A study on english accents ò third year english máo at hong duc university, thanh hoa, vietnam

The aims of this research are to determine the problems in learning and using English accents used by third-year English majored students at Hong Duc University; find out the differences

HONG DUC UNIVERSITY

FOREIGN LANGUAGE DEPARTMENT

GRADUATION THESIS

A STUDY ON ENGLISH ACCENTS OF THIRD YEAR ENGLISH MAJORS AT HONG DUC UNIVERSITY,

THANH HOA, VIETNAM

SUPERVISOR: M.A NGUYEN THI VIET STUDENT: NGUYEN THI CHUYEN CLASS: 176701A

ACADEMIC YEAR: 2017-2021

THANH HOA, 2021

THANH HÓA, NĂM 2021

HONG DUC UNIVERSITY

FOREIGN LANGUAGE DEPARTMENT

GRADUATION THESIS

A STUDY ON ENGLISH ACCENTS OF THIRD YEAR ENGLISH MAJORS AT HONG DUC UNIVERSITY,

THANH HOA, VIETNAM

SUPERVISOR: M.A NGUYEN THI VIET STUDENT: NGUYEN THI CHUYEN CLASS: 176701A

ACADEMIC YEAR: 2017-2021

THANH HOA, 2021

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DECLARATION

M.A Nguyen Thi Viet, an instructor of English at English Department, Hong Duc University

I declare that the information reported in the current paper is the result of my own work, except where due to reference is made The thesis has not been accepted for any degree and is not concurrently submitted to any candidature for any other degree or diploma

Thanh Hoa, 2021 Student

Nguyen Thi Chuyen

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my warmest thanks and appreciation to many people who have helped me in a myriad of ways to complete this study The completion of this research would not have been possible without the encouragement, guidance and support from them

First and foremost, I would like to send my deepest gratitude to my academic supervisor, M.A Nguyen Thi Viet, for her insightful advice, constructive criticism and positive encouragement, without which my thesis would be far from completion

My gratefully acknowledge is to all lectures of Foreign Language Department, Hong Duc University for providing me the favourable environment to accomplish my thesis Special words of thank also go to all my informants for their willing participation in the study I greatly appreciate their generosity with their time and efforts in filling in the questionnaire and answering interviews Without them this paper could not have been possible

Last but not least, I am deeply indebted to my parents whose great love, delicate devotion and whole-hearted support have encouraged me so far

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ABSTRACT

This study investigates overall English accents employed by third-year English majored students at Hong Duc University, Thanh Hoa, Viet Nam The aims of this research are to determine the problems in learning and using English accents used by third-year English majored students at Hong Duc University; find out the differences between American and British English accents in terms of pronunciation and how the students used American and British English accents in their reading English words

A quantitative method was used as the main methodology of collecting data for the present study Semi-structures interviews with 15 students were also carried on in order

to provide more qualitative data for the research The questionnaire was administered to

52 third-year English majored students who were studying at Hong Duc University The data analysis involved descriptive statistic and manual interview transcription

The results show that students' self-discipline in learning English is bad, although all

of them commented that they were interested in learning English and English is important Additionally, the ability of students to pronounce in standard English accents was still poor The study’s contributions, limitations and implications for English accents teaching and learning at Hong Duc University are also addressed

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iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i

