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JABATAN PENGKHUSUSAN BAHASA INGGERIS
INSTITUT PENDIDIKAN GURU
KAMPUS ILMU KHAS
PHONETICS AND
PHONOLOGY
TSL 3104
NO. NAME MATRIC NO.1 NURUL ATIQAH BINTI MOHAMED SAID TESL 168
2 HIDAYATI IZZATI BINTI OSMAN TESL 156
LECTURER : MR. CHANG KHAY SENG
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CONTENTS
1.0 The subject .............................................................................................................................................................. 3
2.0 The data (the reading passage) ............................................................................................................................... 3
2.1 Ortographic .......................................................................................................................................................... 3
2.2 Phonemic Transcription ....................................................................................................................................... 4
3.0 Analysis (recorded text) ........................................................................................................................................... 5
3.1 Phonemic Transcription ....................................................................................................................................... 5
3.2 Discussion of pronunciation features and problems ........................................................................................... 6
4.0 Explanation of possible causes for the pronunciation problems and ways to overcome the problems ............. 7
* NURUL ATIQAH BINTI MOHAMED SAID .............................................................................................................. 7
* HIDAYATI IZZATI BINTI OSMAN ......................................................................................................................... 10
Works Cited ................................................................................................................................................................. 13
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1.0 THE SUBJECT
The subject name is Mohamed Amir Bin Mohamed Said. He is 11 years old. He is a
Malaysian. His ethnicity is Malay and his first language is Malay language. He comes from a
middle-class family. His father works as lorry driver whereas his mother is a housewife. He had
five siblings and he is the fourth. They live at F159 Parit Tok Ngah, Tanjong Piandang, Perak; a
village where its residents are all Malay. All of his family members use only Malay language in
their daily communication. He studies at Sekolah Kebangsaan Parit Haji Wahab in year 5. There
is no other race in his school except from Malay.
(109 words)
2.0 THE DATA (THE READING PASSAGE)
2.1 ORTOGRAPHIC
The sun warmed my face, my feet moved swiftly beneath me. I was on my way to
school. Fear had started to build up inside of me as if I were a geyser ready to burst. I knew
what waited ahead for me at school, but I just let my feet carry me forward.
I had been very sick the last two years. Grave's disease had taken over my life, just as
alcohol takes over an alcoholic. This disease ate away at my immune system, reeking terror on
my physical being and leaving it feeling and looking like a train wreck. Thanks to this disease,
my once light coco skin now held a pale, volcanic ash-like color. My sickly body held a mere fifty
pounds, which is way under the average weight for an eight-year old. The hair on my head was
short and thin, and sometimes fell to the floor like rain drops. Eyes that used to be small and a
beautiful brown now were a dull coffee color, so enlarged that they looked as if they were going
to pop out my head. Worst of all was a large scar, laid upon my neck, which looked like
someone had cut me with a knife.
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I had learned to live with these life changes to my body, but other people had not always
been so accepting. Even though I was now ten, these symptoms still plagued my body. So on
this beautiful, enchanted day, I headed for school and steeled myself for the day's events. I was
used to the daily taunts and teasing from my fellow peers, but two girls in particular could
always get to me. No matter how high I built up my armor-like protection, those two girls could
always break through as if they were trained burglars.
