An OT Perspective on Second Language Phonology: Acquisition of English Word-final Consonants by Mandarin-Taiwanese Learners
This thesis attempts to demonstrate that constraint-based OT (prince and Smolensky, 1993) is well-suited to provide an adequate and explicit analysis of interlanguage data. . . An empirical study of the acquisition ofEnglish word-fmal consonants was conducted in a university in Taiwan. Both Mandarin and Taiwanese share a simple cve syllable, and therefore Mandarin-Taiwanese learners of English are expected to have a certain degree of difficulty in acquiring English word-final consonant clusters. The OT framework is adopted to account for a variety of error patterns observed throughout interlanguage development, particularly in L2 word-final consonant production. The main focuses are that certain constraints are found to be dominant in determining which 'excess' consonant is deleted in a complex cluster, and the issue of how an L2 _. input is formed during L2 acquisition. This thesis also explores what effect linguistic environment has on L2 production: for instance, theĂâĂÂ· activation of ONSET is regarded as a case of spell out TETU effect under a given environment with a following vowel. The goal of this thesis is to adopt OT as a theoretical framework to examine how error patterns are manifested during
Wei-Chen, Hsu
An OT Perspective on Second Language Phonology: Acquisition of English Word-final Consonants by Mandarin-Taiwanese Learners. This thesis attempts to demonstrate that constraint-based OT (prince and Smolensky, 1993) is well-suited to provide an adequate and explicit analysis of interlanguage data. . . An empirical study of the acquisition ofEnglish word-fmal consonants was conducted in a university in Taiwan. Both Mandarin and Taiwanese share a simple cve syllable, and therefore Mandarin-Taiwanese learners of English are expected to have a certain degree of difficulty in acquiring English word-final consonant clusters. The OT framework is adopted to account for a variety of error patterns observed throughout interlanguage development, particularly in L2 word-final consonant production. The main focuses are that certain constraints are found to be dominant in determining which 'excess' consonant is deleted in a complex cluster, and the issue of how an L2 _. input is formed during L2 acquisition. This thesis also explores what effect linguistic environment has on L2 production: for instance, theĂâĂÂ· activation of ONSET is regarded as a case of spell out TETU effect under a given environment with a following vowel. The goal of this thesis is to adopt OT as a theoretical framework to examine how error patterns are manifested during
perspective second_language phonology acquisition_english word_final mandarin taiwanese learners attempt constraint_based prince_smolensky well provide_adequate explicit analysis interlanguage data empirical_study acquisition word consonant conduct university taiwan mandarin taiwanese share simple syllable therefore mandarin taiwanese learner english expect certain_degree difficulty acquire english word_final consonant_cluster framework_adopt account variety error_pattern observe throughout interlanguage_development particularly word_final consonant production main_focus certain constraint find dominant determine excess consonant delete complex cluster issue input form acquisition also_explore effect linguistic_environment production instance thea activation onset regard case spell effect give environment follow vowel goal adopt theoretical_framework examine error_pattern manifest