ABSTRACT ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv

LIST OF TABLES v

LIST OF FIGURES vi

LIST OF APPENDICES vii

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale of the study 1

2 Research aims 3

3 Research questions 3

4 Scope of the study 4

5 Methods of the study 4

6 Design of the study 5

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 6

CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW 6

1.1 Definition of accent 6

1.2 The importance of English accents in learning English 9

1.3 Kinds of English accents 11

1.3.1 British English 12

1.3.2 American English 12

1.3.3 Australian English 12

1.3.4 Canadian English 13

1.3.5 Indian English 13

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1.3.6 Philippine English 14

1.3.7 Ugandan English 14

1.4 Differences between British and American English 15

1.4.1 British English 15

1.4.2 American English 16

1.4.3 Overall differences between British and American English 16

1.4.3.1 The Linguistic Aspects 16

1.4.3.2 Pronunciation Level 16

1.4.3.3 Vocabulary Level 21

1.4.3.4 Grammatical Level 25

1.4.3.5 Semantic Level 28

1.5 Previous studies of English accents 30

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 39

2.1 Participants 39

2.2 The methods of collecting data 39

2.3 Research instruments 40

2.3.1 Questionnaires 40

2.3.2 Secondary data 40

2.3.3 Interviews 40

2.4 The analysis of the data 41

CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 42

3.1 Findings from quantitative data 42

3.1.1 The problems in learning and using English accents of third-year English majors at Hong Duc University 42

3.1.2 Summary 48

3.2 The differences between British and American English accents 49

3.2.1 Intonation 49

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3.2.2 Vowels 50

3.2.3 The pronunciation of the letter ‘R’ 51

3.2.4 The pronunciation of the letter “T” 51

3.2.5 The words are shortened 51

3.3 Findings from qualitative data 52

3.3.1 How the students used British and American English accents in their reading of English words 52

3.3.2 The results of interviews 53

3.3.3 Summary 55

CONCLUSION 56

1 Summary of the findings 56

2 Implications for the teaching and learning English accents at Hong Duc University 56

3 Limitations of the study 57

REFERENCES 58

APPENDICES 60

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iv

iv

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

L2: Second language

A.D: After Date / Anno Domini

ESL: English as Second Language

G.A: General American

L.M.D: License, Master, Doctorate

R.P: Received Pronunciation

ELT: English Language Teaching

UK: United Kingdom

USA: United State of America

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1.3: The Pronunciation of /j /

Table 1.4: Pronunciation Change of / ʃ / to / ʒ/ Table 1.5: The Change of the Suffix “ile”

Table 1.6: The Change of Suffixes ary- ery- ory in BBC and GA Pronunciation

Table 1.7: Differences between some American and British English vocabulary

Table 3.1: The reality of using English accents in students’ reading words

Table 3.2: Students’ awareness of their English accents in their reading words

Table 3.3: Students’ answer about the frequency of learning English accents

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LIST OF FIGURES

subject

Figure 3.2: Students' views on the role of English listening and speaking skills subject Figure 3.3: Students’ frequency of learning and practicing English accents in the lessons Figure 3.4: Students' amount of time spent on studying English at home

Figure 3.5: Students’ views about usefulness of Aloha English Club

Figure 3.6: Students' awareness of (American and British) English accents?

Figure 3.7: Students’ ability to distinguish American and British English accents when

listening

Figure 3.8: The English accents that students supposed that they are using in their

speaking

Figure 3.9: The English accents which students think is more difficult

Figure 3.10: Students’ feelings about their English accents

Figure 3.11: Students' opinions on using a certain English accent in their speaking Figure 3.12: Channels/websites where students studied on English accents

Figure 3.13: Students’ awareness of British and American English accents

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LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix 2: Survey questionnaire in Vietnamese

Appendix 3: Interview form

Appendix 4: Interview transcription

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1

PART A: INTRODUCTION

This part presents in details (1) the rationale of this research, (2) the research aims, (3) the research question, (4) the scope of the study, (5) the methods of the study, and (6) the design of the study

1 Rationale of the study

In this day and age, English is the dominant international language and the indispensable key to the changing world of science; however, the majority of EFL learners are unaware of the vast differences between British and American English

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As English major students we should know many others aspects in English instead of remaining in general English, particularly accent because at accent is one of the important factors to converse well in English and to also help students to avoid confusion and understand what native speakers talk to them In order to help students develop more English pronunciation aspects, this study concentrates on digging dip into English accents to raise their awareness of the importance of English accents as well as pronunciation

With communication as a primary goal of the language education, the importance of students acquiring an inner-circle accent have had to take a step back, even without thoroughly studying the effect this has on the communicative competence and speaking confidence of the students This, together with the possibility of creating an identity with accents (Beinhoff, 2013), affect the way English develops regarding pronunciation and style (Rindal & Piercy, 2013)

Accent refers to distinct ways a language is pronounced, whether by native or native speakers English, a world language with many speakers in many different regions and of many different social groups, has many distinct accents Some are reference accents such as Received Pronunciation (RP) and General American (GA) These accents are well known and provide implicit standards for language learning and teaching

non-2

In today’s school, students do not have to adapt to a specific inner-circle accent when speaking English and every student can choose their accent more freely than before (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2011; Swedish National Agency for Education, 1995)

