Investigating pronunciation errors of english consonant clusters of efl saudi female students level four at Albaha university, KSA

Abstract EN

Learning a new language implies learning its pronunciation.

Therefore, poor pronunciation can affect the understanding of a foreign language and a learner might have a foreign accent as a result of pronunciation errors as well.

Thus, doing beneficial studies on the English pronunciation difficulty that challenges Arab speakers can be useful for learners, materials providers, and teachers.

However, Arabic speakers face difficulties in learning English due to the differences between Arabic and English sound systems.

This study aims to analyze pronunciation errors of English consonant clusters made by English language students.

The study depends on error analysis (Corder, 1967), and contrastive analysis theories (Lado, 1957).

Error analysis (EA) is working with errors that second language learners made whereas Contrastive analysis (CA) is comparing two languages to predict errors according to the differences between these languages (Keshavarz, 1999).

The study focuses on errors made by learners in which the impact of the first language on the second language is the reason.

The influence in the area of pronunciation specifically these errors that are the results of the difficulties of English consonant clusters.

Consonant clusters are consonant sounds which come consequently in a word