Phonology: the sound system

INTRODUCTION

Today, English Language is considered a crucial ability

in one’s life and it is pervasive in expectation to exist in

oneself in order to be labelled as educated individuals.

Fortunately, many people are well-acknowledged of its

importance and the exposition of English itself is huge too.

As people know, every language must come in writing- reading

abilities and hearing-speaking comprehension. In perceiving

English, phonological and phonetics aspects must not be taken

for granted.

Indeed, there are many studies have been conducted by

other authorities and linguists. Many have stated that English

words pronunciation by the second speaker like Malaysian can

be affected by different factors. The factors that related to

this matter are age, nurture environment, family background

and sex. Similarly, the background of the speaker such as the

dialect and the age of exposition to the English language will

be considered as affecting-factors of the pronouncing

patterns. However, how can one’s dialects can affect the

speaker pronunciations of English words? The answer is, when

sounds that exist in Malay words exist in English words as

well.

In this study, the focus will be on the phonological and

phonetics aspect of English by second language learners. Every

person must have his own dialect that may affect the phonology

aspect when uttering speech. In Malaysia, Terengganu people1 | p h o n e t i c s a n d p h o n o l o g y ( E N G L 2 0 4 0 S E C T I O N 1 ) G R O U P 5

can be distinguished by hearing their way of pronouncing

certain words that is quite different from the standard Malay

Language. The differences can be noted in terms of consonants

pronouncing, vowels pronouncing and stress placements. Thus,

this study will focused on the interviewee’s single word in

order to recognize the differences of phonological elements-

consonants, vowels pronouncing and stress placement.

LITERATURE REVIEW

In Malaysia, English language is perceived as the second

language and widely used especially people who are living in

urban areas. However, the people in the rural areas are not

left behind too in acquiring this language as it is taught in

school soon after the children enter elementary school.

Furthermore, variety of English is used in Malaysia according

to their background like dialect and region where they come

from. Their dialect did affect them in pronouncing certain

words as if they do not know how to distinguish certain sounds

like /l/ and /r/.

2 | p h o n e t i c s a n d p h o n o l o g y ( E N G L 2 0 4 0 S E C T I O N 1 ) G R O U P 5

Based on the study of An Acoustical Study of English

Plosives in Word Initial Position produced by Malays, there

are some similarities between Malay and English words. In

general, Malay language has 27 consonants as well as English.

There are 3 voiced plosives sound and 3 voiceless plosives

sound (Shahidi A.H and Rahim Aman, 2010). In Malay and

English, there is /b/ /d/ /g/ /p/ /t/ /k/ which carries

different place of articulation. It can happen in the initial

position of the word, middle and final position. However,

Malay voiceless plosives are always unaspirated like the word

‘tari’ and ‘tulis’. Compared to English, the word /pʰIn/ is

aspirated but utter as unaspirated by Malay. This shows that

English as spoken by Malay speaker is totally or partially

governed by the pattern in Malay language.

In addition, Malay tends to produce certain English word

differently from the actual Standard British English. For

example, father /'fɑ:ðə(r)/ and mother /'mɅðə(r)/, the Malays

will replace the /ð/ sound with /d/ sound. The voiced and

voiceless dental fricatives are pronounced the same for both.

This example can be supported by the study of Variability in

Interlanguage Phonology of Malaysian learners of English by

Alias Abd Ghani, he stated that the accuracy of speech sound

in Malay English with Standard English might be different due

to age, sex, and individual differences. However, the study

also shows that age and sex do not affect much on the speech

sound.


Malaysian Chinese English speaking children usually

acquire 3 languages in the same time which is Mandarin, Malay,

and English. Mandarin, Malay and English do share some

phonological features like final consonant deletion, final

consonant devoicing and syllable reduction (Phoon Hooi San,

2010). However, in term of word stress, the patterns for these

3 languages are very different. English has more complicated

stress compared to Malay and Mandarin as in English, the

stress shifting will occur when affixes is added to the stem.

In Mandarin, they do not have such thing like stress shifting,

so, it is a bit difficult for Chinese children to learn about

this.

