The Influence of Zhen’ an Dialects on Students’Learning of English Pronunciation

宋佳阳

【Abstract】The paper goes through by analyzing the influence of Zhen an dialects on students learning of English pronunciation， and then put forward some specific measures in order to improve Zhen an students English speaking ability.

【Key words】Zhen an dialects； English pronunciation； measures

1. Introduction

Learn and master a language contains listening， speaking， reading and writing， and listening and speaking are the two fundamental factors. In addition， learners have standard pronunciation is the precondition of audio-lingual skills. Thus articulation plays a significant role in language learning. In the process of second language acquisition， our mother tongue always affect it not only in grammar and phraseology but also in articulation. Hence the article aims to enhance English learners oral English by analyzing the influence of Zhen an dialects， and then come up with some specific methods.

2. Some theories

Language acquisition is the process by which humans acquire the capacity to perceive and comprehend language. The field of articulatory phonetics is a subfield of phonetics. In studying articulation， phoneticians explain how humans produce speech sounds via the interaction of different physiological structures.

Language transfer refers to speakers or writers applying knowledge from one language to another language. It can be classified into positive transfer and negative transfer.

3. The influence of Zhen an dialect on part of English articulation

Zhen an county which belongs to Shangluo district lies in the southeast of Shaanxi province. It is 98 kilometers far from Xian. In the history， southern Shaanxi has experienced two big scale immigration movements. After the two large population of flow in the history， a few native people live there while guest people take up 80%-90%. Therefore， the dialect is complex. After a long exchange and integration， Zhen an dialect formed its own unique characterizes.

3.1 The mispronunciation of five stops

The English six stops /p/， /b/， /t/， /d/， /k/， /g/ are all produced by some form of complete ‘stopping of the airstream and then letting it go abruptly. However， when Zhen an students read these plosives， they usually regard them as Chinese pinyin and transfer their reading of six initials into these six stops. For example， they would pronounce theses words “help /help/， bag /b?g/，” as /helpu/， /b?g?/. They usually add tail sounds /u/ or /?/ after stops.

When any two stops meet together in a word or phrase， the former one would loss its explosion， the speaker is required to make the sound but not say it out， and there should be a stop for the unvoiced plosive. For instance， “accept” /?ksept/ this /p/ is not pronunced； another one “sit down” /sit daun/ the /t/ is the unvoiced plosive. In this case， the speaker just shapes the sound and wait until the next phoneme to be articulated. Nevertheless， when Zhen an students read these words， they would pronounce every phoneme clearly.

3.2 The transfer of /s/ /z/ /l/ into /θ/ /?/

/θ/ and /?/ are dentals. These sounds are formed with the tongue tip behind the upper front teeth. /s/ /z/and /l/ are alveolar. These are sounds formed with the front part of the tongue on the alveolar ridge， which is the rough， bony ridge immediately behind the upper teeth. The two groups of phonemes have different places of articulation. Because the dentals /θ/ and /?/ are not exist in Chinese and they sound like /s/ and /z/， most students borrow and imitate the sounds. For example， when they want to show their gratitude， they would say “Thank you” /s??kju：/ instead of /θ??kju：/. And they pronounce “breathe” /bri：?/ as /bri：z/. Even some students read “this /?is/ and that /??t/” as /lis/ and /l?t/.

3.3 The transfer of /v/ into /w/ or Chinese /u/

/V/ is labiodental and voiced fricative. It is formed with the upper teeth and the lower lip. It also involves almost blocking the airstream， and having the air push through the narrow opening. As the air is pushed through， a type of friction is produced. /W/ is bilabial and approximant. It is formed using both upper and lower lips. It is sometimes called ‘semi-vowel or ‘glide， because it is typically produced with the tongue moving， or ‘gliding to or from the position of a nearby vowel. And the Chinese /u/ is a final in Pinyin which sounds like /wu/， so some learners may read “very well” /?veri wel / as /?weri wel / or /?ueri uel /.

4. Reasons， strategies and measures

For most Zhen an students， they have little knowledge about the phoneme， even not to say the reading of phonetic symbols. When they learn new English words， they prefer to use their mother tongue to help them remember the pronunciations and sometimes they write a similar Chinese pinyin in order to read them. For teachers， few of them teach students the phonetic symbols.

In order to promote this condition， first， try to promote the teachers professional levels. Recruit more English majors and distribute them to different grades according to their ability. Then， strengthen the exercise of listening and speaking and encourage students to read more and listen to English frequently. Please remember， listen to a kind of material for ten times is better than listen to ten kinds of material once. Besides， imitation cant be ignored when reading. It is the best way to learn a foreign language. When imitating， students should notice the stressed voices， the intonations， and liaison etc. We can also organize some activities such as speech， singing， dubbing and tongue twister to offer students more opportunities. Finally， speak standard mandarin. Only in this way can decrease the influence of dialect on English learning.

5. Conclusion

The paper merely analyzes a part of the influence of Zhen an accents on English pronunciation and give some suggestions which are not enough. The most important one is， the author hopes that Zhen an students can realize the negative transfer of second language acquisition and make their effort to know more about phonetic symbols in order to speak fluent and standard English as soon as possible.

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