Consonant Elision in English Word Pronunciation of Obolo Speakers of English in Nigeria

Abstract

This research investigates consonant elision in the spoken words of Obolo speakers of English (OSE). There is an assumption that the Obolo speakers of English exhibit features of inaccurate pronunciation especially, the elision of the voiceless alveolar and velar consonant sounds /t/ and /k/ in their English speech as it impedes mutual intelligibility during conversation. This assumption forms the background of this study. Sixty (60) university graduates from different fields of study were randomly drawn from six communities of Obolo: Ekede, Ayama Ekede, Ebukuma, Ngo, Agana and Egwede. The Optimality theory was used as a theoretical thrust for this study, and prepared single and connected words were arranged on a questionnaire for the subjects to read, while their productions were recorded using an MP3 digital recording device. For the analysis, the study employed perceptual and quantitative approaches focusing on the phonotactic order and the structure of English sounds as realized by the Obolo speakers of English. The findings revealed that the majority of Obolo speakers of English delete the consonant sounds /t/ and /k/ in their English pronunciations at the medial and coda positions of consonant clusters. Phonotactically, it was discovered that the output violates the faithful constraints. The statistics also show that subjects exhibit consonant elision in their pronunciation. For instance, 65%, 70% and 64% were unable to realized /k/ and /t/ correctly. This problem is not peculiar to only Obolo Speakers of English. The researcher suggests more research of this kind in other languages using a different approach.