The roles and functions of English in many different parts of the world have shifted and changed given the growth of NNSs of English around the world in recent times (Crystal, 1997; Graddol, 1997; Jenkins 2007; Kirkpatrick, 2007) With the changing functions of English, there has been an emergence and growth of a variety of English around the world These varieties of English flourish and exist in many parts of the world However, these varieties of English are very rarely recognized as legitimate varieties representing their respective users One obvious manifestation of these varieties is the ‘local’ accent that is ascribed to these varieties of English Although external NS models are imposed for written forms of English, imposing external NS models on speech may be possible on paper, but impossible in reality

Accent, or the way a person sounds, is difficult to standardize (Trudgill, 1999) and is closely linked to the speaker’s personal and group identity (Jenkins, 2000) Although, local English varieties are spoken in local contexts, often the NNSs themselves seem to prefer external NS English accents (Holliday, 2005; Jenkins, 2007, 2009) The sounds

of how one talks is another noticeable difference Each country will say that the other has a strong accent, and technically they're right For Americans, an Australian person may be hard to understand because of how each decides to pronounce their r's English speakers from America will pronounce the 'r' whenever it occurs However, English speakers from Australia will only pronounce it when there's a vowel before it, such as 'run' or 'ratings.' The next time you hear an Australian say 'color/colour', it'll likely sound like they're saying 'culla' This is also the case of British English, although not as exaggerated as Australians Another difference is the pronunciation of vowels like 'a' Most Americans will pronounce the 'ae' in words like 'pass', whereas the British and Australians pronounce their 'a' in words like 'father' Sometimes they may use 'ae' in words like 'demand', but Americans will use it for all words

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Accent refers to the pronunciation of people when they speak Everyone has certain knowledge of phonetics and phonology Everybody speaks with an accent A speaker’s accent may relate to where he is from, like a London accent or an American accent It may relate to the social background such as an upper-class accent or an RP accent It may relate also to whether the speakers are native speakers or not Therefore, this research investigates how Hong Duc university third year English major students perceive their own English accents

2 Research aims

The aim of this research is to study the overall English accents employed by year English majored students in order to draw out implications to teaching and learning

third-at Hong Duc University

To achieve the above aim, the present study attempts to gain the following objectives:

- To investigate problems in learning and using English accents used by year English majored students at Hong Duc University

third To find out the differences between American and British English accents in terms of pronunciation

- To find out how the students used American and British English accents in their reading of English words

- To give implications to English accents teaching and learning at Hong Duc University

3 Research questions

The research questions of the present study are:

1) What are problems in learning and using English accents of third-year English majored students at Hong Duc University in terms of pronunciation?

2) What are differences between British and American English accents in terms

of pronunciation?

3) How do the English majored students use British and American English accents in their reading of English words?

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4 Scope of the study

Owning to the author’s limited time in doing research, this study just focuses on a small investigation on overall English accents of third-year English majored students at Hong Duc University, Thanh Hoa, Vietnam in terms of pronunciation and only focuses

on investigating the two main accents, British and American English accents

5 Methods of the study

In order to gain the aims of the study, mixed methods of quantitative (questionnaires) and qualitative (analyzing related materials and students’ interviews) are used to collect data and information from third year English major students at Hong Duc University

The specific following instruments are applied to collect data for this study:

- To find out the answer for the first question, I used survey method

- To find out the answer for the second question, I read 5 reliable articles and analyze and synthesize them To uncover the difference between British and American English accents, I used a secondary research Here are 5 reliable articles that I used for answering the second research question:

1) Qin Yan & Saeed Vaseghi (2002) A comparative analysis of UK and US

English accents in recognition and synthesis

2) Ahmed M Hashim (2017) The Differences between American and British

Accents

3) Dylan Lyons (2020) What Are the Differences Between American And British

English?

