CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS

HOW TO COMPARE SOUND SYSTEM

Created by :
1. Ade Kurnia Ramadhani (K2214001)
2. Amanda Ummu Haniah (K2214005)
3. Ariska Aditiara (K2214009)
4. Jody Wicaksono (K2214029)
5. Kholily Fatimah (K2214030)

ENGLISH EDUCATION DEPARTMENT

TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION FACULTY
SEBELAS MARET UNIVERSITY
2016
 HOW TO COMPARE SOUND SYSTEM

A. Introduction
Phoneme is the smallest unit of sound system of language. Phonemes are not
letters and even the letters do not always represent the phonemes. For example, the
letter p in phase does not represent the phoneme /p/. Two different sounds can be
phonemic differences or non-phonemic differences. The phoneme /p/ in spin and pin
are non-phonemic difference. Meanwhile, the phoneme /p/ in pin and phoneme /b/ in
bin are phonemic difference. There are three systems of contrast in English phoneme.
They are, constrast by voicing, manner of articulation, and point of articulation.
“The amazing thing is that a normal speaker of a language uses this complex
system of contrasts with great speed and the greatest of ease. He is not even aware in
most instances that he is using such a system. This feat can be accomplished by
reducing most of the operation of the system to automatic and semi-automatic habits.”
(Lado, 1957, p. 10). In this case, a learner accustomed to his mother tongue’s habit
system. Therefore, it is difficult for the learner to pronounce the other languages even
though he has no speech impediment and it also happens in listening. Learner also
tends to implement their language system while learning foreign language. Lado
(1957, p. 11) said that the learner transfers to that languages his phonemes and their
variants, stress and rhythm patterns, transition, intonation pattern and their interaction
with other phonemes. Storkel (2003) as cited in Andi (2013, p. 105) also agreed that
“since the learner tends to transfer the habits of his native language structure to the
foreign language, we have here the major source of difficulty or ease in learning the
structure of a foreign language.” When the learner hears foreign language phoneme,
he hears his own language phoneme. It is supported by Lado (1957, p. 11) that the
learner will consistently missed the phonemic difference if it is not the same with
learner’s native language.

B. Problem Analysis: Sound Segments

1. Comparison of Unit
There will be some problems in learning foreign language. The more
problems arise, the more difficulties will be faced by the learner. There are
three stages in handling data to find the problem, these are: linguistic analysis
of sound system, comparison of sound system and description of troublesome
 contrast (Lado, 1957, p. 12). Based on Lado (1957, p. 13), in comparing the
sound systems of foreign language and the native language we need to include
three checks:
a) Does the native language have a phonetically similar phoneme?
b) Are the variants of the phonemes similar in both languages?
c) Are the phonemes and their variants similarly distributed?
2. Location and Description of Segmental Problems
Below are pronunciation problems location and description in comparing
two different languages (native language and foreign language) and to answer
every checked point proposed by Lado.
a) Problem for 1st check:
When native language does not have the phonemes used by foreign
language, the learner will be difficult in producing the sound. He may
substitute the phoneme by his native stock. Sound system in Korea does
not have a number of phonemes that part of sound system of English.
Korean does not have /r/ as in run, /v/ as in love, /θ/ as in think. It will be
difficult for Korean speakers to pronounce and to hear the words clearly.
Futhermore, the result of a research conducted by Andi (2013, p. 128)
which compares Bahasa Indonesia and English phonemes shows that
Bahasa Indonesia does not have / æ, ʌ, ɜ, v, θ, ð / phonemes. Therefore,
it will be hard for Indonesian to produce that sound. Meanwhile, in
Vietnamese /p, k/ are unaspirated (Dinh & Nguyen, 1998 in Tang, 2007,
p. 24) and may be heard as /b/ and /g/ to an English speaker. While in
English sometimes /p, k/ are aspirated depending on its context (Harris,
1994, as cited in Tang, 2007, p. 24). Besides, in Vietnamese, syllable-
final /p, t, k/ are unreleased or “held in”; whereas, these sounds may be
released in English. Noguchi (2014, p. 294) explained that the Japanese
language only has 5 vowels meanwhile there are for about 20 vowels in
English. This difference will affect Japanese people’s ability to
recognize the difference between each vowel. The words ‘bad’ and ‘bed’
can sound the same for Japanese people because they do not recognize
its difference.
 How to compare
When comparing this point, it is better to have a phonemic chart for
each the two languages, the native and foreign. Lado (1957, p. 14)
conveys that both chart should be based on the same criteria of
classification: 1) horizontally with front of vocal apparatus to the left of
the page; 2) air stream variations vertically, with complete interruption at
the top of the page, decreasing to the bottom.

