Non-native pronunciations of English

Template:Short description Template:EngvarB Template:IPA notice [[File:Japanese mistake in English caused by perceptions of R and L sounds at gift shop in Otaru.jpg|thumb|This gift shop in Japan spells the English word "decoration" as decolation, as a result of the [[Perception of English /r/ and /l/ by Japanese speakers|well-attested difficulty of Japanese speakers in distinguishing English Template:Angbr and Template:Angbr sounds]].]] Non-native pronunciations of English result from the common linguistic phenomenon in which non-native speakers of any language tend to transfer the intonation, phonological processes and pronunciation rules of their first language into their English speech. They may also create innovative pronunciations not found in the speaker's native language.

Overview

Non-native English speakers may pronounce words differently than native speakers either because they apply the speech rules of their mother tongue to English ("interference") or through implementing strategies similar to those used in first language acquisition. They may also create innovative pronunciations for English sounds not found in the speaker's first language.

The extent to which native speakers can identify a non-native accent is linked to the age at which individuals begin to immerse themselves in a language. Scholars disagree on the precise nature of this link, which might be influenced by a combination of factors, including: neurological plasticity, cognitive development, motivation, psychosocial states, formal instruction, language learning aptitude, and the usage of their first (L1) and second (L2) languages.

English is unusual in that speakers rarely produce an audible release between consonant clusters and often overlap constriction times. Speaking English with a timing pattern that is dramatically different may lead to speech that is difficult to understand.

Phonological differences between a speaker's native language and English often lead to neutralization of distinctions in their English. Moreover, differences in sound inventory or distribution can result in difficult English sounds being substituted or dropped entirely. This is more common when the distinction is subtle between English sounds or between a sound of English and of a speaker's native language. While there is no evidence to suggest that a simple absence of a sound or sequence in one language's phonological inventory makes it difficult to learn, several theoretical models have presumed that non-native speech perceptions reflect both the abstract phonological properties and phonetic details of the native language.

Non-native speech patterns can be passed on to the children of learners, who will then exhibit some of the same characteristics despite being native speakers themselves. For example, this process has resulted in many of the distinctive qualities of Irish English and Highland English which were heavily influenced by a Goidelic substratum.

Examples from Indo-European languages

Germanic languages

Dutch

Consonants

• Speakers have difficulty with dental fricatives, often pronouncing as (failing to contrast then and den)Template:Sfn or (especially between vowels).Template:Sfn Similarly, the dental fricative is replaced by or , though Belgian speakers may pronounce both and as in word-final position.Template:Sfn
• The voiced stops and fricatives undergo terminal devoicing, especially in stressed syllables, causing feed and feet to be pronounced as the latter. Similarly, Dutch voicing assimilation patterns may be applied to English utterances so that, for example, iceberg is pronounced as , and if I as .Template:Sfn
• Speakers have difficulty with the glottalization of , either not pronouncing it or applying it in the wrong contexts so that good morning is pronounced .Template:Sfn
• The voiceless stops lack aspiration in stressed syllable-initial context.Template:Sfn
• Medial is replaced by such that better is pronounced as .Template:Sfn
• The postalveolar sibilants tend to be pronounced as their alveolo-palatal equivalents in Dutch: ; beginners may pronounce them as alveolar (and voiceless) or in syllable-final positions, leading to wish being pronounced as .Template:Sfn
• may be confused with and with in initial position.Template:Sfn
• may be strongly pharyngealized, even in contexts where the dark l does not normally appear in English.Template:Sfn Beginners may insert an epenthetic schwa between and a following , leading to milk being pronounced as .Template:Sfn
• could pose difficulties for certain regional dialects which lack /h/, such as in Zeelandic and West Flemish.Template:Sfn
• is replaced by Template:IPAblink, which English listeners may perceive as .Template:Sfn
• The alveolar consonants /t, d, n, s, z, l/ are articulated with the blade of the tongue, rather than the tip as in English.Template:Sfn

Vowels

• Speakers confuse between and , so that man and men are both pronounced as the latter.Template:Sfn
• Speakers confuse between and , so that pool and pull are both pronounced with .Template:Sfn Some advanced speakers may employ a glide [ʉy].Template:Sfn
• /iː/ is pronounced closer, tenser, and sometimes shorter than usual. Some advanced speakers might over-compensate for the length with a diphthong like [ëi].Template:Sfn
• is replaced by . Spelling might cause confusion with /ɒ/ in words like wonder, nothing and lovely.Template:Sfn
• British English /ɒ/ is replaced by [ɔ].Template:Sfn
• British English /ɜː/ is replaced by the sequence in Dutch /ør/, with significant lip-rounding and r-insertion.Template:Sfn
• /eɪ/ is replaced by [eː].Template:Sfn
• /əʊ/ is replaced by [oː]. More advanced speakers might use the Dutch diphthong [eːu].Template:Sfn
• /aɪ/ tends to be overly long before fortis consonants, giving the impression of a following lenis consonant.Template:Sfn

German

General

• German has a smaller pitch range, less consonant cluster reduction, and less vowel reduction.