4) Ann-Kristin Alftberg (2009) British or American English? - Attitudes,

Awareness and Usage among Pupils in a Secondary School

5) Miss.Abderrahim Safaa (2015) British Vs American English for university

students teaching purposes: The case of third- year EFL students at Tlemcen University

- To find out the answer for the third question, I used qualitative method, I ask students to read out loud a list of chosen vocabulary and then analyze their accents

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6 Design of the study

This minor thesis includes 3 parts:

Part A: Introduction includes the rationale to the study It also includes the aims of the

study, research questions, the scope of the study, the research methods Then, the design

of the study is also presented

Part B: Development includes 3 chapters:

Chapter 1: Literature review explains some key terms and shows differences of

English accents, and classification them

Chapter 2: Methodology describes the participants, the methods of collecting data,

research instruments and the analysis of the data

Chapter 3: Findings and discussions focuses on findings of the research based on results of the quantitative, secondary data and qualitative data analysis Findings are

presented according to the order of research questions

Part C: Conclusion presents summary the findings of the study Some limited points

of this study and suggestions for further studies are also performed

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PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW

The purposes of this literature review are five folds: (1) define accent, (2) highlight the importance of English accents, (3) give some kinds of English accents, (4) compare the differences between British and American English, (5) summarize some previous studies on English accents

1.1 Definition of accent

Accent, in phonetics, that property of a syllable which makes it stand out in an utterance relative to its neighboring syllables The emphasis on the accented syllable relative to the unaccented syllables may be realized through greater length, higher or lower pitch, a changing pitch contour, greater loudness, or a combination of these characteristics Accent has various domains: the word, the phrase, and the sentence Word accent (also called word stress, or lexical stress) is part of the characteristic way

in which a language is pronounced Given a particular language system, word accent may be fixed, or predictable (e.g., in French, where it occurs regularly at the end of words, or in Czech, where it occurs initially), or it may be movable, as in English, which then leaves accent free to function to distinguish one word from another that is identical segmentally (e.g., the noun permit versus the verb permit) (Garrett et al 2003)

Similarly, accent can be used at the phrasal level to distinguish sequences identical at the segmental level (e.g., “light housekeeping” versus “lighthouse keeping,” or

“blackboard” versus “black board”) Finally, accent may be used at the sentence level

to draw attention to one part of the sentence rather than another (e.g., “What did you sign?” “I signed a contract to do some light housekeeping.” versus “Who signed a contract?” “I signed a contract to do some light housekeeping.”) The concept of

language attitude has been linked with language ideologies and also functions as “a

pivotal concept in sociolinguistics” (Garrett et al 2003, p 2)

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Language attitude is researched to investigate competing understandings and people’s preferences towards a certain language or linguistic features, of which accent is one aspect More significantly, it has been argued that “language attitudes research provides

a backdrop for explaining linguistic variation and change” (Garrett 2010, p 15), and that the notion of accent is often the most salient aspect of foreign language use and language

attitudes (Jenkins 2007)

The notion of accent may include two distinctive elements that people can recognize

from one variety of a language to another: prosodic and segmental features (Lippi-Green

,2012) Moyer (2013, p.10) defines accent from a broader perspective as referring “not

only to the articulation of individual sounds, or segments, but to suprasegmental features

as well”

Although, to some sense at least, accent as a linguistic concept is salient, the term

“accent” can still be so subtle as to have “no technical or specific meaning”

(Lippi-Green, 2012, p.44) because everyone has certain accents for their L1s and other languages they learn Thus, if we look at realistic language use, the notion of accent becomes a term that is hard to define For example, Lippi-Green (2012, p 45, emphasis

in original) seems to avoid defining the term, by pointing out that: Linguists have struggled to find an accurate definition of the word accent, and for the most part, given

it up as a bad job

Generally, accent can only be understood and defined if there is something to compare it with Therefore, linguists find that the notion of accent is difficult to define and that the concept of non-accent is a myth In settings where people do not speak English as their L1, “accent is used to refer to the breakthrough of native language phonology into the target language” (Lippi-Green 2012, p 46)

However, this may not always be the case when applied in the WE framework where certain phonological features are still being codified and widely accepted or the ELF framework where language and communication is more flexible and fluid while

intelligibility is the focus

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The accents this study will mention are the two inner-circle accents British English (BrE) and American English (AmE) The definitions of the two accents concerning this study are in compliance with the definitions made in English – One Tongue, Many Voices by Geoffrey Leech & Jan Svartvik (2006)

