The main aim of this thesis is to begin to extend phonetic distance measurements to the domain of intonation. Existing studies of segmental phonetic distance have strong associations with historical linguistic questions. I begin with this context and demonstrate problems with the use of feature systems in these segmental measures. Then I attempt to draw strands from the disparate fields of quantitative historical linguistics and intonation together. The intonation of Belfast and Glasgow English provides a central case study for this. Previous work suggests that both varieties display nuclear rises on statements, yet they have never been formally compared. This thesis presents two main hypotheses on the source of these statement rises: the Alignment hypothesis and the Transfer hypothesis. The Alignment hypothesis posits that statement rises were originally more typical statement falls but have changed into rises over time through gradual phonetic change to the location of the pitch peak. The Transfer hypothesis considers that statement rises have come about through pragmatic transfer of rises onto a statement context, either from question rises or continuation rises. I evaluate these hypotheses using the primary parameters of alignment and scaling as phonetic distance measurements. The main data set consists of data from 3 Belfast English and 3 Glasgow English speakers in a Sentence reading task and Map task. The results crucially indicate that the origin of the statement rises in Belfast and Glasgow English respectively may be different. The Glasgow statement nuclear tones show support for the Alignment hypothesis, while the Belfast nuclear tones fit best with the Transfer hypothesis. The fundamental differences between Glasgow and Belfast are the earlier alignment of the peak (H) in Glasgow and the presence of a final low (L) tonal target in Glasgow and a final high (H) target in Belfast. The scaling of the final H in Belfast statements suggests that the transfer may be from continuation rather than from question rises. I then present a proposal for an overall measure of intonational distance, showing problems with parameter weighting, comparing like with like, and distinguishing between chance resemblance and genuine historical connections. The thesis concludes with an assessment of the benefits that intonational analysis could bring to improving segmental phonetic distance measures.

<p>Society exhibits a wide variety of different languages with various prominent features. At the same time as we honour diversity, however our civilisation is coloured with prejudice and preconceptions. Even if there is a rather liberal view on language use today, dialects and accents still carry positive and negative connotations for a majority of citizens. Research shows, that we are prejudiced and that we have predetermined ideas when it comes to certain language varieties.</p><p>In this study, I take up four varieties of Standard English: American, English, Australian and Scottish. I focus on the associations Swedish students make when it comes to these four language varieties and how this transforms into attitudes towards the speakers. A language attitude study is carried out by using a modified Matched Guise Test. I explain the difference between dialect and accent, as well as societal attitudes to language varieties and present some prominent linguists and their methods. Finally, I draw some conclusions by comparing my results to previous findings.</p>

Listening comprehension is considered one of the more difficult language skills to teach, which has caused a debate regarding what impact English varieties have on the learners of English. Previous research is divided, with researchers stating that English varieties influence intelligibility and comprehensibility of speech in listening comprehension, while others claim it has no effect. This study aims to investigate Swedish teachers’ attitudes to English varieties in listening comprehension and what affects their choice of teaching material used in listening comprehension contexts. A survey was conducted alongside semi-structured interviews with teachers from upper secondary schools in Sweden. Four counties in Sweden were randomly selected, and all the teachers from each county were contacted with requests to participate in the study. In total, 35 teachers answered the survey, and six participated in the interviews. The results show that teachers are united in that learners of English should be exposed to different English varieties in listening comprehension. However, they are divided on its importance in other contexts, such as if the content of the teaching material used in listening comprehension is more important than the English variety used. They are also divided on if the English varieties affected their choice of teaching material to use in listening comprehension at all.

Forced alignment, a speech recognition software performing semi-automatic phonological transcription, constitutes a methodological revolution in the recent history of linguistic research. Its use is progressively becoming the norm in research fields such as sociophonetics, but its general performance and range of applications have been relatively understudied. This thesis investigates the performance and portability of the Forced Alignment and Vowel Extraction program suite (FAVE), an aligner that was trained on, and designed to study, American English. It was decided to test FAVE on four non-American varieties of English (Scottish, Irish, Australian and Indian English) and a control variety (General American). First, the performance of FAVE was compared with human annotators, and then it was tested on three potentially problematic variables: /p, t, k/ realization, rhotic consonants and /l/. Although FAVE was found to perform significantly differently from human annotators on identical datasets, further analysis revealed that the aligner performed quite similarly on the non-standard varieties and the control variety, suggesting that the difference in accuracy does not constitute a major drawback to its extended usage. The study discusses the implications of the findings in relation to doubts expressed about the usage of such technology and argues for a wider implementation of forced alignment tools such as FAVE in sociophonetic research.

