SUBSTITUTION PROCESS IN THE SPEECH PRODUCTION OF THE YORUBA L2 SPEAKERS OF ENGLISH

ABSTRACT

The Yoruba language is a Language spoken by roughly 45 million individuals across west Africa, though it has a larger concentration of users in the southwest of Nigeria, it consists of various dialects. This research work is basically analyzed problems of pronunciation of certain phonemes among the Yoruba speakers of English. The Yoruba Speakers of English encounter problems in pronouncing certain English sounds because they do not exist in the inventory of Yoruba phonemes Some of these sounds are: /θ, ð, Ʒ, z, J, ʌ, Ʒ: ǝ/. Therefore, they are substituted with phonemes of similar qualities, /d/ for / ð /. Thus, a Yoruba speaker substitute the sound /d/ for / ð / in the word 'father'. Hence, the word 'father'/fɑ:ðər// is then realized as ‘/fɑ:dӕ/. This research points highlights the major phonemes that gets substituted in the speech of Yoruba natives.