写作_安康方言对英语语音学习的负迁移研究.doc

学 号 分类号H07 年 月 日 A study on Negative Transfer of Ankang Dialectin English Phonetic LearningAbstract: Comparing with the standard Chinese, Ankang dialect has its own characteristics in phonetics, so confusion between Standard English pronunciation and Ankang accent, especially obvious in Ankang area. So it is necessary for English teachers in Ankang to study on the negative transfer of Ankang dialect and find out effective ways to teach English phonetics. This paper based on phonetics and the negative transfer theory. The author made an investigation of students English pronunciation problems and an analysis of factors influencing English pronunciation learning by questionnaires and pronunciation tests, and proposes the effective teaching methods to solve the problems.Key words: Ankang dialect; English pronunciation; Negative transfer;安康方言对英语语音学习的负迁移研究摘 要: 由于安康地区方言的语音有自己独特的音系特征，在安康地区这种母语对英语语音学习的负面影响尤其明显。为了提高安康学生的英语口语水平,有必要研究安康方言对英语语音的负迁移的影响,提出行之有效的解决方法。本文从语音学和负迁移理论,以调查问卷和语音测试的方式，来分析安康方言对英语语音的负迁移作用的方面, 并提出了克服安康方言负迁移的有效教学方法.关键词: 安康方言;英语语音;负迁移ContentsAbstract in EnglishiAbstract in ChineseiiContentsiii1. Introduction12. Literature Review12.1 Study abroad22.2 Study at home33. Sound systems of English and Ankang dialect33.1 Phonetic System of English33.1.1 The Consonants of English33.1.2 The Vowels of English43.2 The phonetics system between Mandarin and Ankang dialect54. Research design54.1 Testing materials64.1.1 Test materials of English Consonants64.1.2 Test Materials of English Vowels64.2 Participants74.3 Instruments74.3.1 Questionnaire74.3.2 The Audio Tape Recording74.4 Procedure of Experiment85. Data Analysis and Discussion85.1 The results of questionnaire85.2 Problems Found through the Test Materials95. 2. 1 Negative transfer on the consonants95.2.2 Negative transfer in vowel sounds106. The strategy of overcoming the negative transfer116.1 Solutions for vowels126.2 Solutions for consonants137. Conclusion14References15Acknowledgements16Appendix17iii1. IntroductionChinese students learning English phonetics is generally influenced by mother tongue speech, especially the negative transfer of native dialect speech. And this problem has always been the weak points of English teaching, especially in the poor rural areas. Students live in rural areas, and lacking of learning English phonetics knowledge and scientific speech training, so there are a great number of problems in English pronunciation: their English spoken are influenced by their dialect with strong characteristics of dialects, This phenomenon is very common in Ankang English phonetics teaching, Embodied in the sound level, they often use Ankang dialect to replace some of English vowels and consonants, or cannot pronounce the sound which without the phonemes in Ankang dialect; This issue is more and more serious, but few people put forward the solutions, which makes the Ankang dialect area students oral English and listening level generally in low level. This paper based on the theory of phonetics and the negative transfer theory, by comparing Ankang dialect and English pronunciation, analyzing the difficulties in learning English pronunciation, find feasible effective teaching methods to overcome negative transfer of Ankang dialect on English pronunciation.The significance of this study lies in: (1) This research focus on the negative transfer of Ankang dialect over the acquisition of English sounds, it will show English pronunciation mistakes of the local students. The research is trying to makes some contributions for this blankness; (2) Ankang students will know their problems in the acquisition of English sounds from the result of the research, it is useful to avoid the negative transfer of their dialect; (3) The significances and necessity of this paper is to make a quite clear analysis about Ankang dialect and English speech sounds, which will help English teachers in this area to promote teaching and learning methods.2. Literature ReviewThe thesis is mainly based on the theory of language transfer, which will be introduced briefly in this chapter, followed by a review of the relevant researches by international and domestic scholars on language transfer in learning.2.1 Study abroadOdlin says in Language transfer that, language transfer has been a key issue of applied linguistics, second language acquisition and language studies for at least a century (Odlin, 2001). There are different definitions of transfer. Ellis defines “transfer” as a hypothesis about the learning of assignment A will influence the learning of assignment B. James defines “transfer” as a theory of learning native language and second language. The most concise and exact definition of transfer as the effect caused by similarities and differences between the target language and any other languages that has been learned (Odlin, 1989). Mother tongue transfer refers to the influence caused by similarities and differences between mother tongue and second language. It is generally acknowledged that the positive influence is called positive transfer, negative influence called negative transfer. Positive transfer of mother tongue helps students to learn second language. On the country, negative transfer of mother tongue will influence students second language learning, and it can bring errors for students. As Ellis pointed out, one thing