b) Problem for 2nd check:

The same phoneme may have phonetically different variants. Some
allophones of the ESL learner’s or the native speaker may also be
phonemes in English (Malah and Rashid, 2015, p. 106). For example,
while /n/ and /ŋ/, and /d/ and /ð/ are allophones in Japanese and Spanish
respectively, all the four are different phonemes in English (Malah and
Rashid, 2015, p. 106). Lado (1957, p. 13) in Linguistics Across
Cultures: Applied Linguistics for Language Teachers compared English
with Spanish in his book. He said that we might think that Spanish has
the same phoneme /d/ as /d/ in English. However, the variants are not
similar. Spanish has two variants of /d/, first is [d] as in dos ‘two’ and
the second is [đ] as in lado ‘side’. /d/ in Spanish resembles /d/ in English
as in day, while / đ/ in Spanish resembles /ð/ in English as in they. /d/
and/ ð/ is different phoneme in English. Spanish will transfer their entire
/d/ phoneme to English so they will produce [đ] variant between vowels
and after /r/, for example Spanish speaker will say lather instead of
ladder. In addition, Tang (2007, p. 23) said that in the initial position,
Vietnamese-specific consonants include the dental /t/ as in to which
means big and the dental aspirated /t/ as in thỏ which means rabbit. It is
similar to the English /t/ but it is produced between the teeth.
How to compare
When comparing this point, we should have the list of sound
features. They are voice and voiceless sounds; air stream flow; kind of
articulation manner (stops, fricatives, affricates, etc.); kind of points of
articulation (bilabial, labio-dental, velar, etc.).
 c) Problem for 3rd check:
In comparing Bahasa Indonesia with English, we will find /ŋ/
phoneme in both of the languages. Bahasa Indonesia /ŋ/ as in ngantuk
and English /ŋ/ as in angry. In Vietnamese, the /ŋ/ phoneme also can be
found in the initial position like in the word ngủ which means to sleep
(Tang, 2007, p. 8). However, we will notice that in Bahasa Indonesia and
Vietnamese, it appears on the beginning of words but not in English. The
English /ŋ/ comes out only in word medial and final positions but in
Bahasa Indonesia /ŋ/ can appear in word initial, medial and final
positions (Andi, 2013, p. 120). English speakers will have difficulty in
learning word initial / ŋ / because the transfer is limited.
3. Sequence Sound Problem
Besides those problems, there are sequence sounds or consonant problem
problem when Spanish speaker try to learn English. English has /sp, sk, st/
initial phoneme as in the spy, school, student. However, Spanish does not
allow blend at the beginning of a word, the learners may change the sound into
familiar sound for them (Helman, 2004, p. 454). Spanish will add e- in the
beginning of the words becomes espia, escuela, estudiante. The sound is not
limited to /sp,sk,st/ only but also /s/+/f,m,n,l/. There is also a case of
mispronounce a word although they have already mastered the phoneme.
However, the problem is not in pronunciation but it is simply because of not
knowing how to pronounce that word. It is a vocabulary problem.
4. Problems of Spelling Pronunciation
A learner might be right in writing a word but wrong in pronouncing it as
the reason that it is influenced by the writing system. It will be easier when
