Role of developing language attitudes in a study abroad context on adoption of dialectal pronunciations

Abstract

This study examines how language attitudes play a role in the adoption of dialectal variants in second language (L2) pronunciation in a study abroad context. Twenty‐four North American university students participating in a 6‐week program in Buenos Aires, Argentina, were administered pre and posttest questionnaires and a posttest oral production task to determine how different background and attitudinal variables relate to production of two Argentine dialectal sounds, lenited‐/s/ and assibilated pre‐palatal /ʃ ʒ/. Results show that though students did not produce lenited‐/s/ forms, use of dialectal /ʃ ʒ/ phones by the end of the program was high—but variable—across individuals. Dialect preference, feelings toward Spanish, and desire to sound native‐like were identified as predictors of use of dialectal /ʃ ʒ/. These findings illustrate how social variables play a role in target model accent preferences and adoption of dialectal sounds in L2 pronunciation in a study abroad context.

Individual differences in the acquisition of language-specific and dialect-specific allophones of intervocalic /d/ by L2 and heritage Spanish speakers studying abroad in Sevilla

“…For proficiency level (Table 1), students were grouped according to their course level (intermediate, advanced), with a distinction made among the advanced level 8 between L2-advanced and Heritage-advanced as previous studies found differences between advanced L2 and heritage speakers for /d/ (Amengual, 2019). Students were asked to self-rate 9 their Spanish level in a preprogram questionnaire (Schmidt, 2020): beginner (1), lower-intermediate (2), intermediate (3), high-intermediate (4), advanced (5), high-advanced (6), near-native (7), and native (8). The one heritage speaker in the intermediate course self-rated her Spanish in line with the other heritage speakers and was therefore placed into the Heritage-advanced group.…”

“…The low production of intervocalic /d/ elision furthers the notion that certain dialectspecific phones are more acquirable than others. Intervocalic /d/ elision is similar to French /l/ elision in third person singular pronouns (Howard et al, 2006;Kennedy Terry, 2017) and Spanish coda /s/ aspiration/elision (Linford et al, 2021;Schmidt, 2020) in which there is a grapheme-to-phone mismatch, thus less acquirable than a one-to-one grapheme-to-phone correspondence such as [ʒ]/[ʃ] for <y> and <ll> in Argentine Spanish (Hoffman-González, 2015;Pozzi & Bayley, 2020;Schmidt, 2020) or Cairene Arabic [g] for the Arabic character < ‫>ﺝ‬ (Raish, 2015). Moreover, the elision of intervocalic /d/ may be less salient than other dialectal features.…”

“…Another variable that demonstrates relatively low rates of acquisition is French /l/ deletion in third-person subject clitic pronouns, specifically “ il ” (i.e., il fait beau ‘it’s beautiful outside’ [il.fɛ.bo] vs. [i.fɛ.bo]), produced by L2 French (L1 English) speakers in France (Howard et al, 2006; Kennedy Terry, 2017). However, studies reveal high production of the Argentine Spanish voiced and voiceless palatal fricatives [ʒ]/[ʃ] by L2 Spanish (L1 English) speakers in Buenos Aires (Hoffman-González, 2015; Pozzi & Bayley, 2020; Schmidt, 2020). Similarly, L2 Arabic (L1 English) speakers in Cairo produced high rates of the Cairene/Egyptian Arabic variant [g] for /j/, which is realized as [ʒ], [d͡ʒ], or [j] in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) (Raish, 2015).…”

“…Similarly, L2 Arabic (L1 English) speakers in Cairo produced high rates of the Cairene/Egyptian Arabic variant [g] for /j/, which is realized as [ʒ], [d͡ʒ], or [j] in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) (Raish, 2015). Regarding individual differences, studies have found that L2 speakers of higher proficiency 3 (Geeslin & Gudmestad, 2011; George, 2014), those with positive attitudes toward the local dialect (George, 2014; Schmidt, 2020), and those with stronger social networks with locals (Kennedy Terry, 2017) were more likely to acquire dialect-specific phones.…”

“…Based on Kennedy Terry’s (2017) social network finding, it was hypothesized that students who reported more hours speaking Spanish with sevillano/as outside of the classroom would demonstrate more approximant-like [ð] and/or elision over time. Based upon George (2014) and Schmidt (2020), it was hypothesized that those with positive attitudes toward Sevilla Spanish would produce more [∅].…”