47
however, mispronounced the shared sound feature, which resulted to [ek.ʊ.ret]
and
[ˈer.e.bɪk] pronunciations. According to Yulia and Ena 2004, this
phenomenon happened because of the difficulties in pronouncing the neutral schwa vowel
ə which resulted in erroneous sounds. This reason was also valid
with the second case of fortition. The neutral schwa vowel
ə was strongly pronounced to become o. It was conveyed in words recognize
[ˈrek.əg.naɪz]
which changed into [
ˈrɪk.og.naɪs] and pronunciation [prəˌnʌn.siˈe.sɪən] which
changed into [pro ˌnʌn.siˈe.sɪən].
2. Sound Addition
Sound addition refers to the insertion of sound in a word pronunciation. As mentioned and explained in the previous two chapters, sound addition consisted of
three types: excrescence, epenthesis, and prothesis. In this case, the researcher found only epenthesis type; the sound addition process which occurs in the middle
of the word. While, the other two types: excrescence and prothesis did not appear in this research. The sound addition occurrence, especially epenthesis in
participants‟ pronunciation and can be viewed in Table 4.2.
Table 4.2 The Classification of Words Affected by Sound Addition Words
Longman Dictionary
Participants’ Pronunciation
Changes
Able
ˈeɪ.bl ˈe.bəl
Addition ə sound in bl
cluster Example
ɪgˈzæm.pl ɪkˈsem.pəl
Addition ə sound in pl
cluster
48
There was only one case of sound addition that occurred in participants‟
pronunciation; the insertion of central mid vowel ə in cluster bl and pl. The
insertion was applied in the word able
[ˈeɪ.bl ] which had bl cluster and example [ɪgˈzæm.pl ] with its pl cluster. The insertion of central mid vowel ə in this case
was caused by the absence of such cluster in the participants‟ native language sound system. The appearance of those two clusters challenged the participants‟
pronunciation. According to Yulia and Ena 2004, speakers tend to add a sound
to conform to the phonotatic constraints. The addition of central mid vowel ə
helped the participants to relax the cluster in both words.
3. Fusion
Fusion refers to the blending of two sounds to become one new single sound. In this research, there were two words contains the fusion phenomenon.
They can be observed in the Table 4.3.
Table 4.3 The Classification of Words Affected by Fusion Words
Longman Dictionary
Participants’ Pronunciation
Changes
About ə
ˈbaʊt ə
ˈbot aʊ diphthong
o vowel
Without w
ɪˈðaʊt
w
ɪˈtot aʊ diphthong
o vowel
There was also only one case occurred in this type of sound change based
on the table. The fusion involved the blending of
aʊ diphthong sound into o one single sound. The case was available to be observed in the word about
49 [əˈbaʊt] which most participants tended to pronounce [əˈbot]. In this case, the
change was the result of the simplification. The simplification happened because such particular sound does not exist in t
he participants‟ mother tongue Ur, 1999. That was why the participants tended to replace the sound into the nearest
equivalence they knew.
4. Unpacking
Unpacking is the opposite of fusion. If fusion is the process of blending two sounds into one single sound, unpacking refers to the separation of one single
sound into two or more sounds in a word pronunciation. The appearance of unpacking in this research can be observed in Table 4.4.
Table 4.4 The Classification of Words Affected by Unpacking Words
Longman Dictionary
Participants’ Pronunciation
Changes
Combination
ˌk ːm.bɪˈneɪ.ʃn ˌkom.bɪˈne.sɪən
Unpacking of ʃ
s, ɪ, and ə sounds
Exposure
ɪkˈspoʊ.ʒə
r
ek
ˈspo.sɪə
r
Unpacking of ʒ
s, ɪ, and ə sounds
Information ˌɪn.fə
r
ˈmeɪ.ʃn ˌɪn.forˈme.sɪən
Unpacking of ʃ
s, ɪ, and ə sounds
Pronunciation prə
ˌnʌn.siˈeɪ.ʃn
pro
ˌnʌn.siˈe.sɪən Unpacking of
ʃ s,
ɪ, and ə sounds
From the table, the unpacking phenomenon in this research was divided into two cases. The first case was the separation of
ʃ into three sounds s, ɪ, and ə. The first case, as seen on the table, can be observed in the pronunciation of
word combination
[ˌkɑːm.bɪˈneɪ.ʃn]. The researcher found that most participants
50
tended to pronounce [ˌkom.bɪˈne.sɪən]. The breaking the palatal voiceless
consonantal sound
ʃ resulted the alveolar voiceless consonantal s sound
followed by high front
ɪ and central mid ə vowel sounds. The same sounds results appeared in the change of palatal voiced consonantal sound
ʒ as seen in
the word exposure
[ɪkˈspoʊ.ʒə
r
] which was commonly pronounced [ekˈspo.sɪə
r
] by most participants in this research. The separation in both palatal voiceless
consonantal sound
ʃ and palatal voiced consonantal sound ʒ into alveolar voiceless consonantal s sound were followed by high front
ɪ and central mid ə
vowel sounds. It occurred because of the simplification. The participants tended to
substitute the palatal sounds into alveolar sounds s, which is more familiar in
Indonesian language sound system.
5. Vowel Breaking
Vowel breaking is almost similar to unpacking. The difference is that vowel breaking indicates the change of the sound from single vowel into
diphthong. The appearance of vowel breaking based on this research was available in table 4.5.
Table 4.5 The Classification of Words Affected by Vowel Breaking Words
Longman Participants’
Changes
Country
ˈkʌn.tri ˈkaʊn.tri
Breaking of ʌ
aʊ sounds
Foreign
ˈfɔːr.ən ˈfor.eɪn
Breaking of ə
eɪ sounds
51
In this research, the vowel breaking phenomenon appeared in two cases.
The first case was the breaking of single vowel sound ʌ into diphthong sound
aʊ. As observed on the table, the representative example for the first case was
the word country
[ˈkʌn.tri]. Most participants mispronounced the word to become [ˈkaʊn.tri], allowing the diphthongization result to replace the single vowel
sound. The second case was the breaking of single vowel
ə into diphthong eɪ.
The breaking can be seen in the word foreign
[ˈfɔːr.ən], which most participants pronounced [ˈfor.eɪn]. The diphthong sound eɪ replaces schwa sound ə.
Although both cases did not share the same phonetic features to change, the cause of this phenomenon was simply similar to each other. Yulia and Ena 2004 state
Indonesian spelling is identical to the pronunciation. It means the vowel-breaking occurrence in this case was caused by most participants who pronounced those
words identically to the word spelling.
6. Assimilation
Assimilation refers to the sound change due to the influence of one sound upon each other resulting in the two similar sounds. Assimilation phenomenon is
divided into three types: palatalization, nasalization, and final devoicing Crowley, 1992: p. 49-56. In this research, the assimilation types occurred only in
final devoicing; allowing the final voiced sound into voiceless one. The sounds containing final devoicing phenomenon are available in the Table 4.6.