(302 words)
2.2 PHONEMIC TRANSCRIPTION
| ðə sʌn wɔːmd maɪ feɪs | maɪ fiːt muːvd ˈswɪftli bɪˈniːθ miː | ˈaɪ wəz ɒn maɪ ˈweɪ tə skuːl | fɪə
həd ˈstɑːtɪd tə bɪld ʌp ɪnˈsaɪd əv miː əz ɪf ˈaɪ wər ə ˈɡiːzə ˈredi tə bɜːst | ˈaɪ njuː ˈwɒt ˈweɪtɪd
əˈhed fə miː ət skuːl | bət ˈaɪ dʒəst let maɪ fiːt ˈkæri miː ˈfɔːwəd |
| ˈaɪ həd biːn ˈveri sɪk ðə lɑːst ˈtuː ˈjiəz | ɡreɪvɪz dɪˈziːz həd ˈteɪkən ˈəʊvə maɪ laɪf | dʒəst əz
ˈælkəhɒl teɪks ˈəʊvər ən ˌælkəˈhɒlɪk | ðɪs dɪˈziːz et əˈweɪ ət maɪ ɪˈmjuːn ˈsɪstəm | ˈriːkɪŋ ˈterər
ɒn maɪ ˈfɪzɪkl ˈbiːɪŋ ənd ˈliːvɪŋ ɪt ˈfiːlɪŋ ənd ˈlʊkɪŋ ˈlaɪk ə treɪn rek | θæŋks tə ðɪs dɪˈziːz | maɪ
wʌns laɪt ˈkəʊkəʊ skɪn naʊ held ə peɪl | vɒlˈkænɪk æ ʃ ˈlaɪk ˈkʌlər | maɪ ˈsɪkli ˈbɒdi held ə mɪə
ˈf ɪfti paʊndz | wɪt ʃ ɪz ˈweɪ ˈʌndə ði ˈævər ɪdʒ weɪt f ər ən eɪt ˈjiə əʊld | ðə heər ɒn maɪ hed wəz
ʃɔːt ənd θɪn | ənd ˈsʌmtaɪmz fel tə ðə flɔː ˈlaɪk reɪn dr ɒps | aɪz ðət ˈjuːst tə bi smɔːl ənd ə ˈbjuːtəfl
braʊn naʊ wər ə dʌl ˈkɒfi ˈkʌlər | ˈsəʊ ɪnˈlɑːdʒd ðət ˈðeɪ lʊkt əz ɪf ˈðeɪ wə ˈɡəʊɪŋ tə pɒp ˈaʊt maɪhed | wɜːst əv ɔːl wəz ə lɑːdʒ skɑː | leɪd əˈpɒn maɪ nek | wɪtʃ lʊkt ˈlaɪk ˈsʌmwʌn həd kʌt miː wɪð
ə naɪf |
| ˈaɪ həd lɜːnd tə ˈlaɪv wɪð ðiːz laɪf ˈtʃ eɪndʒɪz tə maɪ ˈbɒdi | bət ˈʌðə ˈpiːpl həd nɒt ˈɔːlweɪz biːn
ˈsəʊ əkˈseptɪŋ | ˈiːvn ðəʊ ˈaɪ wəz naʊ ten | ðiːz ˈsɪmptəmz stɪl pleɪɡd maɪ ˈbɒdi | ˈsəʊ ɒn ðɪs
ˈbjuːtəfl | ɪnˈtʃɑːntɪd deɪ | ˈaɪ ˈhedɪd f ə skuːl ənd stiːld maɪˈself f ə ðə ˈdeɪz ɪˈvents |ˈaɪ wəz ˈjuːst
tə ðə ˈdeɪli tɔːnts ənd ˈtiːzɪŋ frəm maɪ ˈfeləʊ pɪəz | bət ˈtuː ɡɜːlz ɪn pəˈtɪkjʊlə kəd ˈɔːlweɪz ˈɡet tə
miː | nəʊ ˈmætə ˈhaʊ haɪ ˈaɪ bɪlt ʌp maɪ ɑːmə ˈlaɪk pr əˈtek ʃn | ðəʊz ˈtuː ɡɜːlz kəd ˈɔːlweɪz breɪk
θruː əz ɪf ˈðeɪ wə treɪnd ˈbɜːɡləz |
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3.2 DISCUSSION OF PRONUNCIATION FEATURES AND PROBLEMS
It is common among learners of the English Language to use the features of their native
language when using English. This often causes confusion in communication due to the
differences in pronunciation which might lead to a misunderstanding of the message being
conveyed. The mother tongue interference in a Malay user may differ according to which part of
Malaysia they are living in due to the differences in dialect.
The most distinct problem that can be detected in our subject is basically the
phonological feature of segments. In Malaysian English, “there is a general tendency to reduce
contoid clusters to one or two elements less than necessary in Malaysian English”
(Baskaran,2005). Reducing the contoid cluster means that the speaker reduces the phonemes.