Society exhibits a wide variety of different languages with various prominent features. At the same time as we honour diversity, however our civilisation is coloured with prejudice and preconceptions. Even if there is a rather liberal view on language use today, dialects and accents still carry positive and negative connotations for a majority of citizens. Research shows, that we are prejudiced and that we have predetermined ideas when it comes to certain language varieties. In this study, I take up four varieties of Standard English: American, English, Australian and Scottish. I focus on the associations Swedish students make when it comes to these four language varieties and how this transforms into attitudes towards the speakers. A language attitude study is carried out by using a modified Matched Guise Test. I explain the difference between dialect and accent, as well as societal attitudes to language varieties and present some prominent linguists and their methods. Finally, I draw some conclusions by comparing my results to previous findings.

This essay will discuss and research the width and frequency of Irish loanwords in contemporary English varieties. The meanings, uses, differences, similarities and collocations of selected words will be discussed and analyzed in order to find answers to the research questions asked. The methods used are quantitative and qualitative research methods. The quantitative method will measure the frequency of the selected words in each of the selected varieties and the qualitative method will discuss the meanings and uses of the words in the different varieties. Each word has its own section which discuss meanings, developments and instances in which the words can be found in the different varieties. These sections are summarized at the end of the essay and the conclusion states that Irish loanwords in contemporary English varieties are not greatly widespread compared to the frequency of the same words in Irish English. A few of the words have been able to develop their meaning and use through time, but most instances of the words show the original meaning and use.

This study focuses on the teaching and learning of English as a second language and how different varieties of English are currently being used in education around the world and in Sweden. The purpose is to examine Swedish upper secondary students’ comprehension of different spoken varieties of English and their attitudes towards these varieties. Additionally, it will be investigated how important the students think exposure to different varieties is, which varieties they feel are important to have encountered, and what they think more generally regarding English language teaching and learning. 92 students in an upper secondary school in Sweden took part in the study. A listening exercise was carried out with follow up questions to test comprehension and examine how easy the students found the speakers to understand and how much they liked the sound of the pronunciation. This was followed by a questionnaire where the students were asked to indicate their level of agreement with statements about the importance of exposure to different varieties of English in their education. The results showed that the participants understood the speakers well in general, but that English English and American English were considered the easiest to understand and most pleasant to listen to, while Indian English ended up at the other side of the spectrum. Most of the students answered that it is very important for them to be exposed to various varieties of English in their education, and suggestions regarding which varieties to use in class were given. In conclusion, English teaching in Sweden should include more exposure to different Englishes to meet students’ requests.

This study investigates teachers' attitudes towards aural recordings and written English from different English varieties in the Swedish upper primary school EFL-classroom. Data from 27 online surveys and four semi-structured interviews are analyzed. The results show that British and American English are the most accepted varitetis. Australian English is accepted in audio, though not necessarily recognized in writing. Indian English, while mostly recognized, is not as accepted. Swedish English, though still accepted by most, is the least approved of the studied varieties.

This study investigates how Inner Circle and Outer Circle English varieties are perceived by EFL students at two separate schools in Sweden, each with varying levels of linguistic diversity among their student bodies. The language attitude data is collected by way of verbal-guise tests followed by discussion segments. The results suggest that Inner Circle Englishes are broadly viewed more positively than Outer Circle Englishes, in particular where semantic qualities in the status category are concerned. Further, heavily accented Outer Circle speakers were evaluated to have a good sense of humor but low attractiveness by students of both schools. The school with greater linguistic diversity rated the speakers in the study lower across the board, and also rated the RP speaker in particular significantly less favorably than the school with lower linguistic diversity. The students at the more linguistically diverse school further seemed to ascribe a poor sense of humor to the Inner Circle English speakers, which was not the case with the other school which took part of the study. These results affirm that Inner Circle English accents tend to carry with them a greater sense of status than Outer Circle English accents, and further point towards the possibility that linguistic diversity in the classroom may affect how different English varieties are viewed.

The purpose of this project was to find out what varieties of English that Swedish upper secondary school students are exposed to in the classroom and to what extent they are exposed to different varieties. This was conducted by looking at preparation exercises for the listening part of the Swedish National Tests. These exercises are created by Göteborgs Universitet and are available online for everyone and show how the real national test will be done. By listening and analyzing every speaker’s variety they were sorted into British, American, Mid-Atlantic, Australian or New Zealand varieties. A total of 91 speakers were analyzed and the results showed that Students are exposed to mostly British English with half of the speakers using a British variety. One fourth of the speakers used American English while the rest were divided into Mid-Atlantic, Australian or New Zealand varieties.