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Program to support correct pronunciation of foreign languages
Malucha, Jan ; Kohl,, Ing, Zdeněk (referee) ; Sigmund, Milan (advisor)
The aim of the diploma thesis is the development of an autonomous program for checking and evaluating the pronunciation of a foreign language. Theoretical part includes a treatise on the history and importance of computer-assisted language teaching; it also contains a brief introduction to phonetics, phonology and pronunciation issues, as well as an introduction to speech signal processing with a focus on computational methods for pronunciation analysis. In the practical part, a search of currently widespread and available tools for pronunciation control was processed and a number of algorithms usable for its analysis were programmed. Some of the algorithms have been enclosed in a graphical user interface as a basic prototype of a functional program to support pronunciation. The achieved results and the direction of further development are discussed in the conclusion.
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Ability of Czech Speakers of English to Pronounce Words with Silent Letters
Pospíšilová, Markéta ; Červinková Poesová, Kristýna (advisor) ; Farrell, Mark Robert (referee)
The aim of this thesis is to show the historical development of silent letters and their role in contemporary English. In the theoretical part a definition of a silent letter is provided and the reasons for its emergence are outlined. Moreover, we will concentrate on individual silent letters and describe in which positions they normally occur. In the practical part the ability of Czech learners of English to pronounce selected words with silent letters is assessed. The research includes a comparison of recordings obtained from students of the first and the fourth year of upper-secondary education.
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Speech of the Tourist Guide
Pecháčková, Veronika ; Palkosková, Olga (advisor) ; Chejnová, Pavla (referee)
This work deals with speech of the tourist guide from the point of view of individual linguistics levels. This topic was chosen because the author of this work studied tourism at secondary school and she has personal experience with the job of tourist guide. Second reason is the fact that this topic has not been described in details yet. Beside the activity of tourist guide and his/her nonverbal communication, this work deals with his/her speech from the point of view of five linguistics levels - phonetic/phonological, morphological, lexical, syntactic and stylistic one. For their analysis four video-records were used. There is real speech of four tourist guides at castles on these videos. The result of this work is the formulation of specific features of speech of the tourist guide. There are several points added to these features. These points are about recommendation for each tourist guide and his/her right and effective speech.
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Developing pronunciation through musical activities in French lessons
Prucek, Jan ; Klinka, Tomáš (advisor) ; Jančík, Jiří (referee)
Title of the thesis: Developing pronunciation through musical activities in French lessons Keywords: communicative approach, phonetics, phonology, pronunciation, prosody, activity, music, rhythm, rhythmisation, melody, tempo, intonation, accent, song, rap, facial expressions Abstract: This thesis deals with the teaching of French phonetics, considers the status of phonetics in communicatively oriented teaching, and comes to the fact that the teaching of phonetics and phonology is not a priority in the communicative approach. The work demonstrates the importance of such teaching, and therefore explores how the teaching of pronunciation or some of its components could be made more attractive. Based on the proven relationship of music and language, both as auditory phenomena, this thesis approaches the interwoven elements of these two areas. The aim is to explore how the musical elements, such as: rhythm, melody, tempo, phrasing, etc., could be used in the teaching of French pronunciation - especially at the suprasegmental level. The work offers a basic inventory of exercises which benefit from this characteristic and which has been verified in practice, and in the final analysis summarises their effectiveness in foreign language teaching.
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Pronunciation of Proper Names in Interpreting
Chvojková, Kristýna ; Duběda, Tomáš (advisor) ; Sitařová, Kateřina (referee)
This thesis addresses the pronunciation of proper names in simultaneous interpreting from French into Czech. It consists of 2 parts: the 1st, theoretical part discusses the definitions, categorization and functions of proper names as described in the relevant literature. The work then focuses on adoption of loanwords in Czech and on the specific situation of proper names in simultaneous interpreting. The empirical part analyses 600 personal names from speeches interpreted at plenary sessions of the European Parliament. The aim of the research is to describe the adaptation principles in pronunciation of proper names interpreted into Czech; the intelligibility of the used equivalents; and the frequency of use of female forms of surnames in the European Parliament. The results show that the prevailing adaptation principle is phonological approximation, which corresponds to the rules set by the codified pronunciation standard. Other common principles are retention of the original pronunciation and spelling pronunciation. Original pronunciation is more frequent in names of French origin, whereas spelling pronunciation is found mostly in English and German names. Most of the used translation equivalents are comprehensible: the number of incomprehensible equivalents amounts to 7-11%. Surprisingly, most of...
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Pronounciation and perceptual acceptability of the sound r in Czech speeches by foreign speakers whose L1 is German
Novotná, Gabriela ; Veroňková, Jitka (advisor) ; Martínek, František (referee)
The topic of this diploma thesis belongs to the field of language acquisition and language learning. It aims to explore Czech as a second and foreign language of speakers whose mother tongue is German, namely concerning the pronunciation of the r-sound and its perceptual acceptability for Czech native speakers. The theoretical part summarizes the area of pronunciation learning and acquisition in a second and foreign language and outlines various pronunciation difficulties German speakers tend to have in Czech. It deals with the rhotics in general and subsequently focuses on the r- sound, both in Czech and in German, as well as in mutual comparison. In the last chapter, the combinatorial qualities of the r-sound which are used as a basis for the practical part are discussed. The practical part describes the conducted research. Five recordings of German students were collected. The students were staying in Prague for one semester with the Erasmus programme exchange and were learning Czech for the first time. For the recordings a written text was constructed which the students read individually. The text emphasized words including the r-sound. From the recordings, various key words were cut off and a perceptual test was compiled and given to Czech native speakers to evaluate the pronunciation of the...
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Distinctive Features of Irish Accent
Uher, Tomáš ; Červinková Poesová, Kristýna (advisor) ; Ženíšek, Jakub (referee)
TITLE: Distinctive Features of Irish Accent AUTOR: Tomáš Uher DEPARTMENT: Department of English Language and Literature SUPERVISOR: Mgr. Kristýna Poesová ABSTRACT: The aim of this thesis is to examine the distinctive phonetic and phonological aspects of Irish English. The theoretical part provides a comprehensive description of the segmental and suprasegmental features of the Irish accent in contrast with the Received Pronunciation. The first section of the practical part analyses the speech of three Irish actors in Irish films and TV shows in order to examine the use of the distinctive features described in the theoretical part. The second section of the practical part presents a 45 minute long lesson plan on the Irish accent with suggested exercises for intermediate (B2) learners. KEY WORDS: accent, Irish, pronunciation, phonetics, phonology, lesson plan
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