Accent is a common term to describe the way in which a person pronounces a language, and because languages always have to be pronounced when speaking, everybody has an accent (Andersson & Trudgill, 1990, p.127)

However, the term accent sometimes seems to be used to describe accents that differ from the standard variety, and confused with intelligibility or comprehensibility (Ladefoged, 2005, p.2; Munro, 2008, pp.196-197) As Munro (2008, p.193) writes, non-

37 native speakers of English are often easily recognized because of their pronunciation, and in many cases their specific L1 backgrounds can be identified, even in casual conversations Munro (2008, p.195) continues that at the segmental level, accented speech can be noticed, for example, by the omission or insertion of phones, the substitution of one phone for another, or the production of phonemes that differ from native-like phones

Accent is a part of SLA that raises a lot of discussion: there are standards for pronunciation, but very few second language learners seem to be able to achieve them perfectly Lately, many researchers have questioned the need for SL learners to speak in

a so-called perfect accent, since a foreign-accent-free pronunciation is not necessary in communicating in English (Munro, 2008, p.194)

Now that English is widely used as a medium of communication between different groups of people, who do not speak English as their native language, some of these non-native speakers even feel that it is easier to understand a non-native accent of English than the native one Accent is discussed here in relation to L2 speech production, because it seems to raise a lot of different 38 opinions and, more importantly, it seems that especially Academic English learners and some English major students are quite concerned about their English accents (Munro, 2008)

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1.2 The importance of English accents in learning English

Speaking an English accent is one way to keep the language dynamic and alive Moreover, for someone who speaks with a standard accent, it will definitely sound fancier and can be attractive and set speakers apart Listening, as we know, is the skill

of understanding spoken language Listening is an essential skill, present in most of the activities we carry out throughout our lives Every factor that influences learning English (listening, speaking) is extremely important, including accent

There have been many studies such as the studies of Dilek.B and Ahmet.C.U (2019), Matsuura, Chiba, Mahoney, and Rilling (2014), White, Treenate, Kiatgungwalgrai, Somnuk, and Chaloemchatvarakorn (2016), Goh (1998), Kağıtçı Yıldız (2017), Abeywickrama (2013) These studies show that accent plays an important role in listening and understanding a language

According to a study of Dilek Büyükahıska and Ahmet Can Uyar (2019) about the effects of different accents on listening comprehension in EFL classes, there are several major factors that highly affect the learners’ listening comprehension These may include vocabulary knowledge, grammatical competence, motivation or the other competencies of the learner An often-cited factor among these is the speaker’s accent

As Van Engen and Peelle (2014) remarked, being familiar with the accent of the speaker leads listeners to give little or no extra effort to understand

In a similar study, Gass and Varonis (1984) cited familiarity with the accent as a major element affecting the level of listening comprehension Bross (1992) also supported the crucial role of familiarity with the accent of the speaker to be able to make correlation between sounds

Further studies have been carried out in order to find the probable impacts of different accents on listening comprehension Matsuura, Chiba, Mahoney, and Rilling (2014) investigated the relation between familiarity with an English accent and the level of comprehension Participants in the study listened to the same text voiced by both one Canadian and one Indian speaker Canadian was the familiar one to the participants and Indian was the unfamiliar

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The results showed that the participants performed better listening comprehension levels when they listened to the Canadian speaker, which leads to the finding that being familiar with the accent contributes to the level of listening comprehension

A similar study was carried out by White, Treenate, Kiatgungwalgrai, Somnuk, and Chaloemchatvarakorn (2016) The researchers examined how the familiar accents facilitated the listening comprehension of the participants A group of listening texts which were categorized as familiar, moderately familiar, less familiar, and unfamiliar was used in the study

The findings of the study indicated that the listening texts in the category of familiar (Thai, Irish, British) led participants to the highest scores The tests for the unfamiliar accents have the lowest scores according to the results of the study

In another study conducted by Goh (1998), the researcher determined the five major elements that influence listening comprehension as follows: vocabulary, background knowledge, speech rate, type of input, and speaker’s accent According to the results of the study, 68% of the participants stated that the speaker’s accent strongly influenced their listening comprehension The participants declared that they struggled with the unfamiliarity to them In that sense, it was plausible to put forward that the participants

of the study were exposed to British or American accent much more than other accents