responsible for making errors in learning a new language is the influence of the mother tongue, and this is what we call negative transfer (Ellis, 2000). According to Carruthers (Carruthers, 2006), all languages use component sounds to express meaning and each language has its own set of distinctive sounds or phonemes. So when we learn a new language, we pay more attention to its sounds than other forms of a language, especially the parts which sound differently from ones native language, which also may be the difficulties when learning the new language. The American linguist Lado put forward in his book Linguistics Across Cultures that in the context of foreign language learning, learners rely extensively on ones native language and tend to transfer the language form, meaning and culture of mother tongue to foreign language learning. (Lado, 1957) Marx and Mehlhom (Marx and Mehlhom, 2010) explore phonetic similarities between English and German which can be used to promote positive transfer by learners of the target language German and put forward pedagogical implications for making full use of these similarities in language teaching. 2.2 Study at homeChinese scholars have made attempts to study the influence of Chinese on the acquisition of second language phonetics. Studies about phonetic transfer of mandarin on English will be presented as follows, More theoretical support was required for the phonetic teaching, and more scholars work on the study of English phonetics, lots of researches and some discoveries have been made in this area. For example, He Shanfen (何善芬，1988) published a book named Practical English Phonetics, Zhao Demei (赵德梅, 1995) introduced and compared the English and Chinese mandarin phonological system systematically, which helps learners to know well the phonetic characteristic of English and Chinese. Yu Limings Language transfer and second language acquisition review, reflection and research. In this book, he put forward that students who have a correct understanding of mother tongue transfer will promote their foreign language learning (俞理明, 2004: 198). It is generally found the transfer at the level of sound system, probably because pronunciation is not only the most basic component of language, but also the most basic form of communication (戴讳栋, 何兆熊, 2002). The language learners mispronounce would influence the common understanding and fluency of communication with native speakers. In the article of The lexical level of negative transfer of mother tongue, Wu Mingjun pointed out that under the guidance of the language transfer theory, English teachers can contrast and analysis the differences and similarities between mother tongue and English to make students have a better understanding of English. By doing so, students can reduce the effect of mother tongue negative transfer, improve language acquisition, and promote the quality of learning (吴明军, 2004). In CNKI, retrieval the studies from 1994 to2015, the quantity of studies entitled language transfer is 550. From the results, conclusion can be drawn that studies on the effect of mother tongue transfer are increasing year by year. 3. Sound systems of English and Ankang dialect3.1 Phonetic System of English3.1.1 The Consonants of EnglishThere are 28 consonants phonemes p, b, t, d, k, g, h, f, v, , , s, z, r, , d, t, tr, dr, n, m, r, l, , ts, dz, j and w. When pronouncing it the air will meet an obstruction in the process of pronunciation. English consonants can be classified in two ways: one is in terms of to the manner of articulation and the other is in terms of place of articulation. The two classifications are combined in the table below, which could help us adequately describe exact way of the pronunciation of each consonants.Table 1 Manners of English consonants (何善芬, 2002:12)Manner of ArticulationPlosiveAffricativeFricativeNasalLateralApproximant-vv-vv-vvvvvAsp-AspAspAspBilabialpbmwLabiodentalfvDentalAlveolartdsznlPost-alveolarrPalatal-alveolartdPalataljVelarkgGlottalh(Notes: v represents voiced; -v represents voiceless; -asp represents unaspiration; asp: aspiration)3.1.2 The Vowels of EnglishVowels can be divided into twelve monophthongs i, i:, e, , , :, , :, , u:, and : and eight dipthongs ai, ei, i, e, , i, a and . When pronounce the vowels there is no obstruction of air. It can be differentiated by a number of factors: the position of the tongue in the mouth, the openness of the mouth, the shape of the mouth, and the length of the vowels. The following table is the descriptions of English monophthongs.Table2 Classification of English monophthongsHeight of tongueBlade of tongbackcentralfrontroundspreadspreadroundroundspreadhigh(close)u:i:mid-high(close-mid)ui:central:emid-low(open-mid):low(open):3.2 The phonetics system between Mandarin and Ankang dialectDue to the unique immigrant background and distinctive geographical environment, Ankang dialect has formed its own characteristics. Generally speaking, Ankang dialect has the same characteristics with Mandarin, and also there are 39 finals, as much as Mandarin, there are two phonemes i in Mandarin but not in Ankang dialect, however added another two phoneme y u in it. and 26 initials, 4 initials more than Mandarin. Table3 The initials in speech systems（赵桃，2000）InitialppmfttnExample白，拜排，坡木，美风，发堆，搭同，他泪，劳InitiallkkxtstssExample嫩，拿给，干街，沟化，胡早，总层，仓苏，松InitialttttExample张，正车，昌神，省见，纪气，欠修，休让，人initialspfpfvExample追，抓出，吹文，锐安，鹅牙,叶Table4 