Territorial and social differences in the pronunciation of english in different countries (1)

A number of geographical-historical and socio-cultural factors caused English to become a global language spoken by approximately 1, 500 million speakers.

In geographical variation we have to distinguish two basic concepts:

• dialect – is distinguished for its vocabulary, grammar and pronounciation. In this sense the two major varieties of English , the British English and American English may be treated as “dialects”.

• Accent – is a type of pronunciation or a feature of one which can be found in speech of any individual or the whole speech community. Thus, phonetics is mainly concerned with accents of English, as spoken on different territories, in diverse social groups, by particular individuals.

Accents of English worldwide are grouped into:

• Accents in the countries where English is the mother tongue of the majority of the population (“the inner circle”): the UK, the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the white population of the Republic of South Africa;

• Accents in the new developing states, former British colonies, where English is one of the official languages (“the outer circle”): India and Singapore.

• Accents in the countries where English is the most widely used foreign language taught at schools (“the expanding circle”), like Russia and China.

Historical-geographical division of native English accents may be based on the division into:

• British-oriented (the UK, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa);

• North-America-oriented (the USA, Canada).

Most of the countries possess their national pronunciation standards, regional standards and local accents.

National standards

• RP (Received Pronunciation), or BBC English, in the UK;

• GA (General American), or American Network English, in the USA;

• GenCan (General Canadian) in Canada;

• GenAus (General Australian) in Australia.

National pronunciation standards are associated with radio and television newsreaders and presenters of serious channels. There are also professional groups and public figures whose speech is symbolic of certain types of accents.

Smaller geographical divisions are regional standards which are accents of educated population in a certain area.

• Southern, Northern, Scottish and Northern Irish on the British Isles,

• Northern, Northern Midland, Southern Midland, Southern, Western in the USA.

In the US, geographically, the situation is quite the reverse: it is the South and South Midland which stand out for their marked difference from the standard pronunciation.

Less educated people use numerous local accents which can be:

1. urban (characteristic of a city like Liverpool or New York);

2. rural (spoken in the countryside).

The notion of interference. Prerequisites for phonetic interference (segmental level) (12)

The problem of interference was introduced in 1943 by Jacobson and Gavrinek.

Interference has long been interested in a long before (B. de Courtene, Scherba, Брызгунова, Кулешов).

Interference is super-imposing of one language system on another one language system => certain changes in the structure of one language (Russian) under the influence of another (English) and visa versa => interaction of 2 lang-s.

Interference may take place in every aspect of the language (different levels):

• phonetic

• grammatical

• lexical

Interference is most prominent at phonetic level. This is explained by thу fact that audio-pronouncing skills are considered to be the least controlled in speech production & speech perception.

Prerequisites:

1. The differences in the phonological systems of the l-ges that are in contact (in English – system of diphtongs; in Russian – no. In English the nuclear is made stronger, but in Russian – visa versa.

2. The differences in the phonetic laws (English voiced cons-s are not devoiced; in Russian – absolutely devoiced [cæt];

3. The differences in phonetic basis (тут можно начать плести про phonetic basis)

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Types of syllable. The specific character of syllable in English and Russian. Mistakes which occur as a result of the differences in the articulatory bases of E and R in terms of syllable formation and syll division (18).

When a syllable ends in a vowel, with no final consonant, it is said to be an open syllable: be is an open syllable of CV (consonant+vowel) structure. When the syllable is terminated by a consonant, it is said to be closed: it is a closed syllable of VC (vowel+consonant) structure. We can also distinguish covered (CV) (we) from uncovered (V or VC) (ant) syllables, depending on whether they have a consonant in the onset. If there is a long vowel or a diphthong, or more than one consonant in the rhyme (nucleus+coda), the syllable is called long or heavy. Heavy syllables attract stress in E. The syllables with just a short vowel without a consonant [i, ɘ, ʊ] are called light or short, and they are normally unstressed. All the four types of syllable can be found in E and in R. The basic difference between E and R consists in the dominance of an open syllable in R (CV) and a closed syll in E (CVC). Another specific E feature is that approximants [l, m, n, r] may become syllabic after a consonant, which can be accounted for by sonority rule: rhyth-m.

It is important for Russians not to make English syllables open (city – [sit-i], [си-ти]). Wrong S division on the articulatory level leads to inadequate perception of phrases and consequently to misunderstanding.

