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In:Research at the Intersection of Second Language Acquisition and Sociolinguistics: Studies in honor of Kimberly L. Geeslin
Edited by Megan Solon, Matthew Kanwit and Aarnes Gudmestad
[Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 43] 2025
► pp. 144–177

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Chapter 6
University Spanish instructors’ trill production within and outside of the language classroom

 | North Carolina State University
 | University of North Carolina Wilmington
 | Connecticut College
Published online: 26 June 2025
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https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.43.06zah
Abstract
In order to examine how a sociophonetic variable is realized in instructor input compared to speech outside the classroom, this study analyzed the production of the Spanish trill by instructors in both contexts. Different linguistic constraints conditioned the production of the multiple-occlusion variant across contexts. Additionally, participants adjusted their speech towards a more formal, standard pronunciation in the classroom, producing more canonical multiple-occlusion trills than in the conversations. However, each participant also produced a range of other variants: between one and eight distinct noncanonical variants in the classroom and between three and eight in the conversations. Thus, variation was still present in the classroom, indicating that students are exposed to trill variation in their classroom input.
Article outline
  • Background
    • Connection between input and learner development
    • Pronunciation instruction in the classroom
    • Features of instructor input
    • Native trill production in Spanish
    • Second language trill production
  • The current study
  • Method
    • Participants
    • Recordings
    • Coding of dependent variable
    • Coding of independent variables
    • Analysis
  • Results
  • Discussion
  • Conclusion
  • Note
  • References
  • Appendix
References (50)
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