Do French-speaking learners simply omit the English /h/?
Résumé
It is commonly considered that French-speaking learners of English tend to omit the voiceless "glottal fricative" /h/ (Ostiguy et al. 1996, among others). This type of consonant observed in different languages is actually best described as a voiceless approximant without any particular place of articulation, with the vocal folds apart (Ladefoged 1990). Halle and Stevens (1971) define it with the feature [+ spread glottis]. In observing cases where the English /h/ is "omitted" by a French-speaking learner, not only the absence of turbulent noise but another acoustic phenomenon is often observed, namely, a hard vowel onset, which suggests the presence of a glottal stop preceding the vowel. If a glottal stop is produced, the glottis is closed and therefore it is only natural that [h], pronounced with the glottis open, should not be articulated. Do French-speaking learners show this tendency systematically? A set of recordings of recitations of the nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty" was analysed. The speakers were 40 first-year students enrolled in LCA at Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée in 2007-2008. The H2 (second harmonic) / H1 (first harmonic) ratio (difference of intensity in dB) at the onset of the first vowel in the word "Humpty" at the beginning of stanza was measured as an indication of voice quality. A comparison between cases where the initial /h/ was pronounced and where it was not shows that H2/H1 ratio is higher in the latter case, suggesting that the glottis was less open when /h/ was not pronounced. These findings suggest that those French-speaking learners who have difficulty producing /h/ show "wrong" articulatory gestures: tensing the vocal folds instead of relaxing them, closing glottis instead of opening it to allow the pulmonic air-stream necessary for [h]. Pronunciation activities involving relaxing movements (e.g. sigh) may help to raise learners' consciousness about these articulatory gestures.