Public Lecture Series 2014

1. The Hong Kong Institute of EducationFaculty of HumanitiesPublic Lecture Series 2014Accents in EnglishSaturday March 8

2. Public Lecture Series 2014 Spelling: March 1 Accents: March 8 Pronunciation: March 15 Vocabulary: March 22 Literature: March 29 Language learning and technology: April 12

3. Accents Dr. John Trent Associate Professor Department of English Language Education The Hong Kong Institute of Education jtrent@ied.edu.hk Office: B4-2/F-04 Telephone: 2948 7375

4. Accents How good are you are “picking” accents??? http://accent.gmu.edu/searchsaa.php?function=detail&speakerid=921 http://accent.gmu.edu/searchsaa.php?function=detail&speakerid=130 http://accent.gmu.edu/searchsaa.php?function=detail&speakerid=533

5. Accents How good are you are “picking” accents??? http://accent.gmu.edu/searchsaa.php?function=detail&speakerid=1387 http://accent.gmu.edu/searchsaa.php?function=detail&speakerid=981

6. Accents How good are you are “picking” accents??? http://accent.gmu.edu/searchsaa.php?function=detail&speakerid=754 http://accent.gmu.edu/searchsaa.php?function=detail&speakerid=1373 http://accent.gmu.edu/searchsaa.php?function=detail&speakerid=611

7. Accents How good are you are “picking” accents??? Georgia (USA) New York Australia New Zealand London Manchester Edinburgh

8. Accents Do accents matter? Apparently, they do…. You can “master” accents https://library.ied.edu.hk/search~S5?/cPE2815+.M58+2009/cpe+2815+m58+2009/-3%2C-1%2C0%2CE/frameset&FF=cpe+2815+m58+2009&1%2C1%2C “Provides tools to change your accent quickly…”

9. Accents You can undergo “accent training”: https://library.ied.edu.hk/search~S5?/cPE2811+.C66+2009/cpe+2811+c66+2009/-3%2C-1%2C0%2CE/frameset&FF=cpe+2811+c66+2009&1%2C1%2C

10. Accents You can “lose your accent”: https://library.ied.edu.hk/search~S5?/cPE1139+.L67+2002/cpe+1139+l67+2002/-3%2C-1%2C0%2CE/frameset&FF=cpe+1139+l67+2002&1%2C1%2C

11. Accents …or at least reduce your accent: https://library.ied.edu.hk/search~S5?/cPE1137+.A23+2001/cpe+1137+a23+2001/-3%2C-1%2C0%2CE/frameset&FF=cpe+1137+a23+2001&1%2C1%2C

12. Accents Some terminology Accents…standard English… varieties of English… What is an accent???? A dictionary definition: “A distinctive manner of expression…a way of speaking typical of a particular group of people and especially of the natives or residents of a region”.

13. Accents A simpler definition… “the way in which people in a particular area or country pronounce words”. Or… “the pronunciation features of any spoken variety, including pitch, duration and loudness”.

14. Accents Studies often distinguish between “standard” and “non-Standard” speakers of English. These terms are: • NOT unproblematic • Can be confusing • Are ever evolving…..

15. Accents Nevertheless, a standard variety might be thought of as… “the one that is most often associated with high socioeconomic status, power, and media usage in a particular community” (Giles & Billings, 2004). Received Pronunciation (RP) [think Queen Elizabeth] might be taken to identity standard British English.

16. Accents What is a variety? Different types of English that have their own internally consistent grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation. So if someone speaks “Hong Kong English”, there may be aspects of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation that reflect features of Cantonese. In sum, the idea that there is one ‘universal’ English is difficult to sustain. There are Englishes….(plural)

17. Accents What is a variety? Varieties could represent subtypes of a language. We might conclude that American, British, Australian, New Zealand English are varieties of English. Implications: What might be seen as “deficient” forms of English might in fact reflect the way English is developing in different ways across different regions as it comes into contact with unique social environments and particular languages in different locations across the world.

18. Accents What is a variety? Singlish…. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjoAiAV50ds Some definitions to help: http://www.aussiepete.com/2008/05/singlish-language-guide-for-foreigners.html

19. Accents Why might accents matter? Accents do influence listeners’ perceptions about the speaker: • Fishman (1977) • Giles & Sassoon (1983) • Giles, Williams, Mackie, & Rosselli (1995) • McKirnan & Hamayan (1984) • Oller, Baca, & vigil (1978).