According to Idris Aman and Rosiah Mustafa (2009), some

people in the society show their national identity and

integration through accents in speech. It is proven in their

research paper title Social Variation of Malay Language in

Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia: A Study On Accent, Identity And

Integration, there are differences in the Malay

national/standard accent compared to Kuching local accent. For

the open-ended syllable like saya or ‘I’ the standard

pronunciation would be [sayə] as compared to Kuching local

accent, they really pronounce the word [saya] according to

spelling form. Another example would be in the position of

initial (r). This situation is vice versa from the previous

example as the standard Malay people will pronounce it as


‘rumah’ or ‘home’ [rumah] while the Sarawakian will pronounce

it as [Ɣumah].

One of the researchers, Collins J.T. raised the issue on

why there are so many dialects spoken by Malaysian in

different region? It is because certain regions are influence

by the neighborhood country. Kedahan usually pronounce the

word ‘air’ as ‘ayaq’ because of the dialect whereas Terengganu

people tend to add ‘g’ when the word is ending with ‘n’. For

instance, they pronounce ‘ikang’ instead of ‘ikan’. In his

research paper title, Malay Dialects Research in Malaysia: The

Issue of Perspective, he mentioned that dialects are

distinctive from one another lexically, grammatically, and

phonologically. This speech is varies in different state

displayed its own and unique characteristics.

CONVERSATION5 | p h o n e t i c s a n d p h o n o l o g y ( E N G L 2 0 4 0 S E C T I O N 1 ) G R O U P 5

Hafizah: Assalamualaikum. I am Nor Hafizah bt Mohd Suaid.

Today, I am going to interview Mr. Muhammad Adib Hakim in

order to conduct our study on the differences of phonological

issues and pronunciations between native and non-native

speaker. So, could you please tell me about yourself briefly?

Adib: My name is Muhammad Adib Hakim bin Zulkifli and I’m from

Terengganu. Currently studying IIUM Gombak taking Bachelor of

English as major. And now, I’m in first year second sem.

Hafizah: Okay Adib. So, how does you found yourself interested

in English?

Adib: to be honest I found myself interested in English

especially when I was still a kid during the age of five or

six years old ahh... through TV shows and video games ,most of

it. TV shows like cartoons and ahh educational programs for

kids for instance ahh Sesame Street arr, Barney. And for video

games ahh I used to play games like Crony Conquer. And ahh,

apart from my parents, has one that.. the one that tell

me ...ahhh..

Hafizah: Do you love English and how often you are using

English when communicating with others?

Adib: Do I love English? Yes of course. How often do I use it

aa with my friends? aa There are friends I don’t really use

English as a medium of communication between them because and

there are friend like, like your best best friend so they

they love making fun of you especially when you did something6 | p h o n e t i c s a n d p h o n o l o g y ( E N G L 2 0 4 0 S E C T I O N 1 ) G R O U P 5

that you don’t really did, do but friends from English

classes, yes I do speak English with them because as student

of, as a student of aa bachelor of English you must practice

and train yourself using Englsih so that you can be more

fluent.

Hafizah: How about the encouragement and motivation? Does

your family members encourage English-speaking environment?

Adib: My family member is kind of encourage English speaking

environment at home especially my mother because she is very

concern about a.. English aa she... basically want she want

every single member of our family to be if not fluent, be very

aa.. understanding and at least know aa about English and aa

know how to communicate using English language because like i

said before, aa knowing English gives you some sort of bonus

for you if not now, maybe in the future.

Hafizah: What is your opinion in learning English? Does it

difficult to be acquired or not?

Adib: Based on my opinion, learn English is not that difficult

and it does not difficult and it does not difficult to be

acquired especially when you are still young but when you are

or master in English course of what you learn in Linguistics

about the critical period of age for language acquisition and

also aaa although we are not native speaker things can be

learn. They are many things of them and language is one of


them and if one of you feel learn English is difficult trust

me I don’t think it is.

Hafizah: As you said before, you are majoring in English, do

you have a reason for majoring in English?

Adib: Because never came cross my mind that I think that

majoring in English because during my high school , I took

engineering drawing and never interested in language and

literature, especially. But, that’s how it is, when I applied

for IIUM, I think that I was given this, Bachelor of English.