For example, from three phonemes, the speaker reduces it to two phonemes. Our subject
pronounced „held‟ as /hed/ instead of /held/. Another example is „laid‟ being pronounced as /led/instead of /leid/. These problems are mainly due to the simplification of the pronunciation in the
Malay language and also the absence of contoidal clusters in Malay language.
Simplification in pronouncing the English language can be seen when the voiced
fricatives is pronounced voiceless. The phonemes involved in this are the voiced fricatives /v/
and /z/ and the voiceless fricatives /f/ and /s/. The evidence obtained from our subject is in the
pronunciation of the word „teasing‟. It should have been pronounced as /tiːzɪŋ/, instead our
subject pronounced it as /tæsɪŋ/. Another example is seen in the word „those‟. The subject
pronounced it as /dus/ instead of /ðəʊz/.
The wrong pronunciation of words can also be seen in the presence of the consonant /ð/
and /θ/. The words are pronounced as /t/. Examples of these incorrect pronunciations are in the
word „thin‟ which was pronounced as /tin/ instead of / θɪn/. Another example is in the
pronunciation of the word „those‟ which was supposed to be pronounced as / ðəʊz/ instead of
/dus/. These incorrect pronunciations may cause confusion as it literally changes the word.
Frequent omission and error in the consonantal ending of words often occur in the
speech of English learners. Suffixes –ed and –s which are used to indicate tenses and
numbers. These omissions cause the words to come out as „half -uttered‟, and not a full word.
Examples of these errors found in our subject‟s speech are in the words „symptoms‟ being
pronounced as /sɪmtɒm/ instead of /sɪmptəmz/. Another example is the word „headed‟ being
pronounced as / hed/ instead of /hedɪd/.
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Another prominent problem would be the suprasegmentals, specifically, the placement
of stress. Malaysian English speakers tend to put stress on the words that they want to
emphasize as like their mother tongue while English places stress on every word, differing in the
syllable being stressed in order for the different meaning to be understood accurately. This
cause major misunderstanding in communication as the meaning may be understood differently.
As in the recorded text of our subject, we had analyzed and detected many part of the speech
where the stress should have been yet the subject failed to put the stress. For example, /ð ɪs
ˈdɪziːz et əweɪ ət maɪ ɪm juːn sɪstəm/ was pronounced by our subject. It should have been /ðɪs
dɪˈziːz et əˈweɪ ət maɪ ɪˈmjuːn ˈsɪstəm/.
543 words
4.0 EXPLANATION OF POSSIBLE CAUSES FOR THE PRONUNCIATION PROBLEMS AND WAYS TO
OVERCOME THE PROBLEMS
* NURUL ATIQAH BINTI MOHAMED SAID
In this section, several possible causes for the mispronunciation of English words made
by the subject will be discussed. Two possible causes which will be addressed here are mother
tongue interference and the lack of practice.
The first factor which contributes to the pronunciation problem is mother tongue
interference. The syllable structure of Malay language is (C)V(C); optional consonant + vowel +
optional consonant (Deterding & Poedjosoedarmo, 1998). This trait makes the words in Malay
language more orthographically transparent and easy to read as compared to English (Lee,
Low, & Mohamed, 2013). For example the word „buta’ which means blind, consists of four
letters (b + u + t + a) and four phonemes (/b/ + /u/ + /t/ + /a/). All the letters correspond to their
phonetic symbols. Whereas the English word „kite‟ has four letters (k +i + t + e) but only three
phonemes (/k/ + /aɪ/ + /t/). This differentiation confuses the Malay speakers, so they tend toapply the Malay language rule to read English words. Thus, it is hard for the subject to read
English word especially word which has consonant cluster such as „held‟.
