Contrastive Analysis of the Elision of Schwa in English Utterances by Chinese and Uyghur Learners of English

Abstract—An acoustic study on the elision of schwa in English utterances produced by a native speaker of English, a Han Chinese learner of English, and a Uyghur learner of English is presented in this paper. With Praat software, three acoustic parameters – fundamental frequency, the first formant and the second formant – are measured with two tiers (syllables and words). Results show that the Uyghur produces the elision of schwa in the same way as the native speaker of English does while the Han Chinese produces the schwa in English poorly. It indicates that the English produced by learners are influenced by the transfer of their mother tongues. In addition, it shows that the second/third language speech acquisition is restricted by the first language phonological system. Keywords- schwa; elision; first formant; second formant I