THE ACQUISITION OF LOW BACK MERGER IN NON-NATIVE SPEAKERS OF AMERICAN ENGLISH

This study deals with the acquisition of /(sic)/(Eng. CAUGHT) and /alpha/ (Eng. COT) by a group of 6 non-native speakers of American English of Serbian language background. Firstly, the acoustic analysis of F1 and F2 shows that most speakers in this study keep the contrast between the two vowels. The vowel contrast exhibited by the participants of this study may be described as not as strong as in other studies concerning native speakers of American English. This new finding applies to the native speakers of standard Serbian who are non-native speakers of American English. Secondly, the loss of the vowel contrast that is an attested change displayed by native speakers of North American English and usually referred to as a "low back merger" is also found in our cohort. Even though the low back merger was not formally taught to the non-native speakers that are participants of this study, some are shown to have absorbed the changes in the vocalic structure from their language community by adopting the vowel merger. The acquisition of the low back merger brings the participants of this study closer to the phonetic habits of native speakers of American English.