Giving pronunciation a bad name?

Clip art: Clker

Clip art: Clker

What you call it does, of course, make a difference, e.g., EHIEP or HICPR! But how's this for a concluding line to an abstract: "This work demonstrates the potency of processing fluency in the information rich context of impression formation." There are, of course, a plethora of potential reasons that a name or term may appeal or stick quickly, other than just "easier to pronounce," the focus of the 2012 study by Laham, Koval and Alter in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. That effect was evident irrespective of " . . .  name length, unusualness, typicality, foreignness, and orthographic regularity." In other words, if subjects (simply) reported that a name was easier to pronounce, for the most part that seemed to be based on ease of articulation and  perhaps a bit of "sound symbolism" thrown in.

The more interesting implication of the study, however, is the claim that ease of articulation translates into ease of processing fluency--and more favorable impressions or ratings for the bearers of the names, whether of a person, place or thing. So how is that for a criterion for vocabulary selection and sequencing? Begin with more positive words that are easier and more pleasurable to pronounce; hold off on the nasty consonant clusters and idiosyncratic intonation contours until later: what can be more easily pronounced will be encoded and recalled . . . better.

 At least it suggests that in the  process of targeting a specific vowel or consonant that, all things being equal, the anchoring and practice should not dwell on words that are overwhelmingly negative or which contain problematic articulation, despite the intrinsic "vividness" and affect "punch" involved. I had a somewhat "cynical"  colleague who taught pronunciation almost exclusively in the context of pollution--and who was always puzzled that his students were not more positive about the improvement in pronunciation that (should have) resulted. Based on this study, I suspect that the something of the combination of the grim topic/presentation and encountering terms such as "environmental" or "toxic" early on may have helped give his class a bad "name" . . .

Just blowing smoke or essential pronunciation practice ritual?

(Caveat Emptor: If you as an instructor have serious issues with even reading a model piece from an outfit that provides custom essays for college students for a fee, you may want to avoid the link above! If you have never seen one of these "rhetorical pirates" in action, you may enjoy just checking out the sell, regardless. )

I stumbled onto this stock, freshman English-level essay on "Sacred Pipe Ritual" some time ago on the "Dreamessays.com" site. There are many like it out there. This particular essay does list the  "standard" set of ritual parameters of the pipe ceremony seen in many cultures world wide. What it highlights for us is the structure and functions of ritual in general. As noted in earlier posts, the EHIEP system is, on the one hand, highly ritualistic, using haptic video to lead learners (in the complete system) through around 30, 20-30 minute, fixed routines--8 done in class, 24 done as homework. Within the routines are a number of functions, from general learning readiness to anchoring of the essential sounds and sound patterns of English. Those functions are then readied to be carried over into the classroom or personal practice. Note the parallels between the "pipe" ritual elements and what has been described in earlier posts as the key elements of HICP work:

• The pipe becomes the sole focus or center of attention, representing the center of the cosmos. (That may be stretching the analogy a bit!)
• The design on the pipe bowl often resembles the trachea.
• The gestures in the ritual are predominately pointing, either in the four directions or toward participants.
• The two parts of the pipe, bowl and stem are ritually joined together, creating strong symbolism, especially of connection to nature and potency. (The parallel there to haptic events is striking--and worth a later post!)
• The symbolism of the four directions has many manifestations, but, in essence, East relates to birth; West, to death; South to earth (or female/mother); North, to the sun (or male). From the several earlier posts on the phonaesthetics of the visual field and placement of sound patterns within them, the convergence is striking--assuming that the vowel matrix is positioned so that front vowels are to the right, versus the standard IPA left to right orientation.
• Finally, the physical presence of the smoke can take on any number of symbolic functions in unifying the experience for the participants. (There is a great deal of smoke and mirrors in the field today!)

Going back to the previous post. Once you have articulated your approach to pronunciation systematically, examine the ritual inherent in it and how that should relate to integration into spontaneous speech. That is where we are headed today with the accessibility of virtual technology. Put that in your pipe and smoke it! 

The "Rhythm method": a piece of cake

One of my early heros was Louis Hjelmslev, originator of the linguistic theory or model called, Glossematics. It laid the foundation for structuralist work in semiotic network-based models, which have since morphed into contemporary frameworks of mind and brain. His book, Prolegomena to a Theory of Language (published the year I was born!), had--and still has--a major influence on how I look at language production from the perspective of the learner. Hjelmslev's central epistemological principle was that of the "glosseme," the minimal meaningful unit of analysis in describing a language system. In phonology, for example, it was the phoneme; in semantics, the 'cememe'; in grammar, the morpheme, etc.

In other words, within an experiential system, you focused initially on the "sign" (in the semiotic sense of an icon that has independent meaning and point back to something.) In another type of analysis, even on the same data, that might not be the place you begin your analysis, but it was acceptable from a functional perspective. (I am grossly oversimplifying this . . . but glossematically . . . that is probably ok?)

My point here? In HIPC/EHIEP work, the key organizing principle, as noted two post earlier, is grammar/rhythm grouping of the words that are being haptically anchored. The best analogy I have come up with, and I welcome your recommending a better one, is a piece (or slice) of cake. In this sense:
(a) We begin with defining the mood of the spoken discourse--what kind of cake is this?: What is the emotional felt sense of the speakers. If it is as simple classroom exercise, we might term it "business-like" or "boring to the extreme."
(b) We identify the prominent words or syllables--what will be it's visual features or distinct "flavors"
(c) We mix the ingredients and bake the cake: We read it over quickly to get the story or narrative.
(d) We cut out a piece of it, each piece containing one prominent syllable or more,
(e) We examine the prominent syllable more carefully and anchor it for vowel quality.
(f) We practice/anchor the piece, by itself, focusing on rhythm and the prominent syllable.
(g) We add on the analog "wave" contour (intonation contour) that is contained by the boundaries of the piece.
(h) We add on any necessary additional expressiveness--in the form of dynamic pitch changes.
(i) We go back to a rhythm focus, blending all the ingredients back together, still staying centered on the prominent syllable(s).
(j) Finally, we shrink-wrap the piece and all others in the sentence or conversational turn, haptically compressing all the syllables but the prominent one--into more natural, native-like pace or speed.

