Expoloring the Difficulties Native Mandarin and Arabic speakers Facing when Learning English
This paper presents a comparative analysis of Mandarin, Arabic and English in the phonological part. The study focuses on the challenges and difficulties faced by L1 Mandarin and Arabic speakers in acquiring English pronunciation. Chinese is tone-based, and Arabic has a simpler vowel system; in contrast, English, a Germanic language, uses a complicated inventory of vowels and consonants, elaborate syllabic structures, and prominence-related stress patterns. The study looks at how the Arabic vowel and consonant inventory and the Pinyin system, a Chinese phonetic transcription tool, affect phonetic transfer problems when learning English. The study aims to help native Mandarin and Arabic speakers have a better understanding of the difference among different languages which would help them overcome the challenges and achieve more native-like fluency in English speaking.
Authors
- Zixuan Wu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0005-9370-6313)
Institutions
- University of Massachusetts Amherst (US)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Journal of Education Humanities and Social Sciences
- Published
- 2024-12-13
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.54097/jk0dnn44
- Primary Topic
- EFL/ESL Teaching and Learning
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00