ACOUSTIC ANALYSIS OF ENGLISH VOWELS PRODUCED BY AMERICAN SPEAKERS AND HIGHLY COMPETENT SERBIAN L2 SPEAKERS

Abstract

The paper submits the findings of the research which explored the acoustic properties of highly competent Serbian L2 speakers’ vowels and the vowels produced by American native speakers in two reading tasks. The study involved four participants: two female native speakers of English and two highly proficient female Serbian speakers of English. The participants were instructed to read a dialogue and a story, after which the duration and the quality of the vowels produced were measured. Based on the analysis of the collected data, the results showed that there were differences in the production of vowels between the two groups of speakers, but it was concluded that, despite these differences, the Serbian participants did not have any major issues with the production of vowels that would significantly, or at all, afflict their intelligibility. Neither the vowel quality nor the vowel duration was critical for the Serbian participants compared to that of the American speakers. What the research instead inferred was that the American participants displayed a strong tendency to reduce their vowels, while the Serbian participants did not reveal such a marked tendency to do the same.