Why Teach Pronunciation?

Only when reading Brinton and Butner (2012) did it occur to me, that some people would think that teaching proper pronunciation would cause uneasiness to the point of considering it a form of racial discrimination. 

Being a teacher of English in the Philippines, I see to it that I rectify, directly or indirectly, students’ 'mispronounced' words because in my understanding, they are learning the English language; hence, they should also learn the sounds of English (its properties, including patterns of stress, rhythm, and intonation, etc.) in order that they may be understood once they speak. Let me make it clear that the term ‘mispronounced’ here refers to an entirely different pronunciation of any of the sounds of a word, thereby producing confusion as to what word has been referred to, consider the example 'set - seat - sit', because a mispronunciation of any of the vowels here will, of course, imply a significantly different meaning. Let me also make it clear that English teachers never teach students to compromise their native language, even if English is the world’s lingua franca, a language that opens global opportunities. Rather, we subtly instill to students to acquire a sense of communicative competence, which means that they should establish credibility in speaking both L1 and L2 (with accent that’s deemed appropriate for every language). 

Personally, as a language teacher as well as a conversation facilitator, it is but ETHICAL and necessary to teach proper pronunciation, including accent. 

But first, the definition of ‘accent’ and the gauge to which we consider ‘correct’ pronunciation should be as clear-cut as possible to people (teachers and learners). Derwin and Munro (2010) in Brinton and Butner (2012) made a very precise definition, one that does not at all discriminate any language, saying that "accent is the degree to which an individual’s pronunciation differs from a given local variety”. This tells us that language is an intricate system, not isolated, used by a web of people coming from different cultures and social strata; hence, it has varieties. So having an accent does not mean that you are speaking a language that is ‘inferior’ to a language that is ‘superior’. Accent only highlights how unique people and languages are. So having an accent is not bad at all!

Abercrombie (1991), Gimson (1989), and Derwing and Munro (2010) in the same article, however, have all purported the importance of intelligibility in speech, which is generally the degree to which the listener would be able to make sense of the speaker’s utterance. I believe the basic goal of every communicator is to convey a message. It would be tragic, of course, if a mispronounced sound and a hardly recognizable accent will impede the receiver in understanding the message. It is then given that if you are trying to acquire a language in order to communicate, then try to achieve an accent that will be intelligible to the person you wish to communicate with.

Crystal's (2003) theory about the three circles has proven that varieties of English are real since more and more people, coming from different linguistic communities, learn and use English everyday with every possibility of changing the language (its sounds, maybe even contributing their own lexemes, etc.). This gave rise to other Englishes such as Konglish (Korean English), Chinglish (Chinese English), Spanglish (Spanish English), among others. However, being communicatively competent means that one should be sensitive to know that producing something in either of these Englishes might be an obstacle in communicating with a native speaker of English, then one should opt for a pronunciation that IS COMPREHENSIBLE by the receiver, not necessarily sounding like real native Americans because after all Americans have varied accents as well.

I have always been an advocate for teaching correct pronunciation in the language classroom because the students need this. As a language teacher, and now, a conversation leader, I think I owe it to my students and to my Chat Cafe participants, that I teach them the correct articulation of sounds. They enroll or sign up for this because they deem this necessary in their careers or in any other personal or official transactions they may be stuck into. It empowers them. makes them compete with the rest of the world. 

Yes, accents are intimately tied to speaker identity and group membership (Levis, 2005 in the same article); but teaching students how to properly articulate sounds and try to sound intelligible to most speakers of English does not mean that you are eradicating students’ cultural identity, rather, it paves the way for students to be more appreciative of multiculturalism.