So, at first, I think can I be majoring English? Idon’t know.

But then, I realise that English does suit me and I decided to

cancel my Plan to major in Architecture and just go on and

carry on with Bachelor of English. And about be educator, I

think, after I graduate from IIUM, most probably, yeah, I be

translator or educator. Maybe, both of them. Ahhh, okay.

Hafizah: Do you think English will give you privilege in

seeking job?

Adib: English will give me a privilege in future aaa what I

think is statement is very true and

definetly true cause in Malaysia nowadays we just don’t use

Malay as medium of communication. English is very important

too especially if you seek job in private sector and private


industry although it does not mean that use English neglect

Bahasa Melayu is yours I mean my and your first language and

it is our mother tongue language so learn language does not

mean that you stop using Bahasa Melayu but does give you

privilege especially aaa compared to those who does not know

English.

Hafizah: You are from Terengganu, right? Just for a

confirmation, do you speak in dialect? How does it affect your

English?

Adib: Yes. I’m from Terengganu and we do speak in dialect and

does it affect how ways of speaking English? At first it does

but if you practise aa regularly aa it is somehow can know can

be overcome the dialect especially it does a does does affect

your English speaking and it does happen to me too.

Hafizah: do you think English has affected you in a good or

bad way?

Adib: Does learning English affects me in good or bad way?

Ahh..I can say thaty earning English does can effects me in

good way more compared to the bad.. because I learning this

for its language and not for the behaviour of the man or

American though someone them is very ahh... immoral in

behaviour. We take what is been left what is bad.That is how

it’s for me. And learning English, to me gives more benefits

compared to the math thing.


Hafizah: People said by knowing each language, we can know

their speakers’ or community’s secret. Are you in favour with

that statement? Could you please give your opinion for the

statement?

Adib: I agree with the statement that if we know certain

language, we can also know certain community secret mm..

basically I think the statement is very true for instance if

we learn mandarin, especially Malaysia which is a multiracial

country. We can somehow, prevent ourselves from being aa...

cheated especially when you went... somewhere... full of

Chinese aa... I’m not trying to be racist here but some

Chinese are very tricky they, they are... a... sly.. they are

sly. They they can trick you especially in business because

most business in Malaysia are mm... dominated by a... Chinese

so if you know mandarin you can know how to prevent yourselves

from being scam. Apart from that, for Arabic, if we know how

to speak Arabic and you can understand what the language

means, you can somehow ee gain extra knowledge especially from

books written in any ages of a... the companion of the

prophet. During the golden age of Islam these book are very

aa... valuable and gives you a lot of information and other

than that.. you can somehow.. it gives you like somehow a

bonus if you know not just aa than one language to be spoke.

Hafizah: What is your opinion on English language status in

Malaysia today?


Adib: According to my opinion, in Malaysia English language is

vastly growing aa especially in urban area where people

usually usually like they tend to use English to communicate

with others compared to the rura rural as kampong area aa

although although aa English is used widely in urban area,

malay language is aa like I said before never being neglected

because it is our mother tongue and aa I think can be the

effects on of Engish language in Malaysia is very good thus

benefit everyone as English is a international language widely

used around the world So if we know English means it has

benefit you

Hafizah: Can you give some ideas on how to improve English in

IIUM community?

Adib: as you all know, in IIUM all the syllables taught ahh in

English like ahhh for instance engineering, architecture,

human sciences and event Islamic knowledge all are taught in

English. But, there’s certain students still have a difficulty

in learning, mastering in English. According to my opinion on

how to apprehend this matter. Firstly, you must practice

speaking English. To be honest, at first I was also not very

fluent in English, so I practice much. To be ahh, if not

fluent I can’t take English. And secondly, the student must

ready much ,study more about English to understand. Try to

ahh.. locate the meaning of words and ahh ,think about the

meaning and look the meaning on di dectionary. And third,

ahh..you must the of confident, not to be shy, you to


encourage themselves in speaking English ahh . and we must not

be shy in presentation and lectures.

Hafizah: well, that is all from us, thank you for your

cooperation, Adib.