In Goh’s latest research, Chaipuapae (in press) aimed to search about the relationship between sharing the same native language with the speaker of English and the listening comprehension Arabic and Thai learners listened to the Arabic and Thai speakers while they were lecturing in English The results represented that each group performed a better level of comprehension when they listened to the teacher with whom they shared the same native language Possibly due to the familiarity with the accent of the teacher One of the most recent studies was conducted by Kağıtçı Yıldız (2017), who aimed

to find out if the speaker’s accent had any impact on students’ listening comprehension,

as well as the way that students view listening to various accents She worked with six English teachers and 107 EFL students, all of whom were intermediate level students

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The results of Kağıtçı.Y’s study revealed that the speaker’s accent seemed to play a key role in students’ listening comprehension, but the results were not generalized Because, some of the participants performed a better level of listening comprehension when listening to native speakers, however, some of them performed better when the speaker was a non-native speaker of English The findings illustrated that the Turkish accent of the speaker was not a remarkable facilitator for the students

Another related research was carried out by Abeywickrama (2013), who investigated whether the non-native speakers influence the performance of test takers on the test or not The results of the study represented that the effects of different accents on test takers’ performance were not significant, indicating that the varieties of English used did not affect the participants’ performances on the listening tests Similarly, Major, Fitzmaurice, Bunta, and Balasubramanian (2002) found out an indefinite relationship between accent and performance on listening as a result of their research

All in all, previous studies have shown that accent is important for listening and speaking, especially listening

1.3 Kinds of English accents

English is the most widely-spoken language in the world, having the distinct status

of being the official language of multiple countries While the English language is uniform with major variations in spelling present between American English and British English, the dialect or accent is usually the factor that enables one to distinguish the various types of English out there Like most languages, there are varieties of English too, however, the difference is not as prominent as you may see in other languages From the thick Ugandan English to the French-themed Canadian English, the varieties of accents present are both diverse and beautiful Apart from accents, there is

a tendency for people to mix English with their local lingo to form a hybrid variety of English language that is as colorful as the culture in that country

An accent is the way a person speaks Some people pronounce words differently A lot of the time, different countries that speak the same language pronounce the same words in a different way Usually they can understand each-other, but they will notice that they sound a little different Here are some various types of English language that are present in countries around the world (Ivan Vassiliev, 2021):

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1.3.1 British English

British English is the English language as spoken and written in the United Kingdom

or, more broadly, throughout the British Isles Slight regional variations exist in formal, written English in the United Kingdom

English is a West Germanic language that originated from the Anglo-Frisian dialects brought to Britain by Germanic settlers from various parts of what is now northwest Germany and the northern Netherlands The resident population at this time was generally speaking Common Brittonic—the insular variety of continental Celtic, which was influenced by the Roman occupation This group of languages (Welsh, Cornish, Cumbric) cohabited alongside English into the modern period, but due to their remoteness from the Germanic languages, influence on English was notably limited

(Ivan Vassiliev, 2021)

1.3.2 American English

American English sometimes called United States English or U.S English, is the set

of varieties of the English language native to the United States and widely adopted in Canada English is the most widely spoken language in the United States and is the common language used by the federal government, considered the de facto language of the country because of its widespread use English has been given official status by 32

of the 50 state governments (Ivan Vassiliev, 2021)

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Australian English began to diverge from British English after the founding of the Colony of New South Wales in 1788 and was recognized as being different from British English by 1820 It arose from the intermingling of early settlers from a great variety of mutually intelligible dialectal regions of the British Isles and quickly developed into a

distinct variety of English (Ivan Vassiliev, 2021)

1.3.4 Canadian English

Canadian English is the set of varieties of English native to Canada According to the

2011 census, English was the first language of approximately 19 million Canadians (57% of the population) the remainder of the population were native speakers of Canadian French (22%) or other languages (allophones, 21%)

The term “Canadian English” is first attested in a speech by the Reverend A

Constable Geikie in an address to the Canadian Institute in 1857 Canadian English is

the product of five waves of immigration and settlement over a period of more than two centuries

