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In the past, various English teaching systems have put forth their versions of a standard English pronunciation. They usually demand that students from many mother tongues learn many sounds that are unusual to them. Differences between English, American, and other dialects make it much more difficult. And then the task becomes even more difficult when students attempt to match those many new sounds to English spelling.

The generally-accepted fact that non-English speakers can understand each other’s Globish opens up an interesting possibility. It seems possible that some sounds from one’s mother tongue, even if not perfect, can be “enough” for understanding. Language experts of the last century provided very complete collections of sounds from mother tongues that were not present in English. Yet in many cases, students could easily provide substitute sounds from their own mother tongues that could be understood. The main problem for native English speakers seems to be the “accent” of non-native speakers. (Other very strong “accents” from different parts of London, and between America and other former colonies, seem less problematic.)

A study this year in comparative linguistics had English students from 6 mother-tongues recording the same list of words, and a reading of the same story. These were middle-to-high-level students of English who had spent a short period of time in an English-speaking country. The students were from Mainland China, France, Poland, India, Hungary, and Germany. All of these students could understand each other well in what we would call Globish-level words and grammar.

Then a native English speaker was brought in (in this case an American) who had not met any of them or lived in any of their countries. He listened to each recording and wrote down only what he could understand. The study was made over a 3-month period with 2 weeks between each listening activity for the native speaker.

The study had interesting outcomes and perhaps even more interesting possibilities. Because we think the possibilities are worthy of note, we should observe more closely what materials were used. All 6 students recorded the following list of words:

And all 6 students also recorded themselves reading this story:
It all happened at about 6 p.m. on a Sunday evening. The soldier went into the church. He was dressed in a uniform and one could see blood on it. It wasn’t just his vision, it was a lot more. And it wasn’t his choice. He tried to put the ring next to his other things but his hands didn’t move. He didn’t feel well. He was in a trap and he knew it.. “The key to the vault” he thought. “I should start it right now”. He wanted his poor wife, who was a nurse, and his kids to get all his belongings, before he... But the situation was absolutely different. But just then his face went black and he wasn’t sure if it was just his dream. He could see the blue sea and hear some soft music. Soon he had a nice view as well: everyone looked happy now and sipped tea or coffee. “But what does it show?” he had various thoughts. “Aren’t they just ghosts here?” But he had no more thoughts ever. There was a war out there…

From this small study, it appears that there are only 7 sounds that are still a problem for all of the students. The sounds which were a problem for everyone were the vowels in the words: mud (mUd) near (nEAr) no (nO) now (nOW) face (fAce) bad (bAd) and the soft “th” consonant in thing (THing).

However, other findings of the study were equally interesting. We can also observe which sounds are most difficult in individual mother tongues, and with that knowledge, make the number of required sounds even more exact.

Sound Production Difficulties from the Different Mother Tongues

It appears that these individuals from each mother tongue also had trouble – when they spoke English – with an extra, adapted set of sounds. These sounds were: (1) not in their native tongue and (2) gave them a few more difficult sounds to produce. These sounds – not in the native tongues and causing a few extra problems for each student – are in bold, italic letters in the tables below:

There may not be as many extra difficulties here as we thought there would be. At the most, the Mandarin speaker has 6 other sounds that are difficult to understand. The fewest extra sounds came from the French and German speakers. We might suspect these results happen because both languages are closer in roots to English. Of course, there are many reasons that this was not a complete study. However, as it stands right now, this study presents a reasonable set of ideas on which to base some early – but useful – decisions:

1. Most mother tongues already contain most of the sounds that are necessary for understanding between people who speak Globish.

2. These sounds should also be largely understandable by native English speakers.

3. There are – at most – 8 to 13 sounds that are missing in any given mother tongue – for understandable Globish pronunciation. So Globish speakers must learn to produce those few sounds understandably for the times that they are necessary. All the rest of the accepted English sounds would apply only to those students who wish to speak English with little or no accent at all.

4. Only one of the sounds which were difficult for all was a consonant: the “th” sound in thing, thick and both. The other six were vowel sounds.

5. For Globish, it may be possible that understandable vowel sounds - often brought from the native tongue – are necessary only on the stressed syllable.

6. The finding in #5, plus an expected placement of the words within simple grammar, could limit the range of sounds necessary for Globish talking. If the listener doesn’t hear words in the order he or she expects, he will be more likely to think the pronunciation is wrong. This is why the native listener clearly understood the students’ pronunciation much better within the story recordings.

7. Mastering the sounds and the stresses with only 1500 words is rewarding in two ways:

• There is not a need for the many rules tying spelling and pronunciation which is such a large problem for English students.
• Many native English speakers will admit that they remember spelling only partly by sound association, and the other part is visual memory. So learning both the sound and the image of a word may be the most effective way of learning the 1500 Globish words.

8. It would follow from this study that each student from each mother tongue would have a slightly different path to Globish. However, it is likely that most of the sound production problems will happen in the student’s first 350 words. This is a time when almost any language looks impossible to the student.

9. The syllable-stress problems will clearly happen more when students are faced with longer words and more varied stress. However, the problem grows if the student did not learn the few new vowel sounds that are truly necessary to use on the stressed syllables.

10. Thus, if these early findings are even partly correct, then there are probably only a few new Globish sounds that are not in students’ native languages. Clearly, Globish speakers will need to produce these few sounds well – from the start. But this important rule would allow Globish students to have clear goals from the beginning, and clear measurements at the end of their Globish study. It is “enough” to understand, and to be understood.

Technical words

Consonants

the letter sounds around the vowels.

Vowels

in English and Globish - A, E, I, O, and U with variation.

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