Consonants

• Speakers may not velarize Template:IPAslink in coda positions as most native speakers do.
• German features terminal devoicing, which is often carried over to English (creating homophones in cub/cup, had/hat, etc.)
• German features neither Template:IPAslink ("the") nor Template:IPAslink ("think"), and both are often realised as either /s/ or /f/ (think/sink, thought/fought, etc.)
• German speakers tend to realise (written Template:Angbr in English) as (also written Template:Angbr in German) when speaking English.
• The German /r/ is realised differently from the English /r/. Whereas in the former case the tongue touches the uvula, in the latter case it does not.
• After German speakers master the pronunciation of [w], some of them hypercorrect to incorrectly pronounce the [v] phoneme in English as [w] without realizing it.

Hellenic languages

Greek

Consonants

• Greek speakers tend to struggle with the difference between and .Template:SfnpTemplate:Better source needed
• and can be replaced by or .Template:SfnpTemplate:Better source needed
• tend to be unaspirated.Template:Sfnp
• Greek speakers may pronounce the English rhotic as a flap .Template:SfnpTemplate:Better source needed
• The closest sound to English in Greek is , and speakers may substitute this sound in words like house.Template:SfnpTemplate:Better source needed

Vowels

• The English vowels [ɪ] (bit) and [iː] (beat) are conflated.

Romance languages

Catalan

Consonants

• Devoicing of final consonants:Template:Sfn to .

E.g. phase can be pronounced like face (even though Catalan has both and phonemes).Template:Sfn

• Confusion of , usually realized as ( are only distinguished in Valencian and Balearic).Template:Sfn
• Rhotic pronunciation, with pronounced as a trill or a flap .Template:Sfn
• Difficulties with word-initial clusters involving , where an epenthetic e is usually added.Template:Sfn

E.g. stop being pronounced estop.Template:Sfn

• Simplification of some word consonant clusters.Template:Sfn

E.g. instant being pronounced instanTemplate:Sfn

Vowels

• Vowel length confusions.Template:Sfn
• Confusion of , usually realized as Template:Sfn
• Confusion of , usually realized as .Template:Sfn
• Confusion of , usually realized as .Template:Sfn
• Confusion of , usually realized as or .Template:Sfn

Suprasegmental features

• Narrower pitch range, with emphasis marked with extra length instead of extra pitch variation.Template:Sfn
• Problems with variable stress.Template:Sfn

E.g. the blackbird vs. the black bird.Template:Sfn

• Problems with contrastive stress.Template:Sfn

E.g. with sugar or without sugar? (the second sugar is more heavily stressed)Template:Sfn

Italian

Studies on Italian speakers' pronunciation of English revealed the following characteristics:

General

Italians learning English have a tendency to pronounce words as they are spelled, so that walk is , guide is , and boiled is . This is also true for loanwords borrowed from English as water (water closet), which is pronounced instead of .

Consonants

• Tendency to realise Template:IPAslink as ("singer" rhymes with "finger") or as Template:IPAblink because Italian is an allophone of before velar stops.
• Tendency to realise word-initial with , e.g. small . This voicing also applies to and . The main reason is that the letter "s" is always pronounced as Template:IPAslink before a voiced consonant in Italian.
• Italian does not have dental fricatives:
  • Voiceless Template:IPAslink may be realised as Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink.
  • Voiced Template:IPAslink may be realised as Template:IPAblink.
• Since Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink are typically pronounced as dental stops anyway, words like there and dare can become homophones.
• Tendency to pronounce Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink as unaspirated stops.
• Italian speakers may pronounce consonant-final English words with a strong vocalic offset, especially in isolated words, e.g. dog .
• Tendency to realise Template:IPAslink as Template:IPAblink; a trill rather than the native approximant Template:IPAblink~Template:IPAblink, even when the dialect of English they are learning is nonrhotic.

