Proceedings of the - British Association for Applied Linguistics

The Impact of Applied Linguistics: Proceedings of the 44th Annual Meeting of BAAL
University of the West of England
Discussion
The pilot data show clear cross-linguistic differences between German,
Korean and Spanish learners, reflecting rhythmic characteristics of their
native languages. In terms of consonantal material in the speech stream, the
German learners were – as expected – closest to the English target but their
Varco-C is still not quite high enough. Having a stress-timed language
background, German learners naturally have more consonant clusters in
their speech already and are familiar with vowel reduction, even though
this happens to a lesser extent in German. The amount of vocalic material
increases in German learners from B1 to B2 level. However, while the
initial development is in the direction of native British English values, their
speech is more vocalic than that of L1 English speakers at B2. A possible
explanation is that B2 German learners of English over-generalise newly
acquired rules. When learners understand that accented syllables, for
instance, have a longer duration and thus a higher percentage of vocalic
material, they might exaggerate accentual lengthening, or they might apply
it in syllables which would normally be reduced.
Korean and Spanish learners, who have mostly CV structures in their
native language, have a relatively low number of consonants in their speech
as reflected by a low Varco-C value. This shows that in consonant clusters
they still delete some consonants or insert vowels to break a succession of
consonants. While Korean learners do not show any difference between B1
and B2, Spanish learners show a progression towards native-like values.
The same holds true for vocalic material. With a rather high percentage of
vowels still at B1, the Spanish learners significantly reduce the vocalic
proportion at B2 level, even slightly below the native English values. From
this data we can conclude that our Spanish speakers are moving away from
full transfer of prosodic properties, and that they are starting to master L2
properties such as complex syllable structures with clusters of consonants,
and vowel reduction.
Conclusion
This pilot study shows that rhythm can be objectively measured to analyse
L2 speech from learners’ with typologically different L1 backgrounds. In
language learning we are concerned with both intelligibility and accuracy
and should note when, how and why each is required for learners. These
results can help us understand what learners of a specific L1 can do (in a
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