METHODOLOGY

This study will be focusing on Standard British English

(SBE) pronunciation and Receive Pronunciation (RP) by the

Malay speaker which English is the second language. On the

other hand, the interviewee dialect did affect the way of

pronouncing certain words. In order to complete this task,

conversation takes place. In this paper, the conversation

between interviewer and interviewee was recorded at the IIUM

Library, which is the best and conducive place as people are

not allowed to make noise. The interviewee was given few

questions to be answered and all was recorded. The


conversation was recorded by using cell phone, Nokia C2-00 as

a device. The interviewee was also given the paper and pen.

Later, the conversation is analyzed and the words utterances

by the interviewee during the conversation are described. The

conversation that was recorded is saved in the CD as a

reference.


Background Information About the Speaker

Name: Muhammad Adib Hakim Bin Zulkifli

Matric Number: 1123887

Age: 20

Course/ Major: Bachelor of English

Hometown: Terengganu

Interest: Interested in architecture.

Ambition: Translator

Mission: To be a successful translator

Age start learning English: 5 or 6 years old.

Fluency in English: Speaking: Good

Writing: Very Good

Reading: Excellent

Years of learning English: 16 years

Mother tongue dialect: Malay language with Terengganu dialect

Details of Recording

Place of recording: Library of International Islamic

University Malaysia


Instrument used: Voice Recorder in Nokia C2-00 Handphone

ANALYSIS OF THE PHONETICS FEATURES:

VOWELS PRONUNCIATION

English vowels can be divided into three categories which

are monophthong, diphthong and triphthong that consist of a

single vowel, combination of two vowels and trio-vowels

sequences respectively. Vowels can stand alone without the

appearances of the consonants as its sounds carry pitch and

loudness. Vowels are produced with little restriction of the

airflow from the lungs out of the mouth and/or the nose

(Fromkin etal, 2011). It means that the air flow is a

significant criterion in order to pronounce correct vowels

within certain words.

In this paper, the vowels pronouncing by the interviewee,

Muhammad Adib Hakim will be analysed based on the three

factors that are:

1) High or low in the mouth is the tongue.

2) Forward or backward in the mouth is the tongue

3) Are the lips rounded (pursed) or spread.


Throughout the conversation, many words have been uttered by

the interviewee as well as the interviewer. To be noted, some

of the pronounced words, especially the vowels are wrong. The

reasons may be related to the speaker’s dialect influence or

his style of words production (muscular energy used). Take for

example, the word ‘dictionary’,

“.......think about the meaning and look the meaning on di

dictionary”

The speaker pronounces the word ‘dictionary’ by using the

sound of schwa ‘ə’ rather that the correct one that is the

sounds of ‘I’ on the first syllable. In other word,

‘/dIkᶋəneri/’ has been pronounced as ‘dəkᶋəneri’. On the otherhand, the word before ‘dictionary’ supposes to be ‘the’, but,

the speaker pronounced it as ‘/ɗI/’ rather than ‘/ɗe/’ or the

real pronunciation ‘θe’.The reason for this matter may be

caused as a speaker want to make the pronunciation easier. To

be specific, the vowel ‘/ə/’ a low central unrounded vowel

while ‘/I/’ is a high front unrounded vowel. Even though both

vowels are classified as a weak vowel, but, a schwa is

pronounces using lesser energy compared to ‘/I/’ that will

makes the speaker tends to substitute the vowel. Plus, the

vowel ‘/ə/’ can be labeled as a lax vowel while ‘/I/’ can be

considered as tense vowel.


Besides, the speaker also experience the assimilation

process when pronouncing the word ‘studying’ in order to

answer the first question from the interviewer. For instance,

“.......... Currently studying in IIUM Gombak taking...”

By listening to the CD, it can be noted that the speaker

pronounce the vowel ‘/i/’ by assimilating it to the sound of

‘/ŋ/’ that result to the ‘/iŋ/’. The reason for this is

because of the presence of the nasal consonant ‘/ŋ/’.

