Difficulties Faced by British and Iraqi Undergraduate Students of English When Pronouncing Arabic True Geminates and English Fake Geminates

Abstract

     This paper investigates  gemination which is a phonetic phenomenon in English and Arabic .It is concerned with true geminates and fake geminates phonetically ,true geminates which are found  in Arabic are long segments which contrast  with short ones , thus Arabic speakers  have a phonemic length  contrast since  they treat long and short versions of the same sound as distinct categories . In contrast, fake geminates which are found in Arabic, but in English are called so because they are phonetically long but their length does not serve as a phonetic contrast .The research aims at revealing  the difference in the achievement of the Arab  and British undergraduate students of English when pronouncing Arabic true geminates and English fake geminates .It also aims to point out the effect of the intrinsic difference that concerns gemination in both languages . The third aim of this paper is to find out the type of English fake geminate which has more difference in the achievement of the subjects involved in this research .On the light of these aims three hypotheses were set .To carry out this research ,ten Iraqi (Arab ) undergraduate students of English from University of Anbar (4^th year students ) were chosen besides ten British undergraduate students of English(4^th year students ) from Essex University .The subjects involved in the study  have to participate in two tests .In the first ,they have to pronounce  twenty Arabic words (single and geminate),whereas in the second test ,they have to pronounce  thirty words about the types of English fake geminates ,ten words were selected for each type .The study  arrives at certain findings and conclusions .