TO /r/ OR NOT TO /r/: THE ENGLISH /r/ AS A CHALLENGE TO NORWEGIAN L1 EFL LEARNERS
Whilst Norwegians are reported to be fairly proficient in English (Kapranov, 2019), evidence shows that young learners of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) whose first language (L1) is Norwegian experience substantial problems with a range of English consonant sounds (Kapranov, 2021, 2022), for example the fricative /z/, which is absent in Norwegian. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that young EFL learners whose L1 is Norwegian also have problems with the pronunciation of the English consonant /r/. In order to verify this contention, a group of EFL teachers (total N = 8) was asked to reflect on whether or not the English /r/ would be described as problematic to Norwegian L1 EFL learners at primary school. The teachers were requested to provide a short reflective note on their thoughts and observations concerning the way their primary school pupils pronounced the English consonant /r/.
The teachers’ notes were coded, tagged in the computer program Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS), and analysed. The results of the analysis indicated that the majority of the teachers considered the English /r/ problematic due to a number of variables. Among them, they singled out the following: (i) the influence of the learners’ L1 and (ii) the lack of consistency in the learners’ choices of the variety of English and the associated problems with rhoticity and non-rhoticity. These findings will be presented and discussed at the conference.
References
Kapranov, O. (2019). Self-Assessment of the Sounds of the English Language that Pre-Service EFL Teachers Consider Problematic to Pronounce. ELOPE: English Language Overseas Perspectives and Enquiries, 16(1), 77–99.
Kapranov, O. (2021). The English vowel schwa as a difficulty to intermediate EFL students: Evidence from phonemic transcription. Belgrade English Language and Literature Studies, 13(1), 59–92.
Kapranov, O. (2022). The English fricative consonant/z/as a challenge to Norwegian L1 EFL learners: An error analysis of phonemic transcriptions. Philologia Estonica Tallinnensis, 7(1), 148–185.
Publisert i SEVENTH BELGRADE INTERNATIONAL MEETING OF ENGLISH PHONETICIANS (BIMEP 2026), 2026
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