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B. The Linguistic Strategies Done by the Japanese Singer in Producing Tense
Vowels, Diphthongs, and Liquids
This is the second part of the discussion in this chapter. From the previous results, it can be concluded that the Japanese speaker had different pronunciation
process from the English speaker. The difference appears when the singer as a representation of Japanese speaker produced the tense vowels, diphthongs, and
liquids. Then, this part mentions and describes the linguistic strategies done by the Japanese singer when he produced tense vowels, diphthongs, and liquids.
From the videos analyzed, it was found that there were two linguistic strategies done by Japanese singer in producing tense vowels, diphthongs, and
liquids. The strategies which were frequently used were sound substitution and sound simplification. Therefore, this part discusses the two sections.
1. Sound Substitution
In general, sound substitution is the strategy done by a non-native speaker when heshe used the sounds in hisher first language to replace the non-exist sounds
in hisher first language. Sound substitution was one of the linguistic strategies which was frequently used by the singer in pronouncing English words. This strategy
frequently appeared when the singer produced i sound in the words me, street, knee, see, eternity,
and venality. Even though all of those words appeared once in
a song, they are only the words in a song containing the tense vowel of i which means the others only contains
ɪ sounds. In another song the substitution frequently
appeared in the words heavenly and deeply, both of which appeared twice in a song.
40 The examples of sound substitution in tense vowels could be seen when
the singer said the words me, street, knee, and see, he exchanged the tense vowel
i into ɪ which becomes mɪ, strɪt, nɪ, and sɪ. Other examples were the words
deeply, heavenly, eternity, and venality. The singer produced
ɪ sound to replace i sound in the last syllable of the words. Therefore, the pronunciation became
d ɪplɪ, hevənlɪ, etᴈ:nətɪ, and vənalətɪ.
The other examples were from liquids production. The sound substitution
also appeared frequently. As the examples, in a song there were words rolling and asphalt
in which they appeared four times for each word. The other words such as
dare, grown, blood, and survive appeared once. In another song there were words
your and holding, both of which appeared twice in a song.
Then, the process of substitution could be seen when the singer said the
words rolling and grown. He replaced r sound to be l sound. As a result, the
pronunciation became l ɔ:lɪŋ and glon. This is exactly the same as the meaning of
sound substitution itself in which non-native English speakers do the labeling the non-existing sound with the sound which is present in their language and has the
closest quality with the English sound. In this case, i became ɪ and r became l.
2. Sound Simplification
The second strategy which could be identified from the pronunciation process of Japanese singer was sound simplification in which the certain sound
within one syllable was simplified into simple sound McMahon, 2002. This action frequently occurred when the singer produced the diphthongs. It could be seen from
some examples in one song. There were the words rolling and cold which appear
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four times for each word. In another song there were words snake and taste which appeared once and other words such as so and wake appeared twice for each word.
From the strategy used, the examples could be seen when the singer said
the words cold, twilight, snake, and taste. Those words should be pronounced with
clear diphthongs which are ko ʊld, twaɪlaɪt, sneɪk, and teɪst. In fact, the singer
had simplified the pronunciation of the diphthongs which became k ɔ:ld, tw :let,
snek, and test. From the examples of some acts done by the singer, it is true that the singer
did the sound simplification. The acts of simplifying the sound also occurred in diphthongs. In addition, this is exactly the same as what McMahon 2002 had stated
that the sound simplification usually occurs within short and long vowels.
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