both the foreign language and native language use the same letter; however,
sometimes the same symbol can represent two different sounds in those
languages. Furthermore, the inconsistencies in the spelling of the foreign
language make one symbol to have different pronounciation. For example the
words food and foot have the same letter o; however, the pronounciations are
different. The word food should be pronounced as /fuːd/ while the word foot
should be pronounced as /fʊt/. That is why, a learner by assuming the symbol
represents the same sound, can have mispronunciation. The mispronounciation
can be predicted since the two languages have similar form which show the
 patterns of correspondences among the foreign language and the native
language. The learner in this case has spelling problems and to overcome the
problems, he should consider the vocabulary matter if the spellings only apply
to one word but if they apply to a large number of words, he should consider
and describe them as pattern of spelling mispronunciation (Lado,1957, p. 21).
5. Phonemic Contrast through Nonphonemic Features
The phonemic constrast which exists in the foreign language sometimes
does not exist in the native language. For example, the contrast /i:/ as in beat
and /I/ as in bit in English does not exist in Bahasa Indonesia. It will raise a
pronunciation problem both in speaking and in listening where Indonesian
people cannot hear the difference clearly (Lado,1957, p. 21)
6. Dialects
The variations which are shown by large number of people in speaking the
languages called as dialects. The dialect shows a manner of speaking like the
pronunciations, words, expressions, and grammatical constructions used more
or less throughout a group of speakers. Dialects are distributed over different
geographic areas, among different social classes, and at different times. There
are at least three major dialects areas in the United States they are, the North,
the Midlands, and the South. Meanwhile, in England, the dialect of south of
England resembles the Receive Standard in pronunciation and many of the
northerly dialects resembles the Midland American closer than the Receive
Standard. What to do when facing these differences? Comparing a specific
dialect of the native language with a specific dialect of the foreign language is
the way to analyze the pronunciation problems. A given dialects is sometimes
having greater prestige than the others. Having more similarities with the
foreign language will make it easier to learn the language (Lado,1957, pp. 22-
23)
7. Unpredictable Alternation between Two Potential Substitutions
When there is no certain phoneme in a language, the speaker of that
language will substitute it with another phoneme. The substitution from one
language to another however, can be different. For example, there is no /θ/
phoneme in Japanese, Thailand, Tagalog and Spanish. The Japanese and
Spanish will substitute the /θ/ to /s/ while the Thailand and Tagalog will
substitute the /θ/ to /t/. Why is there a difference if in all four languages there
 is /s/ and /t/ phonemes? The reason behind it is because the fact that a
language has its own system with may be different with one another. Each
language has its own prefference to alternate a phoneme and the alternation is
relative (Lado,1957, pp. 24-27).