The first large wave of permanent English-speaking settlement in Canada, and linguistically the most important, was the influx of loyalists fleeing the American Revolution, chiefly from the Mid-Atlantic States – as such, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Washington, D.C., Virginia, and West Virginia Canadian English is believed by some scholars to have derived from northern American English (Ivan Vassiliev, 2021)

1.3.5 Indian English

English public instruction began in India in the 1830s during the rule of the East India Company (India was then, and is today, one of the most linguistically diverse regions of the world) In 1835, English replaced Persian as the official language of the Company Lord Macaulay played a major role in introducing English and western concepts to education in India He supported the replacement of Persian by English as the official

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language, the use of English as the medium of instruction in all schools, and the training

of English-speaking Indians as teachers

The view of this language among many Indians has gone from associating it with colonialism to associating it with economic progress, and English continues to be an official language of India, albeit with an Indian twist, popularly known as Indian English (Ivan Vassiliev, 2021)

1.3.6 Philippine English

Philippine English is any variety of English (similar and related to American English) native to the Philippines, including those used by the media and the vast majority of educated Filipinos English is taught in schools as one of the two official languages of the country, the other being Filipino (Tagalog)

Philippine English has evolved tremendously from where it began decades ago Some decades before English were officially introduced, if not arguably forced, to the Philippines, the archipelagic nation has been subject to Spanish rule and thus Spanish was the language of power and influence

However, in 1898, when the Spanish gave the United States control of the nation, the English language, although initially not favored, became widely used in a matter of years, which was catalyzed by the coming of American teachers (Ivan Vassiliev, 2021)

1.3.7 Ugandan English

Ugandan English, or Uglish (pronounced you-glish), is the dialect of English spoken

in Uganda As with similar dialects spoken elsewhere, Ugandan English has developed

a strong local flavor The speech patterns of Ugandan languages strongly influence spoken English Uganda has a large variety of indigenous languages, and someone familiar with Uganda can readily identify the native language of a person speaking English Ugandan speakers will alter foreign words to make them sound more euphonic (Ivan Vassiliev, 2021)

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*In the current days, English is divided into several varieties, English spoken in different parts of the world Such as; Australian English, South African English, Indian English and so on However, two varieties of English are considered to be the most influential and widespread of all; generally known as British English, mainly spoken on the territory of Great Britain, and American English, the variety spoken in the U.S.A However, the accents this study will mention are the two inner-circle accents British English (BrE) and American English (AmE)

1.4 Differences between British and American English

In the current days, English is divided into several varieties and Englishes, spoken in different parts of the world Such as; Australian English, South African English, Indian English and so on However, two varieties of English are considered to

be the most influential and widespread of all; generally known as British English, mainly spoken on the territory of Great Britain, and American English, the variety spoken in the U.S.A

as Wales, Scotland and Ireland (Crystal, 1995)

In the 17th century, there was a very important colonization of Britain, the colonization was followed by trade and by the establishment of settlers English at that time, was not spoken by Americans, but then the British came there In addition, English was used for administration, commerce and education either as the mother tongue or as

a foreign or second language The settlers from England and later from all over the British Isles founded communities which used English as their native language, not only

at home and at work but also for government and law (Lingyu Qiu, 2011, p.6)

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1.4.2 American English

American English, on the other hand, is becoming one more dialect of the world English, and it has exercised greater influence on world English than any other variety (Crystal, 1995) American variety of English will, thus, imply the language spoken in the U.S with its geographically, politically and economically conditioned characteristics (Jankowaki, 1977) But the American English accents changed and influenced by the immigrations of the British and Germanic in the North America

American English evolved even more when the first wave of immigrants came to the country from the British Isles These immigrants are often called economic-immigrant, because they left the British Isles for economic reasons, to search for a new life in America (Wikipedia Contributions B, 2005) Until recently, “American English was considered less educated, less cultured and less beautiful than British English” (Totti,

2000, p.1), but with its status in media, international business, computing and science, American English has gained as a world language (Totti, 2002, p.245) Furthermore, American English is more accessible to a larger and, naturally, this has made American English more international