Vowels

• Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink are pronounced Template:IPAblink (ship and sheep are homophones);
• Template:IPAslink (in certain words) and Template:IPAslink are pronounced Template:IPAblink (bad and bed are homophones);
• Template:IPAslink (in certain words), Template:IPAslink, and Template:IPAslink are pronounced Template:IPAblink (bat, but, and bath are homophones);
• Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink are pronounced Template:IPAblink (cook and kook are homophones);
• Speakers tend to have little difficulty with Template:IPAslink, though some might pronounce it as Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink).
• The pronunciation of Template:IPAslink, , and are variable, pronounced as Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink.
• The sequence in words like bottle is realized as , , or .
• Schwa Template:IPAblink does not exist in Italian; speakers tend to give the written vowel its full pronunciation, e.g. lemon , television , parrot , intelligent , water , sugar .

French

Consonants

• Because of the phonetic differences between English and French rhotics, speakers may perceive English Template:IPAslink, allophonically labialized to , as Template:IPAslink-like and have trouble distinguishing between and .
• French speakers have difficulty with Template:IPAslink and many delete it, as most French dialects do not have this sound.
• French speakers have difficulty with dental fricatives and (since these sounds do not exist in French). In France they may be pronounced as and , while in Quebec, Canada, the usual substitution is and .Template:Sfn
• Speakers tend not to make a contrast between (as in ship) and . (as in sheep).

Portuguese

Brazilian speakers of English as a second language are likely to exhibit several non-standard pronunciation features, including:

Vowels

• Confusion of and , usually realized as Template:IPAblink, and of and , usually realized as Template:IPAblink.
• Especially in a British context, confusion of and . The Brazilian is equivalent to RP English , and English orthography rarely makes a clear demarcation between the phonemes, thus cold (ideally ) might be homophone with called . The North American equivalent of British , , may be easier to perceive as it closely resembles the Portuguese diphthong . Speakers may also have trouble distinguishing between schwa and .
• In a British context, the diphthong might also be pronounced as the Portuguese diphthong eu, .
• Persistent preference for over (even if the target pronunciation is England's prestige accent), and use of within the IPA space (Portuguese is often , what makes it even more due to confusion in production and perception), so that can't, even in RP, might sound like an American pronunciation of Kent. Some might even go as far as having instead of for last.

Consonants

• Difficulty with dental fricatives and . These may be instead fronted , stopped or hissed .
• Speakers may pronounce word-initial r as a guttural r pronunciations or a trill. These often sound to English speakers as , leading to confusion between ray and hay, red and head, height and right, etc.
• Neutralization of coda , giving preference to a multitude of nasal vowels (often forming random diphthongs with , or also randomly losing them, so that sent and saint, and song and sown, are homophonous) originating from their deletion. Vowels are also often strongly nasalized when stressed and succeeded by a nasal consonant, even if said consonant starts a full syllable after it.
• Fluctuation of the levels of aspiration of voiceless stops , that might sound like .
• Loss of contrast between coronal stops and post-alveolar affricates due to palatalization of the earlier, before vowels such as , , , and .
• The insertion of [i] to break up consonant clusters.
• Palatalization due to epenthetic , so that night sounds slightly like nightch ( rather than ) and light sounds like lightchie ( rather than ).
• Loss of unstressed, syllable-final to palatalization, so that city sounds slightly like sitch ( rather than ).
• Post-alveolar affricates are easily confused with their fricative counterparts , often merging chip and ship, cheap and sheep, and pledger and pleasure.
• Absence of contrast of voice for coda fricatives. He's, hiss and his are easily confused with each other. Spelling pronunciations are also possible, in which all words that historically contain schwas in their orthography are pronounced as /z/, even when the usual pronunciation would be /s/.
• English is less prone to perfect liaison-style sandhi than Portuguese, Spanish and French might be. Often, two identical or very similar consonants follow each other within a row, each in a different word, and both should be pronounced. Brazilians might either perform epenthesis or delete one of them. As such, this stop is produced either or , instead of the native
• In Portuguese, the semivowels and may be vocalized to their corresponding vowels ( and , respectively). so that I love you is pronounced . These semivowels may also be epenthetically inserted between vowels of very dissimilar qualities.
• With the exception of (here represented with a loss of contrast at the end of a word) and , consonants tend to not elide corresponding to or assimilate to the next word's phoneme, even in connected speech. This means, for example, occasional epenthesis even if the following word starts in a vowel, as in their native language (not really).