The specific character of syll division in E and in R

The basic dif-ce consists in the dominance of an open syllable in R (CV), and a closed syll in E (CVC). (78% of R syllables are open). Another important feature concerns the dynamics of syllable articulation. There is a close contact in the R syllable between the onset consonants and the following vowels (CV), which affects the quality of vowels. In E there is a close contact between the vowel and the coda consonants (VC), which affects the length of vowels. Most E syll-s are closed when there is a fortis consonant in the coda. There is one more controversial point in syll.division which concerns medial cluster division in E. There are two authentic sources for looking up syllable boundary of any given word in E: EPD (Cambridge Engl Pronouncing Dict-y) and LPD (Longman). The two sources agree on the following: 1. Compounds should be divided into syllables according to the morphological principle: hard-ware. 2. A single consonant which appears between two syllables after a short stressed vowel should be attached to the preceding vowel: bett|er. However there are differences as to where to put a consonant which follows a long vowel or a diphthong. EPD attaches a single word-medial consonant to the following syllable (Maximal Onset principle): la.dy, in.vi.ted, while LPD puts all word-medial single consonants and clusters to the stressed syllable (Maximal Stress principle): lad y, in vit ed. Thus the word window will be differently attested in the two dictionaries due to the two different principles of syllable division: EPD win.dow, LPD wind ow. Experimental evidence, as reported from British sources by Alan Crutenden, shows that following a long vowel a consonant was syllabified with the following syllable which supports EPD: la-dy. The retention stage of a consonant belongs to the previous short vowel, while the release is with the next syllable. In fact, the boundary between the two syllables runs within the medial consonant: city [sit-ti] better [bet-t`].]

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Functions of syllable. The notions of open and close juncture. Phonetic means of open juncture

There are two very important functions of syllable. 1) constitutive.- its ability to be a part of a word or a word itself. The syllable forms language units of greater magnitude: words, morphemes and utterances. The S is the unit within which the relations between the distinctive features of the phonemes and their acoustic correlates and revealed. Within a S prosodic characteristics of speech are realized, which form the stress-pattern of a word and the rhythmic and intonation structures of an utterance. (S is a specific minimal structure of both segmental and supresegmental features). 2) distinctive – the S is characterized by its ability to differentiate words and word-forms. ([nai-treit] nitrate - [nait-reit] night-rate). The distinction here lies in: a) the degree of aspiration of [t] sounds which is greater in the first member of the opposition than in the second; b) allophonic difference of [r]: in the 1^st member of the opposition it is slightly devoiced under the influence of the initial [t]; c) the length of the diphthong [ai]: in the second member of the opposition it is shorter because the syllable is closed by a voiceless plosive [t]. The S division changes the allophonic contents of the word because, the realization of the phoneme in different positions in a S (initial, medial, final) results in different allophones. (mice kill-my skill, an ice house-a nice house; I saw her eyes-I saw her rise; I saw the meat-I saw them eat.).

In language with distinctive differences in syllable division these differences are regarded as forming a separate phonological unit, - one of its names, which has been suggested by the American descriptivists and is widely used, is juncture phoneme. It refers mainly to distinctive differences in the position of the syllabic boundary at the junction of words or morphemes as in [ə neim - ən eim]. There are two types of juncture usually distinguished: 1) open juncture 2) close juncture. Open juncture is implemented by the onset of a fresh articulatory effort. In a name this open juncture occurs between [ə] and [n]. Close juncture occurs between sounds closely connected with each other within one S by a single arc of articulatory effort, e.g. between [n] and [ei]. Close juncture is not marked. In fact it is just the absence of open juncture. The phonetic nature of open juncture is complex. As the above examples show, its occurance involves changes in length, pitch, aspiration and in other features of sounds.

Attitudinal meaning of the constituents of the melodic contour.

In Brit. Trad. Some scientists say Melody has no meaning and its meaning is totally depended on context. However there is evidence to the contrary. The independ. Character of tonal meanings is borne out by the existence of sent-s in which a free variation of tones is impossible. We can conclude that tones have a n indep.meaning but this meaning is nebulous. We may refer to it as an abstract meaning. Within a context the combination of grammar, lex and situation brings out the local meaning of a tone.

The attitude to the structure of tone is also differ.now. these days tone is seen as a combination of relatively independ.tonal features. Each tone has 2 cardinal points: its end point, its onset point.(1) is responsible for definitness/indefin., complitness/incomplet. The lower the end-the more complete and categoric the tone sounds.(2) signals the degree of the speaker’s involvement. The higher this point- the higher the speaker’s interest. What is said about the tones is true about the scales. No definite meaning can be assigned to scales but high scales signal more involvement which can situationally into a number of attitudinal meanings.

What brings about local meanings? In present we can only summarize the factors which seem to be relevant . We can single out the following types of context which interact with context: preceeding(1) or co-occuring(2).

1)Intonation	lexis	grammar(2)
	Immediate situation

All the meanings that was described can be defined as attitudinal. There is a differ.discription which has a discoursal character.(Brazil, Gussenhover) These discriptions make basic distinctions b/2 or 3 tones.

Brazil distinguishes between: 1) a proclaiming tone(fall) 2)reffering tone(fall-rise). This dist. Is related to that of given and new info. The tones have variants. Rise and rise-fall are variants of fall-rise and fall. Their use is conditioned by the attitude of the speaker. In his system the additional term ”termination” is used to refer to initial pitch of the tone. A mid termination anticipates a passive agreement. A high termination invites an active response. A fall termination –closes matters. This system correlates with key which is the pitch range of asense group. Key is import. For linking together successive intonation groups. Mid key presents the action as separate pieces of info. High K-surprise, Low K –expected info.

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