According to the natural classes of speech sounds, there is a

rule mentioned that the vowels before m, n, and ŋ. Thus, the

vowel ‘i’ has been pronounced like a nasal consonant where the

velum is lowered that allowing air to pass out through the

nasal cavity. However, the interviewee has pronounced the word

‘studying’ by giving a crispy clear sound of the vowel ‘i’

assimilates to the sound of ‘ŋ’. This is because, Terengganu

people utter many words that end with nasal consonant ‘n’ by

substituting with the sound of ‘/ŋ/’. For example, ‘ikan’

(fish) in standard Malay will be uttered as ‘ikaŋ’.

CONSONANTS

After the interview session with a respondent had taken

place, the pronunciation was analyzed and it can be found that

there are slight differences in some words uttered by this

speaker and the native speakers. In this part, it will explain

the comparison between Malay speaker of English and native17 | p h o n e t i c s a n d p h o n o l o g y ( E N G L 2 0 4 0 S E C T I O N 1 ) G R O U P 5

speaker of English in term of consonants. According to Finegan

(2008), consonant is “a speech sound produced by partial or

complete closure of part of the vocal tract, thus obstructing

the airflow and creating audible friction.” Consonants can be

described in terms of voicing, place of articulation and

manner of articulation. Some linguist may said that English

has 21 consonant letter in the written alphabet (B, C, D, F,

G, H, J, K, L, M, N, P, Q, R, S, T, V, W, X, Y, Z) and some

other linguist said that English has 24 consonant sound in

most accent in English.

Even though all the language have consonants, but the way

they pronounce it may vary. For example, our respondent tends

to pronounce the word ‘think’ as ‘thing’. This is because our

respondent is from Terengganu and usually Terengganu people

will tend to add the ‘g’ at the back of the word. The original

dialect of this speaker is affecting the pronunciation of the

word ‘think’. When the native speakers of Standard British

English or RP are pronouncing the word ‘think’ they will

pronounce it as /θɪŋk/.

The second word that is quite different from the original

pronunciation is the word ‘with’. This speaker tends to

pronounce it as ‘wit’. For Malay speaker that the first

language is Malay language, they will usually mispronounce the

sound of ‘th’. This happens because in Malay language, they

are no words that use ‘th’ sound. Apart from ‘with’, our

respondent also have difficulties to pronounce the word ‘the’,


he pronounce it as ‘de’, ‘they’ he pronounce it as ‘dey’.

Looking back at all the words, it is correct that Malay

speakers have the difficulty to pronounce the ‘th’ sound. The

place of articulation of /θ/ sound is supposedly at

interdental which is between the teeth. But for the Malays

they change /θ/ sound into /t/ sound and the place of

articulation will be at alveolar which is the ridge behind the

upper teeth. Although the pronunciation of this respondent is

quite different from the SBE/RP, we cannot say that it is

wrong to pronounce like that.

STRESS PLACEMENT

Throughout the conversations, the use of stress by the

interviewee is less distinguishable because the interviewee

tends to use short vowel by omitting the vowel length when

pronouncing certain words as compared to RP, and tends to omit

some weak vowel in certain words. However, the stress can

still be pointed out through the usage of vowel quality,

loudness and pitch although they are less prominence in

determining the stress as compared to vowel length.

The series of example of shortened vowel by the

interviewee can be seen in the pronounced two syllable simple

words such as /əgrI/, /stetmənt/, and /sIkrət/. In the word/əgrI/, short vowel /I/ is used instead of long vowel /i:/.

However, the stress can still be noted by analysing the vowel19 | p h o n e t i c s a n d p h o n o l o g y ( E N G L 2 0 4 0 S E C T I O N 1 ) G R O U P 5

quality in the word ‘agree’ where schwa /ə/ and /I/ is used.

Since /ə/ is neutral vowel where the place of articulation is

mid-centre, the stress can be said occur at second syllable in

the presence of /I/ where it is articulated at high front.

This is because, /I/ is slightly prominent than /ə/. The same

goes for the word sIkrət/. Apart from that, instead of

pronouncing ‘statement’ as / ˡsteItmənt/, the interviewee

pronounced it as /stetmənt/ where the diphthong /eI/ is

substitute with monophthong /e/. Even so, it can still be

understood that the stress was placed on the first syllable

because /e/ is a more prominent vowel quality as compared to

/ə/ in the second syllable.

