A Study on Hong Kong Young Adults’ English Pronunciation: The Influence of Native Language and American Pop Culture

Abstract

Like in many English-speaking countries, Hong Kong, despite its small area, has its own variation of English, covering accent and phonology. This paper not only studies native Hong Kong people’s attitude towards this variety, but also their English pronunciation under the influence of a rising American English (“AmE”) environment (L3 affecting L2) and their mother tongue (L1 affecting L2). 14 post- secondary students from various colleges in Hong Kong were investigated. Their data displayed many AmE features including postvocalic [ɹ], and Hong Kong English (HKE) features such as simplification of consonant cluster and deletion of final consonant. Overall, HKE is still the dominant accent of many speakers in Hong Kong.