C. Problem Analysis: Stress and Rhythm

Lado (1957, p. 28) states that stress and rythm are significant in many aspect of
pronunciation. With different stress and rythm, there will be different pronunciation.
Since pronunciation can determine the intelligibility of spoken communication, it is
necessary to take this matter into account. Rhythm and stress problem analysis is of
importance not only because stress is phonemic, that is, significant, in English and in
other languages but also because stress and rhythm usually exert considerable
pressure on other matters of pronunciation. Obviously, we must consider stress and
rhythm in any description of pronunciation problem. Since we know that the learner
tends to transfer his pronunciation system, including stress and rhythm patterns, to the
foreign language, we will look for stress and rhythm problems in the differences
between the two languages. The comparison of English and Spanish serves here to
llustrate how two languages may be compared as to stress and rhythm.
English has four significant degrees of stress, that is, four stress phonemes, or
five if we consider zero stress as phonemic. Three of them are fixed as to position and
are describable in terms of words or phrases, the fourth one is moveable and
describable in terms of sentences and sequences of sentences. The trhree of those
degrees are called primary (the heaviest), secondary (the intermediate), and weak. The
moveable stress is called as sentence stress. The tendency to uniform length between
stresses makes English rhythm “phrase timed” rather than “syllable timed”. While the
Spanish has three significant levels of stress, two of them are describable in terms of
words and phrases; their positions are fixed for each word. The third one is
describable in terms of sentences; it is moveable within the sentence to signal
different points of attention. Spanish rhythm tends to give each syllable approximately
the same duration of time, the phrases thus will be longer or shorter depending on the
number of syllables contained. Therefore, it can be said that Spanish has syllable-
timed rhythm. English has definite patterns in the placement of primary stress and that
some of those patterns are described from the beginning of words and others from the
end, while Spanish location seems to be governed from the end of each word.
 Noguchi (2014, p. 294) states that the difference between vowels system and
rhythm pattern in English and Japanese makes it hard for Japanese people to learn
articulating English. It is then furtherly explained that Japanese speakers and English
speaker move their articulatory organs differently. Since it is known that Japanese
vowles are a lot less in number compared to English vowels, Japanese speaker will
face a difficulty to produce certain English vowels because of this. That is why
learning about how these articulatory organs work may be necessary in this case.
However, Noguchi (2014, p. 297) also points out that the less phonemes in
Japanese language can lead Japanese speaker to not realize their capacity in producing
more sounds by moving their articulatory organs in more varied way. Esling and
Wong (1983) in Noguchi (2014, p. 297) proposes a model to help people become
more aware of different ways to make use of their articulators. It contains of: a) spread
lips, b) open jaw, c) palatalized tongue body position, d) retroflex articulation, e) nasal
voice, f) lowered larynx, g) creaky voice.

D. Problem Analysis: Intonation

The problem in learning the pitch system of a foreign language will vary
depending on whether both of the native and foreign language are intonation
languages or one is a tone language. English has four pitch phonemes, not four fixed
points on a musical scale but four relative levels. They are called low, mid, high, and
extra high. these pitch phonemes have no lexical meaning in themselves, but any of
them may change an intonation phrase into another, just as any one of the segmental
phonemes of English can change one word into another word.
The first stage is the comparison of pitch phonemes. If two languages share the
same number of pitch phonemes they are similar enough to function as same, but they
do not indicate that there will not be any problems in learning their intonation. When
one goes from a native language having more pitch phonemes than the foreign one,
there will be no major intonation problem because he will be able to hear the fewer
distinctions of the foreign language. The second stage is the comparison of intonation
patterns. Most of the intonation problems will stem from the patterns which are the
same in form in the two languages but have different meaning in each. The learner
will automatically select the patterns of his native language for the meaning he wants
to express. He will also interpret the foreign language problem with the native
language meaning.
REFERENCES

Andi-Pallawa, B., & Alam, A. F. A. (2013). A comparative analysis between English

and Indonesian phonological systems. International Journal of English
Language Education, 1(3), 103-129.
Helman, L. A. (2004). Building on the sound system of Spanish: Insights from the
alphabetic spellings of English-language learners. The Reading Teacher, 57(5),
452-460.
Lado, R. (1957). Linguistics across cultures: Applied linguistics for language teachers.
Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Malah, Z., & Rashid, S. M. (2015). Contrastive Analysis of the Segmental Phonemes of
English and Hausa Languages. International Journal of Languages, Literature
and Linguistics, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 106-112.
Noguchi, J. (2014). Contrastive Analysis between Japanese and American English
Sound Systems: From and Artoculatory Setting Perspective. The Journal of
Kanda University of International Studies, 26, 293-309.
Storkel, Holly L. (2003). Learning new words II: Phonotactic probability in verb
learning.
Tang, Giang. M. (2007). Cross-Linguistic Analysis of Vietnamese and English with
Implications for Vietnamese Language Acquisition and Maintenance in the
United States. Journal of Southeast Asian American Education & Advancement,
2, 1-33.
ARTICLES