AbstractsLanguage, Literature & Linguistics

Abstract

This thesis addresses the integration of quantitativist sociophonetic studies of vocalic variation and cultural adaptation theory and serves as an attempted explanatory device to show how psychosocial attitudinal mechanisms in cross-cultural encounters can play a role in second language acquisition and production. The question this study seeks to answer is whether or not significant links can be found between fine-grained phonetic variation in L2 production and cultural adaptation in a migration context. This investigation is carried out using the example of US Americans migrants in Germany, and their production of the German front rounded vowels /y:/ and /ø:/, sounds that are foreign to their American English native phonology. The data used for this study consist of questionnaire responses from and interviews with seven US American migrants who have acquired German as an L2 as adults, and who have lived in Germany for a minimum of eight years at the point of the study, as well as four native speaker controls. Adult L2 learners are generally thought to be constrained in their L2 attainment, particularly with respect to pronunciation due to biological age factors. However, research has also identified many late learners whose L2 pronunciation has become indistinguishable from that of native speakers. Therefore, sociocultural variables such as cultural identity have to be taken into consideration as potential factors influencing the degree of foreign accentedness in L2 speech, one of them being cultural identity. Based on the ideas of Social Identity Theory, Acculturation Theory and Accent Accommodation Theory, and the argument that negotiation of identity questions is particularly noticeable in migrant contexts, it is hypothesized in this thesis that L2 speakers with more successful integrative acculturation patterns will be more likely to accommodate cultural elements in the form of non-inventory speech sounds, exemplified by /y:/ and /ø:/, through the process of phonetic category formation. By implication, those participants who show less positive acculturation attitudes towards the target culture are more likely to express cultural distance by diverging from German linguistic norms, for example through lack of clear category formation for non-inventory L2 sounds, or category formation based on qualities that diverge from native norms. To test this hypothesis, this study employs mainly quantitative methods. Accent Accommodation is measured on the basis of the participants’ vowel formant frequencies (F1 and F2, reflecting height and frontness/backness) in comparison to the values measured for the German native speakers. The analyzed speech material consists of both read and spontaneous speech production. Acculturation is measured with the help of the Stephenson Multigroup Acculturation Scale (SMAS). However, as it is acknowledged that quantitative methods can only cover a fraction of multiplex concepts such as culture and identity, a qualitative textual analysis of the attitudinal data gained through the interview is…