Next are the three syllables simple words where the

stress usually falls on first syllable but more probably on

strong syllable. Two examples can be taken from the

conversation that is, ‘companion’ and ‘medium’ where the

interviewee pronounced it as /kɒmpeniən/ and /ˡmidiəm/

respectively while the RP are /kəmˡpæniən/ and /ˡmidi:əm/.

The former word has a blurred line of where the stress falls

because both first and second the syllables are strong vowel.

Although most stress rule often looks on last syllable first,

the rule with three-syllable noun is that the stress should

fall on first syllable if it is a strong vowel. Therefore,

since the interviewee chooses to use /ɒ/, a prominent vowel in

term of quality, the stress can be said to fall on the first

syllable. Though this is slightly a different pronunciation


from RP, it can still be accepted because this section intends

to analyse the stress pattern of the interviewee. The latter

however has less confusion between RP and the Malay accented

English used by interviewee. This because, they only differ in

vowel length and the stress can still be said to fall on the

first syllable as in RP because no prominence changes was

further made by the interviewee.

Complex words stress rule is that, when suffix –ion is

added, the stress of the stem is influenced. The analysis

shows that interviewee did not adapt to the RP’s rule where

the stress falls on different place when suffixes is added.

For instance, ‘communication’ according to RP is

/kə,mju:nIˡkeIʃn/ with primary stress on the second last

syllable and secondary stress on second syllable. The changes

from the stem word is, the primary stress was on the second

syllable and secondary stress is on the last syllable as in

/kəˡmju:nI,keIt/. The interviewee, however, pronounced it

as /,kɒmunIkeˡʃən/ with primary stress on final syllable and

secondary stress on first syllable. There are no changes made

from the stem word where he pronounce /,kɒmunIˡkeIt/. The

stress was notable because the interview slightly raise the

pitch at the end of the syllable although the pronunciation

was entirely too fast to note the stress.


CONNECTED SPEECH

SENTENCES RECEIVE

PRONOUNCIATION (RP)

INTERVIEWEE’S

PROUNUNCIATIONEXPLAINATION

“.......think

about the

meaning and

look the

meaning on di

dictionary”

1) ‘dIkᶋəneri

’

2) ‘θe’

1)‘dəkᶋəneri’

2) ‘di’

1) Using the sound of

schwa ‘ə’ rather that the

correct one that is the

sounds of ‘I’ to make

pronunciation easier.

2) The initial after the

word ‘the’ is‘d’ in

‘dictionary’, so, it’s

easier to utter ‘di’

rather than ‘θe’. Thus,

it has been pronounce

as di dəkᶋəneri. The

pronunciations of

vowels are switched

from ‘I’ to ‘ə’ and ‘e’

to ‘i’ respectively.

“..........

Currently

studying IIUM

Gombak

taking...”

‘ng’

*ᵑ‘ng’

*ῆ

Assimilation process has

been applied in this word

pronunciation wher ‘i’

assimilates with ‘ŋ’. The

pronunciation of ‘iŋ’ is

heard longer than usual

because of dialect22 | p h o n e t i c s a n d p h o n o l o g y ( E N G L 2 0 4 0 S E C T I O N 1 ) G R O U P 5

influence that tends to

utter hard ‘iŋ’ sound.

“....I was

still a kid

during the age

of five or six

years old....”

‘θI eIdʒ of’ ‘θI ei:j

of’

The interviewee

substitute ‘I’ with ‘i:’

The reason could be

related to the

intonations and connected

speech. The speaker seems

to pause at the word

‘age’ after pronouncing

‘θI’ (the). Thus, he tends

to utter the longer

vowel like ‘i:’

POINT OF VIEW

From this study, it can be concluded that the re are

phonological differences between native and non-native speech.

