EFL Learners’ Attitude toward Two Major English Varieties: From Perplexity to Prejudice
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.52690/jadila.v2i1.174Keywords:
British English (BE), American English (AE), English variety (EV)Abstract
For EFL learners, English language is a part of the main course to consume at school. However, some of them and even English teachers are not too familiar with 2 major English varieties (EV). They are American English (AE) & British English (BE). So far, that issue doesn’t bring up responsive concern, but some questions from EFL learners prompt such an inquiry. One of those questions is; which one of those EVs has more economical benefit for their future? In addition, frequent debate might occur among EFL learners about the correct version between kid or child, lorry or truck, taxy or cab, flat or apartment and many others. This chaotic mix-up is undeniable. Thus, this study investigates learners’ attitude on both English varieties, BE and AE, in terms of learners’ prejudice and perplexity which are encountered in learning process. This survey embraced 50 university students to put forward their own perspectives on an open-ended questionnaire consisting of four questions. Next, all answers were grouped into three categories to be interpreted. The survey shows that 50% of students insist that AE is the most well-acceptable English across the globe that could contribute to their better future socially and economically, and the rest percentage shows various contradictive arguments. It is suggested that English teachers are supposed to consider the differences between BE and AE in designing teaching material to avoid EFL learners’ perplexity and prejudice on both EVs.
Downloads
References
Ahmed, Z.T., Abdullah, A.N., & Heng, C.S. (2013). The Role of Accent and Ethnicity in the Professional and Academic Context. International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature. ISSN 2200-3592 (Print), ISSN 2200-3452 (Online). Vol. 2 No. 5; September 2013
Bent, T., & Holt, R. F. (2017). Representation of Speech Variability. WIREs Cogn Sci. doi: 10.1002/wcs.1434
Bernaisch, T. (2012). Attitudes towards Englishes in Sri Lanka. World Englishes. 31 (3), 279-291.
Cargile, A. C. (2000). Evaluations of employment suitability: Does accent always matter. Employment counseling, 37,165-176.
Cargile, A. C., & Giles, H. (1998). Language attitudes toward varieties of English: An American-Japanese context. Applied Communication Research, 26, 338-356.
Carrie, E. (2017). British is professional, American is urban’: attitudes towards English reference accents in Spain. International Journal of Applied Linguistics. Vol. 27, No. 2, 2017
Crystal & David. (2003). A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics, 3rd ed. Cambridge: Massachusetts.
Cateford, J. C. (2003). A Practical Introduction to Phonetics. New York: Oxford University Press, pp.120- 201.
Coupland, N., & Bishop, H. (2007). “Ideologies’ Values for British Accents.” Journal of Sociolinguistics.
Dimitrova, S. (2010). British and American Pronunciation. New York: Oxford University Press.
Dörnyei, Z., K. Csizér, & N. Németh (2006). Motivation, language attitudes and globalization: A Hungarian attitude. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Fought, C. 2002. “California Learners’ Perceptions of, You Know, Regions and Dialects?” In Handbook of Perceptual Dialectology. Vol II, edited by D. Long and D. R. Preston. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Garrett, P. (2009). Attitudes to Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
González, J. A. (2004). Options and criteria for the choice of an English pronunciation model in Spain. In J. Anderson, J. M. Oro, and J. Varela Zapata (eds), Linguistic attitudes from the classroom: language teaching in a multicultural Europe. Universidade de Santiago de Compostela.
Han, L. (2019). A Review of the Major Varieties of English Language. International Education Studies; Vol. 12, No. 2; 2019 ISSN 1913-9020 E-ISSN 1913-9039 Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education
Henderson, A., D. et al. (2012) The English pronunciation teaching in Europe survey: Selected results. Research in Language 10.1: 5–27.
Hos seinzadeh, N. M., Kambuziya, Z., & Shariati, M. (2015). British and American Phonetic Variety. Journal of Language Teaching and Research. ISSN 1798-4769. Vol. 6, No. 3, pp. 647-655, May 2015 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/jltr.0603.23
Jarvella, R. J., E. Bang, A. L. Jakobsen, and I. M. Mees (2001). Of mouths and men: non-native listeners’ identification and evaluation of varieties of English. International Journal of Applied Linguistics 11.1: 37–56.
Lasagabaster, D. (2005) Attitudes towards Basque, Spanish and English: an analysis of the most influential variables. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development.
Lippi-Green, R. (2012) English with an accent: language, ideology and discrimination in the United States. 2nd edn. Oxford: Routledge.
Janicka, K., Kul, M., & Weckwerth, J. (2008) Polish learners’ attitudes to native English accents as models for EFL pronunciation. In K. Dziubalska-Kolaczyk, and J. Przedlacka (eds), English pronunciation models: a changing scene, 2nd edn. Hamburg: Peter Lang.
Mair, C. (2007). Varieties of English around the world: Collocational and cultural profiles1. DOI: 10.1515/9783110197860.437.
Moody, S. (2011). The diversity of English in America. Popular linguistics, 1.
McKenzie, R. M. (2015). “The Sociolinguistics of Variety Identification and Categorisation: Free Classification of Varieties of Spoken English amongst Non-Linguist Listeners.” Language Awareness 24 (2).
Mesthrie, R., Jpan, S., Ana, D., & William, L. L. (2009). Introducing sociolinguistics. Edinburgh University Press.
Preston, D. R. (2008). How can you learn a language that isn’t there? In K. DziubalskaKolaczyk, and J. Przedlacka (eds), English pronunciation models: a changing scene, 2nd edn. Hamburg: Peter Lang.
Rindal, U. (2010) Constructing identity with L2: pronunciation and attitudes among Norwegian learners of English. Journal of Sociolinguistics 14.2: 240–61.
Ryan, E. B., & Giles, H. (1982). Attitudes towards language variation: Social and applied contexts. London, England: Edward Arnold.
Roach, P. (2009). English Phonetics and Phonology: A Practical Course. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sevinj, M. (2015). American Variety of English Language. International Journal of English Linguistics. Vol. 5, No. 5; 2015 ISSN 1923-869X E-ISSN 1923-8703
Sierra, J. M. (2005). The nativeness factor: an analysis of learners’ preferences. ITL International Journal of Applied Linguistics 148: 21–43.
Spencer, & Oatey, H. (2008). Culturally speaking: culture, communication and politeness theory. London: Continuum.
Thomason, & Grey, S. (2001). Language Contact. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Qiu, Lingyu. (2010-12). British English VS American English. INS Eduard Fontserè: Judit Nochta Publication.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2021 Rina Herlina, Didih Faridah
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
_1.png)
