The Intelligibility of Malaysian English : a Study of Some Features of Spoken English Produced by University Students in Malaysia. YOON YAH WANG Thesis submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy of the University of London 1987 University of London Institute of Education i CHAPTER ONE THE MALAYSIAN BACKGROUND TABLE OF CONTENTS 1.1 Historical Background 1 1.2 Present-day Situation 3 Language Policy in Malaysia the Past, 1.3 the Present and the Forseeable Future 4 1.3.1 Language Policy in Malaysia the Past 4 1.3.2 Language Policy in Malaysia the Present 9 Language Policy in Malaysia : the Forseeable 1.3.3 Future 12 1.4 The Role of Spoken English in Malaysia Today 13 1.4.1 The Role of Spoken English in the Mass Media 13 1.4.2. The Role of Spoken English in Trade and Business 15 1.4.3 The Role of Spoken English in Government Services 16 1.4.4 The Role of Spoken English in Higher Education 17 1.5 Varieties of Malaysian English : An Overview 17 1.5.1 Standard ME/the Wider Speech-form/MEl 19 1.5.2 Sub-standard ME/the Local Dialect/MEII 22 1.5.3 ME and International Intelligibility 25 Choosing a Model/Models of English for 1.6 Teaching Purposes in Malaysia - the Problems 26 1.6.1 The Concept of 'Modeli 26 Nonnative Varieties of English and the Question of 1.6.2 Recognition and Acceptability 27 Choosing a Model/Models of English for Teaching 1.6.3 Purposes in Malaysia 30 1.6.4 A Model of Spoken English at University Level in Malaysia and its Relevance to the Present Study 34 Notes 36 ii CHAPTER TWO ON INTELLIGIBILITY TABLE OF CONTENTS 2.1 The Definition of Intelligibility 37 2.2 The Parameters of Intelligibility 39 2.3 The Degree of Intelligibility 40 2.4 Factors Influencing Intelligibiaity 41 2.4.1 Regional/Sociolinguistic Factors 41 2.4.2 Physiological Factors 41 2.4.3 Extralinguistic or Non-linguist.c Factors 42 2.4.4 Paralinguistic Factors 42 2.4.5 Linguistic Factors 43 2.5 Previous Research on Intelligibility 44 2.5.1 Measurement of Intelligibility of Native Speaker's Speech 44 2.5.1.1 Measurement of Intelligibility of Segmental Items : Vowels 44 2.5.1.2 Measurement of Intelligibility of Supra- Segmental Items : Stress 45 2.5.1.3 Measurement of Speech Intelligilbility in Different Levels of Noise 45 2.5.1.4 Measurement of Effects of the Listener's Anticipation on the Intelligibility of Heard Speech 46 2.5.1.5 Measurement of Intelligibility of Speech with and without Context 47 2.5.1.6 Measurement of the Effects of Rate of Utterance and Duration of Excerpt on Intelligibility 48 2.5.2 Measurement of Intelligibility of Non-native Speaker's Speech 48 2.5.2.1 Measurement of Intelligibility of Segmental and Suprasegmental Elements in Learner's Speech 48 2.5.2.2 Measurement of Intelligibility Using Speech Characteristics as Criteria 49 iii 2.5.2.3 Measurement of Intelligibility of English Speech to Nonnative Speakers 50 2.5.2.4 Measuremnet of Intelligibility in Relation to Aural Comprehension 50 2.5.2.5 Measurement of Mutual Intelligibility through Different Varieties of English 51 2.5.2.6 Measurement of Learner's Spoken Interlanguage through Oral Interviews 53 2.5.3 Measurement of Intelligibility of Specific Varieties of Nonnative English Speech to Native and Nonnative Speakers of English 54 2.5.3.1 Indian English 54 2.5.3.2 Ghananian English 55 2.5.3.3 Nigerian English 56 2.5.3.4 Tanzanian English 57 2.6 Criteria for Determining Speech Intelligibility between NSs and NS-NNSs 58 2.7 The Concept of Intelligibility in the Present Study 62 Notes 65 2.6 Diagram 2.1 Criteria for Determining Speech Intelligibility between NSs of English 60 2.6 Diagram 2.2 Criteria for Determining Speech Intelligibility : NNS to NSa of English 61 iv CHAPTER THREE THE DATA AND RESEARCH PROCEDURE TABLE OF CONTENTS 3.1 Intelligibility Test Materials 67 3.1.1 Choosing A corpus 67 3.1.2 The Selection and Description of the Data 69 3.1.2.1 The Main Corpus: Oral Interviews (Data Collection One) 69 3.1.2.2 The Subsidiary Corpuses: Reading of Words and Sentences (Data Collection Two); Summary (Data Collection Three) 74 3.2 The Listening Procedure 75 3.2.1 The Selection of Listeners 75 3.2.2 The Method of Listening: D.C. One and D.C. Two 77 3.3 The Scoring System: Oral Interviews 79 3.4 The Scoring Procedure: Oral Interviews 81 3.5 Intelligibility Scores 84 3.6 Analysis of the Main Corpus: An Overview 91 3.7 The Nature of the Main Corpus 92 3.7.1 Some Terminology Used in the Main Corpus 92 3.7.2 Discourse Structure of the Oral Interviews 99 3.7.2.1 Verbal and Non-verbal Behaviour in the Oral Interview8 99 3.7.2.2 Oral Interview Versus Casual/Informal Conversation 99 3.7.2.3 Application of Sinclair and Coulthard's System od Analysis 104 3.1.2.1 Table 3.1 Background knowledge of subjects 71 3.2.1 Table 3.2 Allocation and baciground knowledge of