Impact of Level of Education on the Realization of /r/ and /l/ among Asante English Speakers in Ghana

Abstract

Socio-phonetically, the study seeks to investigate the realization of RP phonemes /r/ and /l/ among Asante English speakers in Ghana focusing on the level of education of participants. Using stratified proportion of 1:1:1 for a total of 30 participants, each of the educational groups (Basic, Secondary and Tertiary) consisted of 10 participants who lived and studied in Kumasi, Ghana. The data was analysed using acoustic and auditory tool (PRAAT 6104) and followed by Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) using SPSS version 20. The study revealed that the phoneme /r/ can be realized as [r], [l] and linking [r] while the phoneme /l/ is realized as clear [l], dark [?] and linking [l]. The findings indicated that participants level of education significantly impact their choice of specific variants of /r/ and /l/. The study also revealed that the nonstandard realization of the phoneme /r/ as [l] is dominant among basic school children but significantly reduces as they progress from basic through tertiary education.