Phonemic Contrastive Analysis and the Prediction of Pronunciation Difficulties for EFL Saudi Learners

Abstract
Relative to research on learning and teaching second language grammar (morphosyntax) and vocabulary, pronunciation has received little attention in previous applied linguistic research (Foote, Trofimovich, Collins, & Urzúa, 2016). This is one of the main reasons why teachers and learners usually depend mainly on their intuitions when it comes to teaching and learning pronunciation (Thomson & Derwing, 2015). One of the methods used among researchers and teachers to identify the pronunciation difficulties learners may face is the use of cross-linguistic contrastive analysis, where the phonological systems of learners’ first and second/foreign languages are compared, and then areas of differences would constitute the bulk of teaching materials in language classrooms (Jenkins, 2004). The current study attempts to examine whether this method is capable of predicting the difficulties Saudi learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) would face in producing English consonants. First, a basic phonemic contrastive analysis between English and Saudi Arabic consonantal systems was conducted, and based on this analysis; predictions about consonantal pronunciation difficulties or problems were made. Then, a number of Saudi EFL learners were asked to produce a number of utterances which included the predicted problematic consonantal sounds. The produced consonantal sounds where then analyzed to find out to what extent the cross-linguistic contrastive analysis was successful in predicting the learners’ difficulties. The results were mixed; not all the predictions made by the phonemic contrastive analysis were correct. Although it would be difficult to draw a strong conclusion with regard to the efficiency of the contrastive analysis method in predicting learners’ pronunciation errors, the method can be beneficial for English teachers, but it should be used with caution.