Like I said . . . it is just a piece of cake. 

Pronunciation syllabus "line of march"

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Recall that HICP (and EHIEP) assumes that pronunciation classes as separate entities are at best unnecessary, that the work should be integrated into speaking, listening or conversation teaching. Somewhat paradoxically, it has a relatively fixed order of presentation and practice that is generally applicable for ANY learner group. Most importantly, what is also being learned is a set of learner skills and strategies to enhance pronunciation learning--and a toolkit of pedagogical tools for classroom presentation, feedback and correction. In some ways it is a return to the idea of a more uniform syllabus ordering in pronunciation instruction in terms of efficient, initial teaching, followed up with extensive, integrated classroom application.

There are several good pronunciation texts out today that can be used in conjunction w/EHIEP, or to complement it, depending on the context.  For adult pre-academic types, I still like Clear Speech by Gilbert. One reason is that the syllabus, or at least the table of contents (linked above) is not too far off from that of EHIEP: Syllables, Rhythm, Vowels, Word and Sentence stress, Consonants, Intonation and Thought groups. Clear Speech is set up so that it is not necessary to go through the book in that order--but it isn't a bad idea; it is still fine to skip around. (So it says in the introduction to most pronunciation books today, in fact.)  

Here is the basic EHIEP order of instruction: Warm up, Vowels and word stress, Syllables and sentence stress, Intonation, Rhythm, Integrated thought groups. (Consonants are dealt with as necessary, throughout the syllabus.) This fixed "line of march" is probably the most controversial--and critical--feature of the EHIEP system. The underlying rationale for that will be the subject of an upcoming post. For the time being, just warm up a bit more to HICP instruction and follow us. 

A place for EHIEP in Pronunciation Utopia!

Photo credit: Japan Sumo
Association

For an excellent glimpse of the future of (at least Canadian) pronunciation teaching, by one of its leading theorists, see this paper, Utopian Goals for Pronunciation Teaching, from the 2009 Pronunciation in Second Language Learning and Teaching Conference at Iowa State University, by Derwing. I'd agree with most all of the projections and recommendations, but would note one obvious omission (big as Asanowaka, pictured at the left, from our perspective.)

Recall the earlier post which quoted another important 2005 paper by Derwing and Munro, " . . . we would ask whether the aspects of a learner’s speech that cause problems for intelligibility are the focus of instruction, regardless of the teaching methods employed." "Utopia," is also "method-neutral."

EHIEP (Essential, haptic-integrated English pronunciation), by contrast, is an ordered, HICP method that is applicable to a wide range of learner populations--that, in essence, begins where Derwing leaves off--in the classroom. It comes with a basic curriculum and requires little formal training for the instructor, although the basic pedagogical movement patterns and anchoring protocols can be easily adapted for use with learners of any proficiency in any skill area syllabus or classroom. It focuses on teaching and anchoring productive use of what has been identified as essential, first for all learners (basic prominence, vowels, stress, conversational rhythm and intonation) and then goes on to attend to selected learner-specific consonants and other processes, as necessary. (See earlier posts on specifics.) When you are ready to "do" pronunciation, this side of Utopia, get in touch!

The "I" in Haptic-integrated Clinical Pronunciation Teaching

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We use "integrated" in at least two distinct senses. The first, the "gold standard" today in the field, is the curricular strategy of "simply" busting up the pronunciation class and then inserting its parts throughout the program and, ideally, merging the techniques with other skill-based procedures. (See the earlier post on the subject, linked to Grant & Levis, 2004.) Here is a brief article by Steed at the University of Sidney describing a possible/typical approach to integrating pronunciation activities and techniques into speaking instruction (including the standard questionnaire-based check with students to see if they feel like it "works.")

The other sense of the term integrated--what makes the HICP perspective unique--is the requirement for extensive haptic anchoring (using movement and touch along with speech and management of the visual field); and thus potentially much more effective encoding (integration, so to speak) and recall of new and changed sounds, words and processes. Note: The only other use of the term "haptic anchor" currently appears to be in cutting edge eye surgery. How appropriate that haptic anchors be "in the eye of the beholder" as well as the body!

Pronunciation teaching: from methods to integrative "tool kits" and back again!

I'd characterize today's pronunciation teaching as presenting "integrative tool kits" to instructors, that is providing for instructors a wide range of options in terms of techniques and perspectives on how to work with pronunciation in their classes and programs. For what they are, there are several good ones, including Gilbert's prosodic framework. For instructors of a requisite level of training, that kind of support is potentially adequate. For those less trained, and those who do not have a good sense of how to create optimal sequencing of pronunciation work, that type of informed "recommendations" is often relatively useless--at best.

Clip art: Clker

The approach to working with pronunciation that has been developed on this blog is, in many respects a method, a relative fixed set of procedures, focusing on a limited set of phonological targets, presented to learners in a fixed order and then used in all aspects of language teaching. That such a system could be applicable or capable of being modified for most learners and classrooms is, I realize, quite a claim. In subsequent blog posts, I'll outline the EHIEP system in some detail, not as the "only" way to integrate pronunciation but as a model for how it can be done. In our "post-method" era, it may seem odd to propose one again, but, as always, methods will inevitably emerge from the current often bewildering, chaotic, mix-and-match-ness.