ENGLISH PHONOLOGY AND PHONETICS

ANALYSIS ON PHONOLOGICAL ASPECTS

OF AN EFL LEARNER’S UTTERANCES

This paper is to fulfil the final assignment of

English Phonology and Phonetics KPE1206 Class D

Written by:

NURUL RIEZZA RIESTY FAUZIE

130210401083

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM

DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS EDUCATION

FACULTY OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION

UNIVERSITAS JEMBER

2016
 ANALYSIS ON PHONOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF AN EFL LEARNER’S
UTTERANCES

A. INTRODUCTION

Phonology and phonetics deal with sounds. Phonology is concerned

with how sounds function in relation to each other in a language, while phonetics
is concerned with how sounds are produced, transmitted and perceived. In simple
words, phonetics is about sounds of language and phonology is about sound
systems of language.
As EFL learners, it is worth to study phonetics and phonology,
especially for EFL teachers to be. The phonetics of English gives us a much better
ability both to hear and to correct mistakes that we make. We are also able to
teach the correct pronunciation of English.
EFL teachers to be might be familiar with the term ‘interference’. First
language takes an important role in producing the target language sounds (in this
case English). Alabi (2007:85) says, interference implies a re-arrangement of
patterns that result from the introduction of foreign elements into more highly
structured syntax, as well as some areas of vocabulary culture and discourse. In
the view of Osisanwo (2009:139) cited Egbokhare (2007:4) interference ‘has to
do with the carryover of the linguistic habits of an individual’s first language to
the second language’.
In this paper, the writer provides the result of her own analysis on
phonological aspects (focusing on segmental aspects of pronunciation) of an EFL
learner’s utterances. The writer analyzed what mispronounced words appear and
how powerful the interference of the first language to English pronunciation as
the target language is. The subject of the writer’s analysis is utterances of a 25
years old Indonesian lady in reading a short paragraph.
B. ANALYSIS

The respondent of this analysis is a young lady, Miss Ririn. She turns
into 25 years old on June 13th 2016. She works as an administrator in a hospital in
Jember. She got her bachelor of economics in Universitas Jember in 2014. She
has learned English for about 15 years. Unfortunately, she is a passive English
learner. She hardly ever speaks English outside the English classroom. Thus, she
never practices her English. Besides, she has no partner to speak English. Her
mother tongue is Madurese although she is not good anymore in speaking
Madurese since she moved to the uptown part of Jember in 1995. Bahasa
Indonesia has become her first language.
The writer recorded Miss Ririn’s voice in reading a short paragraph
taken from a book by William J. Gibson and Andrew Brown, “Working with
Qualitative Data”, page 11 on point “The relationship between theory and
analysis” paragraph 3.
Just like the terms ‘analysis’, ‘theory’ is so varied in the manner in
which it is understood and realized in practice that it is extremely hard to discuss
in any generalized sense. We might describe the role of theory as involving.

The IPA phonetic transcription of the paragraph above is:

/ʤʌst laɪk ðə tɜrmz əˈnælɪsɪs, ˈθiəri ɪz soʊ ˈvɛrid ɪn ðə ˈmænər ɪn wɪ
ʧ ɪt ɪz ˌʌndərˈstʊd ænd ˈriəˌlaɪzd ɪn ˈpræktɪs ðæt ɪt ɪzɛkˈstrimli hɑrd tu dɪˈskʌs
ɪn ˈɛni ˈʤɛnrəˌlaɪzd sɛns./ wi maɪt dɪˈskraɪb ðə roʊl ɑv ˈθiəri æz ɪnˈvɑlvɪŋ./

However, when the respondent read the paragraph and the writer
recorded it, the phonetic transcription of her utterances is as follows:
/ʤʌs laɪk də tɜrm əˈnalisis, 'təori is so fɛrd in də menər in wiʧ it iz
ʌndərˈstʊd en rilaiz in prektɪs det it is ɪk’stremli hard tu diskʌs in
ˈɛni ˈʤɛnrəˌlaɪzd sɛns./ wi maik di’skraɪb də rʊl ɑf təori əs in’ vɑlviŋ./

From those two transcriptions, it can be seen that there are some
differences. The respondent pronounced some English words in such a different
way and produced different sounds with the IPA version. The different
transcriptions are represented in a tabular form:
 Transcription of
Word Miss Ririn’s IPA transcription
utterances
Just /ʤʌst/ /ʤʌs/
Terms / tɜrmz/ / tɜrm/
The / ðə/ / də/
Analysis / əˈnælɪsɪs/ / əˈnalisis/
Theory /ˈθiəri/ /'təori/
Is / ɪz/ /is/
So / soʊ/ /so/
Varied /ˈvɛrid/ /fɛrd/
In / ɪn/ /in/
Manner /ˈmænər/ /ˈmenər/
Which / wɪʧ/ /wiʧ/
It / ɪt/ /it/
And / ænd/ /en/
Realized /ˈriəˌlaɪzd/ / rilaiz/
Practice /ˈpræktɪs/ / prektɪs/
That / ðæt/ /det/
Extremely / ɪzɛkˈstrimli/ / ɪk’stremli/
Might / maɪt/ /maik/
Describe / dɪˈskraɪb/ / di’skraɪb/
Rule / roʊl/ /rʊl/
Of / ɑv/ /ɑf/
As / æz/ /əs/
Involving / ɪnˈvɑlvɪŋ/ /inˈvɑlviŋ/