listeners 76 3.3 Table 3.3 The Intelligibility rating scale 80 3.4 Table 3,4 Units of utterances and number of words in oral interviews 82 3.5 Table 3.5 The breakdown of intelligibility scores of each listener with each subject 85 3.5 Table 3.6 Mean Score of utterances rated ++h, +h, h, and -h, --.h 89 3.5 Table 3.7 Mean Score of utterances rated at the 5 degrees of Intelligibility (each ethnic group) 90 3.5 Table 3.8 Mean Score of utterances rated at the 5 degrees of intelligibility (all subjects) 90 3.7.1 Table 3.9 Areas of dicourse analysis and their relevance to this study 96 Notes 107 V 3.h2.1 Appendix A(1) Transcription of Oral Interviews in Orthography 364 3.4 Appendix A(2) Utterance Number of the Units of Utterance in Oral Interviews 378 3.1.2.2 Appendix B(1) Reading of Words from Oral Interviews 389 3.1.2.2 Appendix B(2) Reading of Sentences 390 vi CHAPTER FOUR INTELLIGIBILITY AND ERRORS AT THE PHONOLOGICAL LEVEL TABLE OF CONTENTS 4.1 Segmental Errors and Intelligibility 108 4.2 Criteria for Assessing Segmental Errors and Their Correlation with IntelLigibility 110 4.2.1 Definition of Segmental Errors 110 4.2.2 Grouping of Segmental Errors 111 4.2.3 Classification of Segmental Error Types 111 4.2.4 Degrees of Intelligibility 112 4.2.5 Information Included in Appendixes D (1), D (2) and D (3) 114 4.3 Analysis of Results 115 4.3.1 General Remarks 115 4.3.2 Intelligibility and Lexical/Function cords 115 4.3.3 Intelligibility and Mono/Di/Polysyllabic Lexical Words 115 4.3.4 Intelligibility and Number and Type of Segmental Errors 116 4.3.5 Intelligibility and Error Type, Error Frequency and Error Gravity 116 4.3.6 Hierarchy of Error Gravity iri the Three Ethnic Groups 118 4.3.7 Segmental Error Types and Ethnic Origin of Subjects 122 4.3.8 Common Segmental Errors Among the Three Ethnic Groups and Intelligibility 124 4.3.9 Other Segmental Errors of the Three Ethnic Groups and Intelligibility 126 4.4 Phonological/Contextual Factors and Intelligibility 130 4.5 Suprasegmental Errors and Intelligibility 134 4.5.1 Definition of Suprasegmental Errors 134 4.5.2 Word Stress in English 134 4.5.3 Stress Errors and Intelligibility 136 4.5.4 Stress Patterns of the Subjects 137 4.5.4.1 Word Stress Patterns of Chinese Subjects and Intelligibility 137 4.5.4.2 Word Stress Patterns of Malay Subjects and Intelligibility 139 vii 4-5.4.3 Word Stress Patterns of Indian Subjects and Intelligibility 142 4.5.5 Rhythm and Intonation of English 146 4.5.5.1 Rhythm 146 4.5.5.2 Rhythmic 'Errors' and Intelligibility 147 4.5.5-3 Intonation: (1) Tone Group, Tonality and Tonicity (ii) Tones 148 4.5.5-4 Intonation 'Errors' and Intelligibility 154 4.5.6 Rhythmic and Intonation Patterns of the Subjects 155 4.5.6.1 Rhythmic Patterns of Chinese and Malay Subjects and Their Influence on English 155 4.5.6.2 Rhythmic Patterns of Indian Subjects and Their Influence on English 157 4.5.6.3 Rhythmic 'Errors' of the Subjects and Intelligibility 159 4.5.7 Tonality and Tonicity of the Subjects' Speech: (i) Tonicity, (ii) Tonicity 'Errors' and Intelligi- bility, (iii) Tonality, (iv) Tonality 'Errors' and Intelligibility 161 4.5.8 Other Related Features: (i) Absence of Contracted Forms, (ii) Absence of Weak Forms, (iii) Absence of Liaison 165 4.5.9 Tones of the Subjects' Speech 167 4.5.9.1 Tones in Malay 167 4.5.9.2 Tones in Chinese 169 4.5.9.3 Tones in Tamil 170 4.5.9.4 Differing Intcnation Patterns of the Subjects and Intelligibility 170 Notes 174 4.2.3 Table 4.1 Classification of Segmental Error types 112 4.2.4 Table 4.2 Intelligibility rating scale for segmental errors 113 4.3.5 Table 4.3 Frequency of degrees of intelligibility of error types and error gravity 117 4.3.6 Table 4.4 Frequency of degrees of intelligibility and error gravity (Chinese Subjects) 119 viii 4.3.6 Table 4.5 Frequency of degrees of intelligibility and error gravity (Malay Subjects) 120 4.3.6 Table 4.6 Frequency of degrees of intelligibility and error gravity (Indian Subjects) 121 4.3.7 Table 4.7 Error types, error frequency and ethnic origin 123 4.2.1 Appendix C (1) Phonetic symbols used for transcription 392 4.2.1 Appendix C (2) Phonetic symbols used for transcribing subjects' mispronunciation 394 4.5.6.2 Appendix C (3) Prosodic notation 395 4.2.5 Appendix D (1) Segmental errors and their degrees of intelligibility (Chinese Subjects) 396 4.2.5 Appendix D (2) Segmental errors and their degrees of intelligibility (Malay Subjects) 402 4.2.5 Appendix D (3) Segmental errors and their degrees of intelligibility (Indian Subjects) 408 ix CHAPTER FIVE INTELLIGIBILITY AND ERRORS AT THE SYNTACTIC AND LEXICAL LEVELS TABLE OF CONTENTS 5.1 Recent studies on Error Gravity at Syntactic and Lexical levels 176 5.1.1 Recent Research on Error Gravity in Indo-European Languages 176 5.1.2 Recent Research on Error