The distinctions can be noticeable, or subtle as the non-

native speaker try to sound like the native when pronouncing

words. Besides, the background of the non-native speaker plays

a big role in one’s way of pronouncing. According to Alias

Abdul Ghani (1995) there are possibilities for the Malaysian

speaker to make a phonological transfer from Malay Language to

the English Language. This statement can be a platform in

order to regard one’s dialect as a cause of phonological

transfer as well. Take for example, the schwa sound ‘ə’ is


abundantly used by the non native speaker who is from

Terengganu or Kelantan. As these people used to change the

last vowel in the last syllable of the words, this norm will

be applied in uttering English words as well like the word

‘say’ which is pronounces as “/sei/’ will be pronounce as

‘/sə/’ instead. This phonological transfer is adapted from the

pronunciation of Malay words by a Terengganu-dialect-speaker

like ‘biasa’ (normal) in standard Malay language which is

uttered as ‘/besə/’.

The differences that exist might be because of the common

reason such as their first language which may have different

sounds system from English language. When the non-native

speakers change the pronunciation of the consonants, then

voicing (voice or voiceless), the place of articulation and

the manner of articulation will change too. Sometimes, when

they are pronouncing the words, they are unconscious of their

pronunciation because they are too fixated about the grammar.

Stress placement, as had been discussed previously, the

interviewee tends to omit long vowel, reducing it to short

vowel and changing some vowels sounds of English words into

other vowels sounds that are more common in their mother

tongue. The analysis shows the interviewee is inclined to

pronounce the words close to how it is spelled. It may be from

the influence of mother tongue, Malay, where the

pronunciations usually follows the spelling form. The word

stress is also mostly indistinguishable because standard Malay


language does not have stress on syllable. However, Terengganu

dialect does have stress on certain words, like /bəso/ to mean

‘big’ and /ˡbəso/ (the first syllable is stressed prominently)

to mean ‘to make it big’, but it does not contribute much to

the interviewee to have better command on English word stress.

It is clear that the interviewee was influenced by his dialect

when he mostly stress on the first syllable of the word.

CONCLUSION

First of all, in this paper, we were able to distinguish

and compare the pronunciation of English between Malay speaker

of English and native speaker of Standard British English.

Now we know how to differentiate the sounds of the words. At

the same time, we can improve the way we learn English

language. This is because, before this, we tend to neglect

about the pronunciation and pay more attention in gaining the

vocabulary and structuring the grammar. Therefore, it is

fervently hope that this paper will be of benefits and

knowledge to people at large concerning the difference in

pronunciation according to different pronunciation of English

between Malay speaker of English and native speaker of

Standard British English.

Apart from that, this paper has attempted to show that

there are differences in vowels pronunciation, consonants

pronunciation and stress placement between non-native speaker

and native speaker when they are pronouncing the words. There


are also slight variations in connected speech made by native

and non-native speakers. Even though the English pronunciation

of the Malay speakers and native speakers of English is

different, it could not be simply judge as totally wrong

because each and every country has their own dialect and it is

quite difficult to the native speaker of every dialect to

neglect their own dialect and intonation when they speak in

English. By reading this paper, readers will understand more

about the difference of phonological between native and non-

native speaker in their speech.

References

Alias Abd Ghani. (1995). Variability in interlanguage phonology of Malaysian learners of English. Retrieved on December 9, 2012 froM


http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/429/1/uk_bl_ethos_411469.pdf

Finegan, E. (2008). Language its structure and use. ThomsonWadsworth. USA

Fromkin V. et al (2011). An Introduction to Language: Phonetics.9th edition. Wadsworth:

United State.

Idris Aman, Rosiah Mustafa. (2009). Social variation Of Malay language in Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia: A study on accent, identity and integration. GEMA online journal of language studies, 9(1).

J.T. (1987). Malay dialect research in Malaysia: the issue of perspective. Retrieved on December 9, 2012 from http://sabrizain.org/malaya/library/dialectresearch.pdf

Phoon Hooi San. (2010).The phonological development of Malaysian English speaking Chinese children: A normative study. Retrieved on December 10, 2012 from http://ir.canterbury.ac.nz/bitstream/10092/4336/1/thesis_fulltext.pdf

Shahidi A.H., Rahim Aman. (2010). An acoustical study of English plosives in word initial position produced by Malays. The Southeast Asean Journal of English Language Studies, 17(2).

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http://sabrizain.org/malaya/library/dialectresearch.pdf

Phonology: the sound system

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