English pre-fortis clipping by L2 Saudi speakers

Ghazi Algethami ()
Additional contact information
Ghazi Algethami: Taif University

Palgrave Communications, 2023, vol. 10, issue 1, 1-6

Abstract: Abstract The current study is a partial replication of Flege and Port (Language Speech 24(2):125–146, 1981), which examined the production of pre-fortis clipping (i.e., vowel shortening before voiceless obstruents) by Saudi L2 English speakers. In addition, it examined whether language experience operationalized as the length of residence in an English-speaking country, had any positive effect on the production of the pre-fortis clipping by the Saudi L2 English speakers. 16 Saudi L2 English speakers were requested to produce the English vowels /æ/, /ɪ/ and /i:/ in a carrier word, once before the voiceless stop /t/ and once before the voiced stop /d/. The same vowels in the same context were also elicited from a reference group of native English speakers. Similar vowels in a similar context were also obtained in Arabic from Saudi native speakers. A durational ratio of each vowel before /t/ to the same vowel before /d/ was calculated for each speaker in the native and nonnative groups. Similar to the findings of Flege and Port (1981), both the Saudi native Arabic and L2 English speakers showed broadly less durational contrast between the vowels in the two contexts than did the native English speakers. However, the results varied across the three examined vowels. In addition, no significant correlation was found between the length of residence and the L2 speakers’ production.

Date: 2023
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41599-023-01661-7 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palcom:v:10:y:2023:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-023-01661-7

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/palcomms/about

DOI: 10.1057/s41599-023-01661-7

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Palgrave Communications from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().