1.4.3 Overall differences between British and American English

1.4.3.1 The Linguistic Aspects

There are clearly many more varieties of English; British and American English are the two varieties that are taught in most EFL/ESL programs Generally, it is agreed that

no version is “correct”; however, there are certainly preferences in use The major differences between British and American English can be summarized as follows:

1.4.3.2 Pronunciation Level

The main difficulties EFL students may often face when learning English is pronunciation which seems to be one element which remark foreign accent The most important ones are standard pronunciation of British English which is known as Received Pronunciation (RP) and also called Oxford English or BBC English

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The second one is General American (G.A) which is the accent considered as standard

in North America and as such, it is the pronunciation heard in most of American Films,

Tv shows, series and national news The differences between British and American pronunciation can be summarized in terms of levels as explained in the following section:

A/ Vowels Differences

There are many differences at the level of vowels between British and American English The most important differences between RP and GA vowels are in the sound (Miss.Abderrahim Safaa, 2015):

• / ɒ / vs / a: /: Generally, RP has a slightly rounded / ɒ / in words like hot, stop, nod, where GA has an un-rounded / a: / sound

• / ɒ / vs / ɔː /: RP uses / ɒ / while GA uses / ɔː / before the consonants / ŋ /, / f /, / s / and / θ / This can be seen in words such as long, song, coffee

• /ᴧ / vs / 3: /: RP uses / ᴧ/ while GA uses / 3: / before the consonant /r / This

is found in words like courage, hurry, worry

• / a: / vs / æ /: RP uses / a: / while GA uses / æ / before the consonants / f /, / s/, / θ / and before the endings -nce , -nch , -nd and -nt This difference is found

in words like dance, path and command

• / əʊ / vs /aʊ /: RP uses /əʊ / while GA uses /aʊ / This is found in words like boat, coat and note

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B/ Consonants Differences

According to a study of Miss.Abderrahim Safaa (2015), BBC pronunciation and General American do not differ considerably in the consonantal systems The two standard accents have the same consonant phonemes The differences are based on their phonetic realization and their distribution The most important difference between the consonants of the two accents concerns the distribution of /r/ BBC English is a non-rhotic accent, i.e., this consonant occurs only before vowels There is no such constraint

on its distribution in General American, which is a rhotic accent, i.e., /r/ is pronounced everywhere (before a vowel, after a vowel, and in front of another consonant) This is explained in the following table:

Table 1.2: Pronunciation Differences of /r/

On other hand, many speakers of General American do not pronounce /j/ in stressed syllable after the alveolar consonants /t, d, n/, eg:

Word BBC Pronunciation General American

Table 1.3: The Pronunciation of /j/

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Besides, the consonant / ʃ/ is pronounced as / ʒ/ in a number of words, eg:

Table 1.4: Pronunciation Change of / ʃ / to / ʒ/

Moreover, there are other differences in terms of suffixes; the vowels in which are pronounced differently in the two standard accents There is a tendency for the “ile” suffix in hostile, fragile, futile To have a weak vowel or a syllabic consonant and to be pronounced / əl/ or in /l/ in General American, eg:

Table 1.5: The Change of the Suffix “ile”

The suffixes “-ary, -ery, -ory, -mony” usually have a weak vowel in BBC Pronunciation but a strong one in GA, eg:

Table 1.6: The Change of Suffixes ary- ery- ory in BBC and GA Pronunciation

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1.4.3.3 Vocabulary Level

British and American English have significantly different vocabulary and usage There are different words for the same concept, or the same word has different meanings More than a thousand words have different meanings or usages in British and American English Here are some common words used differently (Miss.Abderrahim Safaa, 2015):

informal or poetic language)

- angry

- mad

- mad

- crazy

Barrister/ solicitor Attorney, lawyer

Block of flats apartment house/building

Braces (to hold up trousers) suspenders (men’s)

cigarette; fag(slang)

cigarette or cigarette (in the US fag

or faggot means homosexual man (rude, offensive)

class, form

- grade (school levels 1st - 12th)

- class (top 4 levels 9th - 12th = freshman, sophomore, junior, senior)

diary (personal account) journal, diary

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driving license (c for noun, s for

Dummy (for babies) Pacifier

flat ('apartment' is sometimes used

heat & cook gaol, prison, jail prison, jail, penitentiary, pokey