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Prosodic marking of information status in L1 and L2

Prosodic marking of information status in L1 and L2. dr.Laurent Rasier Université catholique de Louvain laurent.rasier@uclouvain.be. Introduction. Little attention paid to prosody in L2 Important role in « foreign accent » Social & communicative consequences Research program:

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Prosodic marking of information status in L1 and L2

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  1. Prosodic marking of information status in L1 and L2 dr.Laurent Rasier Université catholique de Louvain laurent.rasier@uclouvain.be

  2. Introduction • Little attention paid to prosody in L2 • Important role in « foreign accent » • Social & communicative consequences • Research program: • Learning process of prosody? • Difficulties? • Factors influencing L2 prosody? • Use of (de)accentuation to signal information status in L2 Dutch & L2 French

  3. Accent in L2 • Distributional studies of accent in L2: • Overproduction in L2 • Overgeneralization of rules, transfer • Markedness • Accent in L2 Dutch and L2 French: • Poorly studied • Difficult to acquire

  4. Research questions • Germanic vs. Romance languages: • Germ. lgues: accent // news value • Rom. lgues: accent ≠ news value • Possible impact on L2 acquisition of accent • Research questions: • Accentuation in L1 Dutch ≠ accentuation in L1 French? • Impact on acquisition of L2 Dutch and L2 French? • What about prosodic transfer?

  5. Experimental accent placement test in L1 & L2 Description of geometrical figures Variation of name and/of colour 40 informants, advanced level 20 French-speaking learners of Dutch 20 Dutch-speaking learners of French Non-specialists (BAC2 students of economics) Methodology

  6. Methodology (2) New + New • Situational contrasts • Control news value: • New: contextually unknwon • Given: contextually known • Contrastive: con-trast with preceding Contrastive + Given (N) Given + Contrastive (F) Given + Contrastive (N) Contrastive + Given (F) Contrastive + Contrastive

  7. Methodological framework 1a L1 French L1 Dutch 1b 1c 1c Contrastive prosodic grammar – L1 2 2 5 PROSODIC TRANSFER 4 Contrastive prosodic grammar – L2 3b L2 French L2 Dutch 3a

  8. Accent patterns in L1 Dutch

  9. Accent patterns in L1 French

  10. Typology of accent systems Contrast Dutch – French: French: structural > pragmatic factors Dutch: pragmatic > structural factors Eckmanns Markedness Differential Hypothesis A more marked than B if A  B but B  ? Pragmatic rules more marked than structural ones + marked rules more difficult than unmarked ones Accentuation in Dutch more marked than in French, so more difficult Unmarked Marked Pragmatic & structural rules Structural rules only Structural & pragmatic rules Pragmatic rules only e.g. Portuguese, Spanish, Italian e.g. French, Romanian e.g. Dutch, German, English ?

  11. Typology of accentuation rules Unmarked Marked Structural Structural / pragmatic Pragmatic / structural Pragmatic FR: - final accent NL: - rhythmic accent FR: - bridge accent NL: - / NL: - integra- tive accent (d.i. broad focus) FR: - extended bridge ac-cent NL: - narrow fo-cus - deaccen- tuation FR: - narrow focus - deaccen- tuation • Predictions (based on Eckmann 1987): • Marked patterns more difficult than unmarked ones • If marked in L2 but less marked than in L1, then not difficult • The more marked in L1, the less likely to be transferred to L2

  12. Accentuation in L2 Dutch/L2 French • L2 Dutch: • 48% correct • L2 French: • 75% correct • Easier D  F than F  D

  13. Accent patterns in L1/L2 Dutch

  14. Deaccentuation in L1/L2 Dutch

  15. Accent patterns L1/L2 French

  16. Over-/Underuse in L2 French • Overuse: • Narrow focus • Accent on each word • Underuse: • Bridge accent • Extended bridge accent • Not produced: • Final accent

  17. Accentuation*pausing problem • Accent on each word  contextually inadequate: • [een gele driehoek] *EEN euh GEEL // VIERkant • [un cercle bleu] *UN // TRIanGLE // euh: BLEU • Accent on both lexical items in the phrase  not always contextually inadequate: • [start of the game] een ROde ehm // DRIEhoek • [een rode driehoek] *een GEle: // DRIEhoek • [un cercle rouge] un CERcle // BLEU

  18. Pausing*accentuation

  19. Conclusion • Accentuation Dutch ≠ accentuation French • Impact on accentuation in L2: • Transfer • Link with markedness • Pausing • Future work: • Phonetics & phonology of accent in L2 • Use of prosody & syntax in the linguistic marking of information status in L2

  20. Thank you for your attention!Bedankt voor uw aandacht!

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