Variation in stress in the Jamaican classroom

Abstract

This article investigates how Jamaican schoolchildren aged 7 respond to their teachers’ production of stress. Based on a larger sociolinguistic study (Lacoste 2012), the data concerns particularly the production of a Standard Jamaican English (SJE) speech pattern that was observed in the classroom setting, i.e. phonetic exaggeration of the three stress correlates: duration, pitch and loudness in word-final syllables. Statistical results show a recurrent use of high levels of the stress correlates including lengthening of vowels in word-final syllables in the children’s speech. The lengthening of vowels in word-final position may be aimed at facilitating the children’s learning of the standard English variety.