Can the degree of the foreign accent be reduced?

Abstract

gree of the foreign accent of Albanian speaking students at the South East EuropeanUniversity, Tetovo, Macedonia. The aim of the study is to find out whether the degreeof the foreign accent of these students can be reduced by using different pronunciationimprovement techniques involving segmental and supra-segmental pronunciation training.Among the other aims of the study, an additional purpose is finding out whether the levelof performance/GPA (Grade Point Average) has a correlation with the reduction of theforeign accent. The experiment was carried out with second year BA/English Departmentstudents at the South East European University divided in two groups. Both groups ofstudents (control and experimental) were pre- and post-tested by recording their initialand improved pronunciation at the beginning and the end of the semester respectively.The stress of the study is put on spontaneous speech pronunciation as well as readingpronunciation (paragraphs and tongue twisters). After a semester of accent reductiontraining the outcome of both groups shows significant improvement in the experimentalgroup meanwhile the control group shows unexpected changes. On the other hand, thestudy shows that the GPA (Grade Point Average) had no correlation with the improvementof the pronunciation.