English Rhythm of Guangxi Zhuang EFL learners

Abstract

The study intends to explore EFL learners' Rhythm of English through a phonetic experiment over the reading-aloud task produced by the English learners from Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. The tested subjects are grouped as the first-year non-major learners(NM1), the second-year non-major learners(NM2), the first-year major learners(M1) and the second-year major learners(M2). On the basis of the segmental analyses, four acoustic rhythmic indices are calculated: vowel quantity (V%) and consonantal variance (Δ C) proposed by Ramus et al (1999), vocalic normalized Pairwise Variability Index (nPVI) and intervocalic raw Pairwise Variability Index (rPVI) proposed by Grabe and Low (2002). The findings show that the English-major learners have a greater improvement than the non-major learners in the rhythmic production, suggesting that systematic instruction over the explicit phonetic and phonological knowledge together with comprehensive L2 input and sufficient L2 output helps to bridge the rhythmic marked difference between the learners' L1 and L2.