Romanian

Consonants

• Romanian doesn't have Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink. They are often pronounced as Template:IPAblink and Template:IPAblink, respectively.
• The letter r is often pronounced as the hard rhotic Template:IPAblink, as that is the only sound it makes in Romanian, even though a native English speaker would pronounce it as Template:IPAblink~Template:IPAblink.
• The silent p before a consonant(e.g. in psychology or pterodactyl) is usually pronounced.

Vowels

• Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink are often pronounced Template:IPAblink (ship and sheep are homophones).
• Romanian doesn't have the Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink sounds. They are often pronounced as Template:IPAblink. However, speakers in some parts of Transylvania are usually familiar with Hungarian before learning English, and Hungarian does have Template:IPAslink, as such, they pronounce them as Template:IPAblink.
• Romanian doesn't have the Template:IPAslink sound. It is often pronounced as Template:IPAblink.
• Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink are often pronounced Template:IPAblink (cook and kook are homophones).

Spanish

File:Non-native English reading by Spanish native speaker 002.ogg

An excerpt of Herman Melville's Moby Dick as read in English by a person whose mother tongue is Spanish

Consonants

• Since Spanish does not make voicing contrasts between its fricatives (and its one affricate), speakers may neutralize contrasts between Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink; likewise, fricatives may assimilate the voicing of a following consonant.
• Rhotic pronunciation, with /r/ pronounced as a trill [r] or a flap [ɾ].Template:Sfn
• Cuban and Central American speakers tend to merge Template:IPAslink with Template:IPAslink, and with Template:IPAslink.
• and Template:IPAslink often have a fluctuating degree of closure.
• For the most part (especially in colloquial speech), Spanish allows only five (or six) word-final consonants: Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink; speakers may omit word-final consonants other than these, or alter them (for example, by turning Template:IPAslink to or ).
• In Spanish, must immediately precede or follow a vowel; often a word beginning with + consonant will acquire an epenthetic vowel (typically Template:IPAblink) to make stomp pronounced rather than .
• In Spanish, the phoneme exists only in (most dialects of) Spain; where this sound appears in English, speakers of other Spanish dialects replace with Template:IPAslink or .
• Speakers tend to merge Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink, pronouncing both as a plosive unless they occur in intervocalic position, in which case they are pronounced as a fricative. A similar process occurs with Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink, because Template:IPAslink does not exist in Spanish.
• The three nasal phonemes of Spanish neutralize in coda-position; speakers may invariably pronounce nasal consonants as homorganic to a following consonant; if word-final (as in welcome) common realizations include Template:IPAblink, deletion with nasalization of the preceding vowel, or Template:IPAblink.
• Devoicing of final consonants.Template:Sfn

Vowels

• Vowel length confusions.Template:Sfn
• Confusion of , usually realized as Template:Sfn
• Confusion of , usually realized as .Template:Sfn
• Confusion of , usually realized as .Template:Sfn
• Confusion of , usually realized as .Template:Sfn

Suprasegmental features

• Narrower pitch range, with emphasis marked with extra length instead of extra pitch variation.Template:Sfn
• Problems with variable stress.Template:Sfn

E.g. the blackbird. vs. the black bird.Template:Sfn

• Problems with contrastive stress.Template:Sfn

E.g. with sugar or without sugar?

(the second sugar is more heavily stressed)Template:Sfn

Slavic languages (part of the Balto-Slavic branch)

Czech

These are the most common characteristics of the Czech pronunciation of English:

Consonants

• Final devoicing of voiced consonants (e.g. "bet" and "bed" are both pronounced ), since non-sonorant consonants are always voiceless at the end of words in Czech. Some speakers may pronounce consonant-final English words with a strong vocalic offset,Template:Definition needed especially in isolated words (e.g. "dog" can be ).
• Czech is alveolar trill. There is a tendency to pronounce the trill in English and in all positions where Template:Angle bracket is written.
• Final -er (-or) pronounced as syllabic alveolar trill (e.g. "water" sounds ). Stressed tends to be realized as (e.g. "bird" ).
• Tendency to realize both and as , since does not exist in Czech.
• Tendency to pronounce the initial Template:Angle bracket cluster as (e.g. "write" ).
• Tendency to realize as or , since does not exist in Czech.
• Tendency to substitute as or , since does not exist in Czech.
• Tendency to pronounce as voiced (e.g. "how" ).
• Tendency not to aspirate the stops (e.g. "keep" sounds instead of ), since these stop consonants are not aspirated in Czech.
• Tendency to realise as or (e.g. "singing" ), because Czech is an allophone of before velar stops.

