Jingles-Type Training Systems Could be Created for ALL Languages!

Dear Fellow Earthlings, A few years ago I measured a certain "Mr. S" 's applied English pronunciation. It had dropped from 89.8 (indistinguishable by most people from the pronunciation of native speakers of English) to 89.2 (still very pleasant to the ear -- but clearly characterized by a great number of non-nativelike speech motor skills characteristics). Such a drop is not uncommon for Jingles clients who do not do any Jingles training for periods of a year or longer. But Mr. S was an active Jingles client, coming to one or two session a week -- and actively practicing on his own as well... I interviewed Mr. S about the activities he had been pursuing lately -- and learned that he had been doing a lot of business in China. His business dealings were handled in English for the most part. But he was dealing with the English produced by native speakers of Chinese. In the course of his dealings with Chinese people, Mr. S. (a native speaker of Japanese) had grown accustomed to the varying English pronunciations produced by people from Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, and so on. His spoken English reflected these coping tactics: It had changed, one gesture at a time, to a hybrid Sino-English allophonome. A solution now presented itself: I began to develop "Ding Ling", or Chinese Jingles. I asked Mr. S. to practice them. He said that he was not particularly interested in studying Chinese. In response, I told him that the goal was not to learn Chinese, but to gain control of his nascent Chinese allophonome so that it would not affect his English allophonome. After only one year, Mr. S's English allophonome level had once again moved up to 89.8 or thereabouts. As for his Chinese allophonome, it was at 89.5! Furthermore, he suddenly, as a by-product of his Ding Ling practice, found himself speaking Chinese in such a way that he sounded more or less the same as native speakers of Chinese do as they speak their various varieties of Chinese! I hasten to add that Mr. S's Japanese allophonome (his primary or "native" allophonome) continues to be unaffected by his Jingles and Ding Ling training. Steve Walker Earthsaver and Jingles Creator

© 2013 Steve Walker, The Jingles-The Japan Foundation for English Pronunciation, Summit Enterprises.