AN OT ANALYSIS OF MANDARIN INTERFERENCE IN THE PRONUNCIATION OF ENGLISH OBSTRUENT-OBSTRUENT CLUSTERS

Considerable research has focused on the interference of the native language (L1) in second language (L2) learning, motivating the present study to look more deeply into how Mandarin interferes in the pronunciation of English obstruent-obstruent clusters by Taiwan Mandarin-speaking elementary school children. Optimality Theory is utilized to provide a formal analysis of Taiwan elementary school children's strategies for pronouncing English obstruent-obstruent clusters: schwa [a] insertion or obstruent deletion. English syllables allow complex syllable margins, while Mandarin syllables strictly forbid obstruent clusters at syllable margins. Therefore, Taiwan elementary school children might utilize either epenthesis or the deletion of segments to deal with the pronunciation of English words with complex syllable margins. The constraint ranking proposed in the study reflects that Taiwan elementary school children's pronunciation of English obstruent-obstruent clusters shows interference from Mandarin. Utilizing the findings in the present study and the propositions contained within the Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis, the study will provide pedagogical suggestions on form focused instruction and corrective feedback.