Vowels

• is often realised as , so that "had" sounds like "head" , homophonous with "hat".
• Schwa does not exist in Czech. Speakers tend to pronounce it as (e.g. "a table" ) or (e.g. "China" ).

Suprasegmental features

• Tendency to isolate all words in speech, because the liaison is unusual in Czech. For instance, "see it" tends to be pronounced , rather than .
• The melody of the Czech language is not so strong as in English. Czech speakers may sound monotonous to an English ear.

Russian

Consonants

• There is no Template:IPAslink in Russian; speakers typically substitute Template:IPAblink.
• Native Russian speakers tend to produce an audible release for final consonants and in consonant clusters and are likely to transfer this to English speech, creating inappropriate releases of final bursts that sound overly careful and stilted and even causing native listeners to perceive extra unstressed syllables.
• Word-initial voiceless stops Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink may not be aspirated by Russian speakers (following the pattern in Russian), which may sound to native English speakers as Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink instead.Template:Better source needed However, at least one study challenges this, with Russian-accented English speakers in the study aspirating the voiceless consonants just as much as General American English speakers, and Template:IPAslink even more than General American speakers.
• Russian exhibits final-obstruent devoicing, which may also be used by speakers in English.
• Since there are no dental fricatives (Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink) in Russian, speakers may pronounce them respectively as Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink and as Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink.
• English is typically realised as a trill Template:IPAblink, the native Russian rhotic.
• Likewise, Template:IPAslink may be pronounced like its closest Russian equivalent, Template:IPAblink.
• Since there is no Template:IPAslink in Russian, speakers typically produce Template:IPAblink or instead.
• The voiced palato-alveolar affricate Template:IPAslink may be realised as a sequence of a stop and a fricative: Template:IPAblink Template:IPAblink.
• The voiceless palato-alveolar affricate Template:IPAslink may be pronounced as its closest Russian equivalent, Template:IPAslink.
• The postalveolar fricatives Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink may be realised as their closest Russian equivalents, Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink.
• The consonant cluster Template:IPAslink Template:IPAslink may be realised as an affricate, Template:IPAslink.
• The "clear" alveolar Template:IPAslink may be realised as Russian Template:IPAblink, sounding closer to English velarised Template:IPAblink (a.k.a. "dark l").
• Consonants written twice in English may be geminated by speakers.

Vowels

• Russian speakers may have difficulty distinguishing Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink, Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink, and Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink; similarly, speakers' pronunciation of long vowels may sound more like their close counterpart (e.g. Template:IPAslink may sound closer to )

Examples from non-Indo-European languages

Sino-Tibetan

Cantonese

Consonants

• Template:Ipa tends to be [d], so this is [dis],

Vowels

• /ə/ tends to be [a], so whether is Template:Ipa.
• There is less vowel reduction in unstressed syllables, and some variation in the placement of stress. For example, chocolate may be pronounced instead of .

Uralic

Hungarian

Consonants

• The dental fricatives Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink may be realised as and Template:IPAblink respectively.
• Since Hungarian lacks the phoneme Template:IPAslink, many Hungarian speakers substitute Template:IPAslink for when speaking in English. A less frequent practice is hypercorrection: substituting for in instances where the latter is actually correct.
• In Hungarian phonology, in obstruent clusters, retrograde voicing assimilation occurs, so voiced consonants change to their voiceless counterparts if a voiceless consonant follows them and voiceless consonants change to their voiced counterparts if a voiced consonant follows them. While in English, it's the other way around. e.g. pronouncing dropped as [d r ɔ́ b d] instead of [d r ɔ́ p t]

Austronesian

Indonesian

The following are some characteristics of the English pronunciation by Indonesian speakers:

Consonants

• Merger of Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink into Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink.
• Final-obstruent devoicing.

Vowels

• Difficulty with English vowels, including lack of vowel length.
  • →
  • →
• Common occurrence of unusual spelling pronunciations (e.g. eleven as , cow as , bite as or even what as ).

Japonic

Japanese

Consonants

• Speakers tend to confuse and both in perception and production, since the Japanese language has only one liquid phoneme /r/, whose possible realizations include central Template:IPAblink and lateral Template:IPAblink. Speakers may also hear English as similar to the Japanese .

Vowels

• Tendency to realize syllables containing unstressed central vowel /ə/ with a vowel based on the written form
• Tendency to insert a vowel, typically /o/ or /ɯ/, after consonants other than moraic nasal /ɴ/, as Japanese lacks syllable-final consonants.