The finals in speech systemsInitialExampleInitialExampleInitialExamplea他，茶房，厂uo昨，货o波，哥i衣，及uei亏，灰资，次ia夏，牙uan宽，管施，尺iau小，表u冬，总r儿，耳iou丢，秋un坤，问ai台，败ia边，千ua光，慌ei飞，每in斤，宾uai快，外u高，早i量，香i英，星ou沟，叔y荣，穷u花，瓦an陕，男u吴，古n奔，正4. Research designThis chapter will introduce how the author design the experiment, which including the testing materials, the participants and the instruments (questionnaire, the audio tape recording).4.1 Testing materialsThere is a reading test for participants. The aim of the designed questionnaire is mainly to check if subjects have enough Standard English pronunciation.4.1.1 Test materials of English ConsonantsThere are 28 consonants in English, and the author chooses 56 words which are familiar to those participants and they can pronounce them without any difficulties. The following table is the reading materials.Table5 Consonants of EnglishconsonantsWordsconsonantsWordsppencil, tapetchair, watchbbook, labtrtree, trainttidy, lastdrdress, drawddog, bednnine, knowkkey, askmmine, roomggirl, bagring, morningffind, afterllet, planvvery, lovetscats, sportsthing, threedzwords, cardsthis, motherjyes, yellowsspell, lesswwatch, whitezzero, pleasehhello, highpleasure, measurerrose, reddJane, orangeshe, English4.1.2 Test Materials of English VowelsThere are 20 vowels in English, and 40 words are chosen as the reading materials. Those words are easy for the participants to read. The following table is the reading materials.Table6 Vowels of Englishvowel patternvowelsWordsmonophthongsi:sheep, eveningiship, middleeegg, sevenblack, bad:art, barnot, clock:short, sportu:fool, schoolbut, askfull, look:her, firstruler, colordipthongsaiwhite, timeeisame, lazyiboy, oilebear, airtour, poorsofa, photoahow, houseihear, beer4.2 ParticipantsIn order to keep the reliability of the study findings, the objects of this investigation are related to the rural middle schools students in Henan middle school. The survey selects thirty students from grade 9 were born in rural families speak Ankang dialect as their first and daily language, whose family members have lived in Ankang for several generation. Therefore, these students are most representative of this survey.4.3 InstrumentsIn order to make the research more reliability, the author use several methods to do the research, which including questionnaire, texts.4.3.1 QuestionnaireThere are 20 items for basic information in Chinese and participants need to complete them. The purpose of the questionnaire (See Appendix I) is mainly to find out students current learning situation of English phonetics and their awareness of the negative transfer from Ankang dialect towards the learning of English phonetics4.3.2 The Audio Tape RecordingThe participants are asked to read the testing materials aloud, what the subjects read would be recorded and would be checked in order to know the pronunciation errors. The participants are asked to be familiar with the material in three minute before recording. Then they will be required to read the material in turn. 4.4 Procedure of ExperimentThe first step is to ask thirty subjects to complete the questionnaire seriously. After finishing the questionnaire they will be told the method to read the prepared reading material. Subjects will read the texting material presented by the author separately in a quiet classroom and at the same time their sounds will be recorded by voice recorder. The second step is data collection. The author will analyze the questionnaires and recording of the texting material to get related information about subjects pronunciation. After a deep analysis of those data and related information, a clear description will be made in the following chapter.5. Data Analysis and DiscussionThere are two parts in this chapter. In the first part, the author will analyze the data from questionnaire. In the second part the author will present the most frequent mispronounce speech sounds in table according to the information and data gotten from the testing materials5.1 The results of questionnaire The feedback showed all their parents are native people in Ankang. Analysis from the results of questionnaires shows that most children choose Ankang dialect as their language for communication even though they can speak mandarin. Though there may be some social problems, once they are in the context, the overpowering effect cannot be ignored. Also, in Ankang, Students now start learning English in primary school and they learn the phonetics by imitating teacher and audio tape, they said that they do not get enough training of phonetics and their oral English is poor. 5.2 Problems Found through the Test MaterialsAccording to the information gotten from questionnaire, the author will make a list of the mispronounce speech sound as follows.Table7 consonants which would be frequently mispronouncedconsonantsPercent (%)consonantsPercent (%)v60dr7770n73705330ts57r53dz53Table8 vowels which would be frequently mispronouncedconsonantsPercent (%)consonantsPercent (%)i:6330e665080ai66:43ei633666:60a70u:53i465. 2. 1 Negative transfer on the consonantsAccording to the research, the conclusion can be drawn that many pronunciations of the consonants in Ankang dialect have the similarity with English consonants, so most students can easy to pronounce these consonants corr