Besides that, not all English phonemes exist in Malay language. Even though both
language share the same number of letters which is 26 (6 vowels and 20 consonants) but the
number of phonemes is different. English has 24 consonants sound and 20 vowel sounds
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whereas Malay just has less than that. So, the absence of certain phonemes such as /θ/ and /ð/
in the Malay language causes the subject to pronounce the word incorrectly. Since the sound of
dental fricative /θ/ and /ð/ are not familiar to the subject, he choose the nearest similar sound
which was /t/ or /d/. Perhaps, the subject was unaware that he might change the meaning of the
word by changing a phoneme.
Other than that, Malay language is syllable-timed language which pays the
approximately equal amounts of time to pronounce at each syllable while pronouncing a word.
Zuraidah Mohd Don, Knowles, & Yong (2008) stated that there are no phenomena in spoken
Malay corresponding to what phonologists call stress. So, the idea of placing stress on words is
hard to be comprehended by the Malay speaker. Even English language learner is also
encounter difficulties in acquiring the correct pattern of stress placement. This explains why the
subject read the text monotonously. He gave the same attention towards every word rather that
just to the content words. Misunderstanding will likely to occur since English speakers rely to
stress to grasp the intended meaning.
The second possible cause of this problem is the lack of practice in speaking English
language. The subject comes from the middle-class family who use only Malay language in their
communication process at home. In terms of exposure towards the English language, his
parents are able to buy him English text material to read such as story book and newspaper.
Their home also has television in which he always watches English movies. However, since
there is no one in the house use English to communicate, he is not directly exposed to the
correct pronunciation. On top of that, he does not have enough chance to practice English. The
only time that he can speak English is at the school. This also limited to the English period only
because none of his friend is using English as their first language. Thus, the lack of practice
influences his fluency in reading English text.
To overcome this problem, here I lay several suggestions which can help students to
have a better pronunciation. Generally, in order to have good pronunciation teacher should
expose the students with the real communication using the target language rather than focusing
on the mechanical aspect of that language. Here are several techniques which can help teacher
in teaching pronunciation.
Firstly, teacher can use minimal pairs to highlight that difference that a phoneme will
make when it is mispronounced no matter whether it is consonant or vowel (Hewings, 2004). In
this activity teacher asks students to hear, say out loud and read the minimal pair. After that,
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they are required to pin point the difference between the two words. By doing this, students will
realize the importance of each phonemes and eventually correcting their mistake. This activity is
very effective in helping students especially in recognizing long and short vowel. For example,
the differences between the short vowel /ɪ/ versus the long vowel /i:/ can be clearly seen this
minimal pair „bid‟ and „bead‟.
Second activity is proposed by Hewings in his book Pronunciation Practice Activites, the
cluster word chain. It is best to draw students‟ attention to consonant cluster and help them to
overcome problem while dealing with it. In this activity students are required to come out with a
list of word which have consonant cluster in it. It depends on the teacher to specify the location
of the consonant cluster whether it must be at the beginning, middle or end. The main aim is to
make the students aware of the several consonant cluster ways of pronunciation as some of
them is pronunced clearly like blind /blaɪnd/ whereas knee /niː/ is not. As the focus is on
pronunciation, it is best if the students can just voicing out the answer rather than writing it on
the paper so that they can distinguish the sounds.
The next activity is poem read aloud activity. This activity can help students to pay more
attention towards the stress pattern. According to Gerald Kelly (2000) limerick is one of the best
type of poem that can be used to teach stress pattern as it has a strict form. Its rhythm pattern is
AABBA and the beats for each line are 3, 3, 2, 2 and 3 respectively. So, any misplace stress in
the word will make the line sound weird. Teacher just need to prepare a good limerick and read
it aloud in the class. Then, teacher asks students to read it together with her. After that, teacher
can assign students to create their own limerick. This process will bring awareness on the
importance of stress to student and they will learn to use it correctly while making their own
limerick. At the end of the session, student recite their poem and everyone will decide whether
he place the stress correctly or not.
As a conclusion, it hard for second language learner to be able to speak as fluently as
the native speakers. This is due to the differences that exist the sound system of both language.
However, this is not an impossible task. With the right guidance and activity, second language
learner can improve their pronunciation.
