Intonation focus in the interlanguage of a group of Spanish learners of English

The present paper is a report on intonation errors made by a group of Spanish learners of EFL in their last year of Secondary School (2° Bachillerato). More specifically, we attempt to identify and classify the errors relating to the students' use of intonation to highlight informati...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Gutiérrez Díez, Francisco
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Universidad de Alicante 2005-11-01
Series:Revista Alicantina de Estudios Ingleses
Online Access:https://raei.ua.es/article/view/2005-n18-intonation-focus-in-the-interlanguage-of-a-group-of-spanish-learners-of-english
Description
Summary:The present paper is a report on intonation errors made by a group of Spanish learners of EFL in their last year of Secondary School (2° Bachillerato). More specifically, we attempt to identify and classify the errors relating to the students' use of intonation to highlight information. With this aim in mind, we have used the tonetic approach to intonation analysis as the theoretical framework for the study. When comparing the students' performance with English native speakers', two types of errors emerge, interference and developmental. Once more, contrasts between English and Spanish regarding the focalisation of information by means of intonation (tonicity) can serve the purpose of explaining some of the errors (interference). At the same time some developmental errors are detected in the students' intonational interlanguage.
ISSN:0214-4808
2171-861X