Migrant Pronunciation: What Do Employers Find Acceptable?

Migrant Pronunciation: What do Employers find Acceptable? by Marty Pilott A thesis Submitted to the Victoria University of Wellington in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Victoria University of Wellington 2016 CONTENTS CONTENTS ........................................................................................................................................................... I LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................................................................. V LIST OF TABLES.................................................................................................................................................. VI LIST OF MODELS ............................................................................................................................................... VII ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................................................................................VIII ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................................................ IX 1 INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................................................ 1 1.1 MOTIVATION............................................................................................................................................ 1 1.2 SCOPE .................................................................................................................................................... 4 1.3 AIMS ...................................................................................................................................................... 6 1.4 STRUCTURE AND SURVEY ............................................................................................................................. 8 1.5 CONCLUSIONS ........................................................................................................................................ 10 2 BACKGROUND ........................................................................................................................................ 11 2.1 WELCOME TO NEW ZEALAND ..................................................................................................................... 11 2.1.1 A new multi-ethnic society ......................................................................................................... 11 2.1.2 Immigration policies .................................................................................................................. 13 2.2 BARRIERS TO MIGRANTS ........................................................................................................................... 17 2.2.1 Reluctant hosts .......................................................................................................................... 17 2.2.2 Ethnic stereotyping .................................................................................................................... 18 2.2.3 Impact on refugees .................................................................................................................... 20 2.3 LANGUAGE AND EMPLOYMENT ................................................................................................................... 21 2.3.1 Accent discrimination ................................................................................................................ 21 2.3.2 Learning English ........................................................................................................................ 22 2.3.3 Employer attitudes .................................................................................................................... 23 2.3.4 Positive Attitudes....................................................................................................................... 24 2.4 ATTITUDES TO MIGRANTS IN OTHER COUNTRIES .............................................................................................. 26 2.5 DISCUSSION ........................................................................................................................................... 28 3 LANGUAGE LEARNING AND GLOBAL MEASURES........................................................................................ 29 3.1 OVERVIEW ............................................................................................................................................. 29 3.1.1 Learning pronunciation.............................................................................................................. 29 i 3.1.2 Learner goals and attitudes ....................................................................................................... 33 3.2 THE STANDARD GLOBAL MEASURES ............................................................................................................ 36 3.2.1 Nativeness ................................................................................................................................. 37 3.2.2 Alternatives to Nativeness ......................................................................................................... 39 3.2.3 Accentedness ............................................................................................................................. 39 3.2.4 Intelligibility............................................................................................................................... 44 3.2.5 Comprehensibility ...................................................................................................................... 48 3.3 ACCEPTABILITY ........................................................................................................................................ 51 3.3.1 Irritation and distraction............................................................................................................ 51 3.3.2 Familiarity ................................................................................................................................. 52 3.3.3 The Global Measure of Acceptability ......................................................................................... 54 3.4 DISCUSSION ........................................................................................................................................... 60 4 PREDICTING DIFFICULTIES FOR LEARNERS OF ENGLISH .......................................................................... 61 4.1 OVERVIEW ............................................................................................................................................. 61 4.2 UNCOMMON FEATURES OF ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION ...................................................................................... 63 4.3 LANGUAGES OF SPEAKERS RECORDED FOR EMPLOYER SURVEY ............................................................................ 66 4.3.1 English pronunciation compared to recorded languages ............................................................ 66 4.3.2 Notes on Recorded Languages ................................................................................................... 68 4.4 PREDICTING ERRORS ................................................................................................................................ 76 4.4.1 Error Hierarchy .......................................................................................................................... 76 4.4.2 Functional load .......................................................................................................................... 77 4.4.3 General Research on error hierarchy .......................................................................................... 78 4.5 DISCUSSION ........................................................................................................................................... 83 5 PREDICTING ACCEPTABILITY ................................................................................................................... 85 5.1 OVERVIEW ............................................................................................................................................. 85 5.2 SEGMENTALS .......................................................................................................................................... 86 5.3 PROSODY .............................................................................................................................................. 88 5.3.1 Word Stress ............................................................................................................................... 88 5.3.2 Rhythm ...................................................................................................................................... 90 5.3.3 Intonation ................................................................................................................................. 91 5.4 FLUENCY ............................................................................................................................................... 93 5.4.1 Definitions of Fluency ................................................................................................................ 93 5.4.2 Relevance of Fluency ................................................................................................................

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