20. Accents • It appears that listeners construct speakers social and psychological traits… • based on linguistic features of speech such as accents and the rate of speech delivery.

21. Accents Such traits include… social status: intelligent and wealthy and social attractiveness: pleasant, confident, modest, gentle, reliable, and sociable…. Could be based on listeners’ dispositions towards certain groups of people… …their attitudes to different accents.

22. Accents Studies have examined students’ attitudes towards nonnative accents of foreign born teachers, especially in the US….

23. Accents Teachers with foreign accents are perceived by parents and students to be…. Less intelligent compared with teachers without foreign accents…. • Nelson (1991) • Solomon (1991).

24. Accents Rubin (1992): • Videotaped two sets of lectures. • One was delivered by an Asian lecturer. • The other by a Caucasian lecturer. • Using voiceover, the lectures were in fact delivered by a native English speaker. • So, participants had two different visual stimuli (two instructors from different racial backgrounds) • And one audio stimulus (recorded by the same person). Any predictions on what Rubin found about attitudes to the two lecturers????

25. Accents Rubin found that: • Although the instructors spoke the same English, undergraduates perceived the lecturers’ accents differently. • This perception influenced their perceptions about the extent to which they understood the lectures.

26. Accents Edwards (1982): • Students evaluations of teachers’ teaching performance are influenced by their accents. • Ss displayed a preference for “standard” varieties.

27. Accents Researchers have also investigated the relationship between teachers’ accents and NNES students’ evaluation of such accents.

28. Accents Chiba, Matsuura, & Yamamoto (1995): • Japanese university students were asked to listen to six speech samples. • The samples were produced by speakers with a variety of accents.. • Japanese, HK, Sri Lankan, Malaysian, British, American English accents…. • Students showed a more positive attitude towards….

29. Accents • American and British-accented English. • Followed by Japanese-accented English. Dalton-Puffer, Kaltenboeck, and Smit (1997): • Austrian college students were found to have negative attitudes toward Austrian-accented English. • They perceived it to be a foreign accent. • They showed a preference for so-called native accents, especially British English, which they were most familiar with…

30. Accents Forde (1995): HK students’ attitudes towards variations of English. British and American English were evaluated favorably compared with HK English.

31. Accents Attitudes of Chinese Students Zhang and Hu (2008): Studied the attitudes of advanced Chinese English language learners towards three varieties of native English in the US. American, British and Australian speakers. What do you think the results might have been?

32. Accents • More positive attitudes were recorded towards American and British English than Australian. • American and British English were considered suitable models for instruction. • No significant difference was found between American and British English.

33. Accents The Power of Standard Accents Until recently, RP-like varieties have attracted the most favourable evaluations in the English speaking world, not only in the Britain but also in Australia, NZ and the US.

34. Accents The Power of Standard Accents Bayard (2001): • Research into attitudes towards Australia, NZ and US varieties in each of the three countries. • The most highly regarded voice was an American female, followed by an American male. • Even Australian students ranked Australian-English below American-English. • All groups disliked the NZ male!!

35. Accents The Power of Standard Accents Recall: In Northern Ireland, students recalled more when it was presented in RP (Cairns & Duiez, 1976). Cooperation: In the UK, housewives wrote and provided more information on a three-item, open-ended questionnaire when it was delivered by an RP speaker.

36. Accents What are your attitudes to accents? An informal survey of us… Sewell, H. (2005) Teaching Implications of Students’ Attitudes to Differing English Accents

37. Accents Sewell (2005) • A questionnaire was given to 62 Korean first year college students • Majoring in tourism • Most participants could be categorized as low to mid beginning level English language learners.

38. Accents First question to consider in groups… Are there any common patterns in terms of the countries or the regions that people in your group show a strong desire to understand? That is, are one or two countries / regions more “popular” than others?

39. Accents Second question: Are there any common reasons why people in your group think it is important to understand English spoken with those accents? What are they? If there are no common reasons, just highlight 2-3 different reasons.

40. Accents Question 3: Are there any common patterns in your group explaining why people think it is not important to understand English spoken with certain accents? What are they? If there are no common reasons, just highlight 2-3 different reasons.

41. Accents Some results from the Korean study

42. Accents

43. Accents

44. Accents

45. Accents

46. Accents

47. Accents

48. Accents

49. Accents

50. Accents Teaching implications from the Korean study Is the situation different in HK? Strong preference for North American accent. Resistance to teachers with accents from other regions. This was thought to reflect familiarity with the North American accent. Ss are already struggling with English and want to avoid the problem of dealing with different accents.