowels- because vowel duration is not "phonemiC" (i.e ., hngulstically relevant) in English fJon.asson and McAllister Mimicry of lIon·diSllnctn'e phonetic differences I Flcge aJ Hummond 3 1972). On th~ oth~r hand, I~arn~rs may b~com~ aware of purely phonetic differ­ enc~s ~tween their nativ~ langu:lge and a foreign language in the process of leamjng rhe foreign languag~ . U this were the C:.llse, one might conclude th:u non· authentic pronunciation of foreign languag~s h:.lls primacily an articulatory rather than perceplUal origin, resulting perh2ps from general neurophysiological constuints on the acquISition or modification of fine motOr skills rath~r than from perceptual limiuuons Imposed by phonologtcal filtering or previous linguistic e~rience Is~e Strange :.lind Jenkins, 19781. The present study was conducted in the hope of shedding some light on the ability of spe:lkers to detect phonetic differences between languages. If it can be demon­ strated that speakers in a language contact situation are aware of purely phonetic Ii.e., "redundant" or "non·distinctive"l differences between language varieties It would suggest th.u phonological filtering does not impose an insuperable barrier [Q phonetic le:lming in second·language acquisition. Two phonetic differences be· tween English andSpamsh provided a means by which to assess the hypothesis that speakers are able to detect non·distinctive phonetic differences between language varieties. Spanish-English Phonetic D ifferences One way the voiceless StOps of Spanish and English differ is according to VaT [voice onset time). English /p,t,kI are produced with "Iong·lag" VOT values, whereas voicing begins soon after stop release for the unaspirated "short-lag" /p, t,kI of Spanish ILisktr and Abramson 1964; Williams 1977). As a result, native English speakers often ttnd to produce voiceless SpllOish StopS wuh VaT values that are tOO long Ii.e., with too much aspiration; Stockwell and Bowen 1965) willie Spanish speakers predictably under·aspmne English ip,t,klIWiIliams 1979; cf. lones 1948; Flege 1980). There are several reasons to thmk that the kInd of cross·language differencts which lead to inappropriate VaT values during pronunciation of a foreign language will not be linguistlcal1y relevant (i.e., lead to the perception of segmental substitu· tions) for native·speakers expt:riencing a foreign accent. The distinctive difference between English Ip,t,kI vs. Ib,d,gI is ordinanly considered to be one of "voicing" or "tensity" rather than one of degree of aspirationorVOT. Although VaT may in fact be used to distinguish between natural classes of SlOpS in English and Other languages le.g., Ip,t,kI vs Ib,d,gI), VaT IS not equivalent to the distinctive linguistic feature "voicing" or "tensity". In fact, degree of aspirauon is ordinarii y considered by phonologJsts to be a redundant property of English stopS because It is predictable from phonetic context Isee POrt and Romnno 1979; Weismer 1979a). It IS well known that mampularion of the VaT value of synthetic CV syllables (such as 1p:aJ vs /bal) will have an important effect on whether the syllable is ,udged to be initiated by a voiced or voiceless Stop Isee, e.g. Abramson and Lisker 1970, 1973). However, other acoustic dimensions which co· vary with VaT in natural speech may also importantly affect StOP voicing judgments made by English speak· ing listeners in the abSence of clear VaT differences between StOpS (Lisker 1978a). 4 Studlu in ~GOtld ulll1!//Qg/! ACI/IIISIIU)IJ, 5, No " /9H2 Thus il is not surpnsmg that an English s~akcr mlglll heaT :l short-I.;Ig li.c.
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