It was discovered that the respondent has problems with most of the
sounds which were not available in her first language (L1) and she replaced them
with the ones that were found. Also, her pronunciation is according to the way
how the words were written down. She also has problem in articulating the
consonant clusters encountered as she deleted some of the consonant sounds. As
explained in introduction, the writer focuses on segmental aspects of
pronunciation which are consonants and vowels.
1. CONSONANTS

Miss Ririn substituted these sounds: /ð, θ, z, v, t/ with these sounds: /d,
t, s, f, k/. Bahasa Indonesia has no sound /ð/. In connection with this, she used
sound /d/ to substitute the voiced dental fricative sound /ð/. It also happens in
the production of the voiceless dental fricative /θ/. No matter what word it is
in Bahasa Indonesia, it does not have the sound /θ/. Thus, she used sound /t/ as
the substitution, like in word /'təori/ for /ˈθiəri/. In Bahasa Indonesia, it is very
uncommon to have the voiced alveolar fricative /z/ and the voiced
labiodentals fricative /v/. Even if Indonesian people find those words, they
sometimes substitute them with voiceless alveolar fricative sound /s/ and
voiceless labiodentals fricative /v/. Moreover, Madurese always substitute /z/
sound with /ʤ/ sound.
In addition, Bahasa Indonesia sound system does not have consonant
cluster structure. She resolves the problem by simply deleting certain
consonants when there is consonant cluster, just like in these words: /ʤʌst/
for /ʤʌs/, /tɜrm/ for /tɜrmz/, /en/ for / ænd/, /rilaiz/ for /ˈriəˌlaɪzd/, and
/ɪk’stremli/ for /ɪzɛkˈstrimli/.

2. VOWELS

The negative interference of the first language is seen obviously in

vowel sounds. Some Bahasa Indonesia words are adapted from English, such
as ‘analysis’ becomes ‘analisis’, ‘theory’ becomes ‘teori’, ‘practice’ becomes
‘praktik’, ‘extreme’ becomes ‘ekstrim’, ‘description’ becomes ‘deskripsi’, etc.
This affects the Indonesian people read the origin words in English the way
they read them in Bahasa Indonesia. This also happens to Miss Ririn. She uses
to read the word ‘analisis’ in Bahasa Indonesia so when she found the word
‘analysis’, she read it /əˈnalisis/. It also happens in other words. She read
/'təori/ for /ˈθiəri/, /rilaiz/ for /ˈriəˌlaɪzd/, /prektɪs/ for /ˈpræktɪs/, and /ɪk’stremli/
for /ɪzɛkˈstrimli/. She uses to read those words in Bahasa Indonesia so she just
read them the way the words were written down. Other vowels that she
pronounced in different way are: /is/ for / ɪz/, /in/ for /ɪn/, /wiʧ/ for /wɪʧ/, /it/
for /ɪt/,/diˈskraɪb/ for /dɪˈskraɪb/, and /ɪnˈvɑlvɪŋ/ for / inˈvɑlviŋ/.It is
discovered that letter ‘i’ is pronounced /i/. This is because in Bahasa
 Indonesia, every vowel has one sound (except ‘e’ and ‘o’). That is different
with English vowels.
Bahasa Indonesia has no diphthong sound as observed, most time its
substituted with a monophthong closest, as in stage /so/ for /soʊ/, /ˈmenər/
for /ˈmænər/, /en/ for /ænd/, /rilaiz/ for /ˈriəˌlaɪzd/, /ˈprektɪs/ for /ˈpræktɪs/,
/det/ for /ðæt/, /rʊl/ for /roʊl/, and /əs/ for /æz/.

C. CONCLUSION

It has been observed that EFL speakers or learners may encounter

difficulties in learning the target language which is English due to the first
language already acquired. This situation is known as interference and it can
occur at different levels i.e. morphological, phonological and syntactic. Although
the learners have learned English at school for a long time, the less amount of
English exposure also takes important in successful English pronunciation
learning. However, we cannot claim that someone’s pronunciation is bad, (s)he
cannot improve it since his/her first language is very strong. Everything can be
improved, including English pronunciation. The more we practice, the better
result we will get. Thus, it is crucial for EFL teachers to be to learn English
Phonology and Phonetics in order to hear, correct, and teach EFL learners about
the correct pronunciation.
D. REFERENCES

Eghokhare, F.O. (2007). Fundamentals of Oral English for Schools and Colleges;
Lagos Stirling Horden Publishers.

Gibson, William J. and Andrew Brown. (2009). Working with Qualitative Data.
London: SAGE Publications Ltd.

Ofuya, A. (2007). English Phonetics and Phonology’ O. Obafemi, G.A Ajadi,

and V.A Alabi.(Eds) Critical Perspective on English Language and
Literature, Ilorin: Department of English, University of Ilorin.

Osisanwo, A. (2009). Fundamentals of English Phonetics and Phonology.

Nigeria: Femulous Fetops.

Vikner, S. (1986). “Phonetics and Phonology”. Geneva: University of Geneva,

dept. of English.