Suprasegmental features

• Tendency to reanalyze English words according to moraic timing and/or pitch accent, leading to unnatural stress/timing

Austroasiatic

Vietnamese

Note: There are three main dialects of Vietnamese, a northern one centered on Hanoi, a central one centered on Huế, and a southern one centered on Ho Chi Minh City.

Consonants

• Speakers may not produce final consonants since there are fewer final consonants in Vietnamese and those that do exist differ in their phonetic quality:
  • Final Template:IPAslink Template:IPAslink Template:IPAslink is likely to be confused with Template:IPAslink.
  • Final Template:IPAslink is likely to be confused with Template:IPAslink.
  • Final Template:IPAslink Template:IPAslink Template:IPAslink Template:IPAslink is likely to be omitted.
  • Final Template:IPAslink is likely to be confused with Template:IPAslink, but some Vietnamese pronounce the word bell as .
  • Final Template:IPAslink is likely to be confused with Template:IPAslink by southern Vietnamese.
• Speakers also have difficulty with English consonant clusters, with segments being omitted or epenthetic vowels being inserted.
• Speakers may not aspirate initial , , and , native English-speakers think that they pronounce as Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink. For example, when Vietnamese people pronounced the word tie, native English-speakers think that they say the word die or dye.
• Speakers often have difficulty with and confuse the following phonemes, which in some cases may depend on where in Vietnam they are originally from:
  • Template:IPAslink with , .
  • Template:IPAslink with , .
  • Template:IPAslink with (especially in southern dialects).
  • Template:IPAslink with .
  • Template:IPAslink with Template:IPAslink.
  • Template:IPAslink with Template:IPAslink or .
  • Template:IPAslink with by northern Vietnamese.
  • with , , or by northern Vietnamese.
  • Template:IPAslink with by southern Vietnamese.

Vowels

• Speakers often have difficulty with and confuse the following phonemes, which in some cases may depend on where in Vietnam they are originally from:
  • Template:IPAslink with Template:IPAslink.
  • Template:IPAslink with Template:IPAslink or .
  • Template:IPAslink with Template:IPAslink.

Suprasegmental features

• Vietnamese being a tonal language, speakers might try to apply the Vietnamese tonal system or use a mid tone with English words. However, they produce a high tone when the closed syllable is followed by /p, t, k/. They may also associate tones with the intonational pattern of a sentence and become confused by inflectional changes.

Afroasiatic (Semitic branch is only listed)

Arabic

General features among most or all Arabic speakers:

Consonants

• Speakers tend to speak with a rhotic accent and pronounce Template:IPAslink as Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink.
• There is struggle in pronouncing alone in its final position; the “ing” syllable. It is often immediately related to the sound, like in: "waiting" instead of and "something" instead of .
• A study conducted with 45 subjects from Egypt, Libya and Saudi Arabia found that speakers had difficulty in pronouncing some English consonants such as , , , dark .

Vowels

• Confusion between as in sit and as in set , pronouncing both vowels as Template:IPAblink, Template:IPAblink, or Template:IPAblink.Template:Sfnp
• Difficulty distinguishing low sounds, as in bam and as in balm may both be realized as Template:IPAblink, Template:IPAblink, or Template:IPAblink depending on the speaker's dialect.Template:Sfnp
• Confusion between as in called and caught with as in cold and coat, both being realized as Template:IPAblink or Template:IPAblink depending on the speaker's dialect.

Hebrew

Consonants

• The dental fricatives Template:IPAslink (as in "the") and Template:IPAslink (as in "think") are often mispronounced.
• Hebrew speakers may confuse Template:IPAslink and Template:IPAslink.

Vowels

• The lack of discrimination in Hebrew between tense and lax vowels makes correctly pronouncing English words such as hit/heat and cook/kook difficult.

Suprasegmental features

• In Hebrew, word stress is usually on the last (ultimate) or penultimate syllable of a word; speakers may carry their stress system into English, which has a much more varied stress system. Hebrew speakers may also use Hebrew intonation patterns which mark them as foreign speakers of English.

See also

• Anglophone pronunciation of foreign languages
• [[Pronunciation of English ⟨th⟩|Pronunciation of English Template:Angbr]]
• Non-native speech database
• International Dialects of English Archive
• Accent reduction
• Koiné language
• Shibboleth
• English prosody

External links

• Speech Accent Archive (most recordings also have an IPA transcription)
• International Dialects of English Archive Template:Webarchive
• Articles, Determiners, and Quantifiers Template:Webarchive