A Socio-phonological Analysis of Taiwan English from the Perspective of World Englishes*

A number of previous studies on the English pronunciation of native speakers of Mandarin have discovered many sound features distinct from Standard English, yet none of these analyse how frequently each of these features occurred in learners with different English proficiency levels (Chang, 1991; Chen, 1975; Chung, 2006; Gao, 1995; Lee, 1986). This study focuses on the frequency of such pronunciation features amongst intermediate-level learners of English. To this end, in this study ten Taiwan Mandarin speakers read 1,225 words commonly used in English, and the findings indicate that a total of 11 sound features regularly appeared in the pronunciation of the respondents. Among these, five features have not been described in prior research. In particular, three of these features are identified as those which make Taiwan Mandarin-accented English distinct from other varieties of English. This study details the results and concludes by discussing this Expanding-Circle variety of English from the perspective of World Englishes.