Of mouths and men: non-native listeners' identification and evaluation of varieties of English

Advanced Danish students of English as a foreign language tried to identify the national origin of young men from Ireland, Scotland, England and the USA from their speech and rated the speech for attractiveness. Two male speakers from each country were heard reading lists of words aloud (Experiment...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:International journal of applied linguistics 2001, Vol.11 (1), p.37-56
Main Authors: Jarvella, Robert J., Bang, Eva, Jakobsen, Arnt Lykke, Mees, Inger M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Advanced Students
College Students
Denmark
England
English
English (Second Language)
Foreign Countries
Higher Education
Ireland
Language Attitudes
Language Variation
Males
Oral Language
Scotland
United States
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Summary:Advanced Danish students of English as a foreign language tried to identify the national origin of young men from Ireland, Scotland, England and the USA from their speech and rated the speech for attractiveness. Two male speakers from each country were heard reading lists of words aloud (Experiment 1) and making utterances that could be used to say hello to someone, thank them,swear at them, or say good‐bye (Experiment 2). In both studies, listeners succeeded about three‐fourths of the time in recognizing a speaker's country of origin. Listeners were more accurate in identifying speakers from England and from the USA, but identi ?ability also varied between speakers from the same country. Listeners rated speech produced by Englishmen as most attractive and the speech of Americans as least so. Rated attractiveness also varied with the speaker and the kind of utterance produced.
ISSN:0802-6106
1473-4192
DOI:10.1111/1473-4192.00003