(1114 words)
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* HIDAYATI IZZATI BINTI OSMAN
Making errors in learning is a part of the process itself. Without errors and mistakes, one
would not learn the correct way. By working through those mistakes, people truly learn. As such,
language learners also make mistakes again and again. Through all these unexpected errors do
they understand and are able to implement the correct structure and form of the language.
There are many causes as to which language learners make errors when using the target
language.
The most prominent cause is due to the inadequate exposure to the target language.
Most learners of the language are unable to acquire the language because of the environment
in which they are in do not support the use of the language. Our subject is a good example of
this. Being raised in a family where English is used minimally, the subject did not obtain enough
exposure of the language to master it. In fact, English is not used daily in the part of Malaysia
where the subject is residing in. Unaccustomed to the language, the subject is unable to master
the correct form and structure of the language due to lack of the opportunity to use the language
in the productive and receptive areas of the language.
Another cause of errors in language among language learners is due to
overgeneralization. Being exposed very little to the language, when encountering new forms or
structure of the language, learners tend to overgeneralize the newly learned with what they
have learned before. For example, the subject pronounced „dull‟ as /dʊl/ instead of the correct
pronunciation, /dʌl/. This might be related to the overgeneralization of the word that is speltalmost similarly to bull which is pronounced as /bʊl/. Overgeneralization often occurs to learners
who do not have the opportunity to use the language frequently and is restricted to very few
vocabularies.
Most errors in pronunciation also take place due to what is being called „medium
transfer‟. This occurs when the speaker pronounce the word as it is spelt or spells the word as it
sounds. For example, a speaker may spell the word „terrible‟ as „teribel‟, following it sound. As
such, the subject pronounced „built‟ as /built/ rather than the correct pronunciation /bilt/. For
most Malay learners of English, medium transfer is strongly affected by the interference of
mother tongue itself. Malay is a language where the words are pronounced exactly as it is spelt
and vice versa. Therefore, it is very common in Malay learners of English to misspell or
mispronounced the words in English.
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Further cause of errors in speech and writing of the subject might be affected by the
model in which the subject is learning the language from itself. The teacher himself might be a
poor user of the language, not due to the lack of knowledge but in the lack of practice in using
the language itself. English being a language that is always changing might be confusing to
those who are not constantly up-to-date on it. It might be that the person in which the subject
refers to as the model uses the language wrongly and indirectly affects the subject.
Another cause for the errors done by the subject might be the result of the coherent
difficulties of the target language. As noted before, English is a very rich language. It has lasted
and adapted centuries of changes. There are words in English that have existed even
thousands of years before and yet there are always new words coined every day. Compared to
Malay, the mother tongue of the subject, English is a very hard language due to the ever
changing and immense amount of vocabularies existing. This might be the cause of the
constant errors in using the language as it confuses the subject.
However, these causes seems trivial to the fact that errors may almost always be
corrected. As for the subject, most of the errors happened due to interference of the mother
tongue which might be the effect of the lack of usage of the language. Therefore, these errors
may be able to be fixed.
First of all, the subject needs to be more exposed to the language in order to fully master
it. Other mediums such as radio, internet and television might be able to help the subject listen
and becomes aware of the pronunciation of the words. Even watching movies help because it
gives insights on how the native speakers pronounce the words. There are also online
dictionaries available on the internet that will be able to teach the subject accurately how each
word is pronounced. Rather than depending on the environment in which the English is used
minimally, the subject should find other alternatives to learn.
Next, the subject should be encouraged to think using the target language. By doing this,
the subject will not bring in the mother tongue influence when the words are finally uttered. The
teacher, being the model should possess good command of both the mother tongue and the
target language in order to thoroughly explain to the students, particularly the subject the rules,
structure and form of both the language and how it different.
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Finally, the subject should be encouraged to read more. Through reading, the subject
would be able to access the vast vocabularies of English and would be able to view the
differences in the words. It would also add the subject‟s interest towards the language.
The errors which the subject has committed are due to a number of factors. However,
these errors can be corrected of given an appropriate chance and opportunity for the subject to
learn the language freely and correctly.
937 words
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