Babkina, V. (2018). Phonological interference of mother tongue over the English

fashion, sushi, 
shampoo, Shanghai 
and some other words, the pronunciation of the 
sound /ʃ/ reminds the most common for Spanish phoneme /tʃ/. 
The mentioned phoneme difficulty can cause misunderstanding 
from the part of a listener when completely different words can be heard 
due to unintelligible pronunciation of the sound /ʃ/: 
show – chow, 
shareholders – chair holders
, 
shares – chairs 
and so on.

Case 2. Replacing the fricative labio-dental sound /v/ with the 
plosive/stop bilabial phoneme /b/. 
87
Stanley Whitley, M. (2002). Ibid. 
88
Stanley Whitley, M. (2002). Ibid. p. 53.

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57 
Example 1. Natura gives money to its employees. 
The student pronounced the word as /ˈgib/, whereas the standard 
pronunciation of the word considering grammar is /ˈgivz/. 
Example 2. They have ten international boutiques.
The student pronounced the word as /ˈhʌb/ and the standard 
pronunciation of the word in bold is /ˈhæv/.
Example 3. So all the employees feel valued.
The word with the underlined sound in this example was 
pronounced as /ˈbʌljut/ and it must be pronounced as /ˈvælju:d/.
Example 4. Inca Cola has always been a very solid company.
The word was pronounced as /ˈberi/ and the standard pronunciation 
is /ˈvery/.
In the mentioned examples of Case 2 the English fricative labio-
dental sound /v/ is replaced by the plosive/stop bilabial phoneme /b/ 
which is quite common for Spanish. Table 2 demonstrates the lack of the 
pair for the voiceless labio-dental fricative sound /f/ in the Spanish 
language, unlike in English (Table 3). That proves the fact that the labio-
dental sound /v/ is rather unusual for Spanish in general and, thus, for any 
of its variant in particular.
The only allophonic variation that resembles the sound /v/ is the 
intervocalic approximant allophone [β] (Table 1) which appears in such 
Spanish words as 
lavar, lobo, selva, clave
and so on. So in such English 
words as 
able, development, environment, travel,
and so on pronounced 
by a Spanish speaker, the allophone [β] of the phoneme /b/ usually 
appears.
The above examples demonstrate that this sound replacement can 
be quite tricky and confusing especially when it is difficult to deduce the 
meaning from the context. The word 
very
becomes 
berry
, 
travel- trouble
, 
vice – bice
, 
various-barrios
, and so on.

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58 

Case 3. Devoicing the voiced alveolar fricative sound /z/ to the 
voiceless alveolar fricative sound /s/ in an intervocalic/ word-initial 
position. 
Example 1. One example of the benefits is that it attracts more 
employees…

The word is pronounced /ikˈsʌmple/. The standard pronunciation is 
/igˈza:mpəl/ or /igˈzæmpəl/ (American English pronunciation).
Example 2. They take holistic approach using responsibility of 
purchasing practices.

The word is pronounced as /dʒuːsin/. The standard pronunciation of 
this word is /juːziɳ/.  
Example 3. He is an executive vice president of the company.
The words are pronounced as /ikˈsekutib/ and /ˈpresidən/. The 
standard pronunciation of these words is /igˈzekjutiv/ and /ˈprezident/. 
Example 4. Starbucks found out that their thirty factories failed 
zero tolerance standards. 
The word is pronounced as /ˈsirəu/. The standard pronunciation is 
/ˈzi:rəu/.
The examples of Case 3 demonstrate the tendency of Peruvian 
learners of English to devoice the voiced fricative alveolar sound /z/ and 
pronounce it as the sound /s/. According to Table 2 of the Spanish 
phonemes, in Spanish there is a single fricative alveolar phoneme and not 
a paired one.
Devoicing of the sound /z/ does not always lead to 
misunderstanding of the message, especially when the context can be of a 
help to deduce the meaning, but in some cases this can impede 
comprehensible communication. The pronunciation of the sound /z/ can 
be quite an obstacle for a Spanish speaking learner that is why it is 
always necessary to provide the students with sufficient practice in order 
to help them improve their pronunciation.

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59 
However, as it has been mentioned above, sometimes “S-Voicing” 
(Stanley Whitley 2002) phonological rule is applied by a Spanish 
speaking learner of English. This rule assumes that whenever the sound 
/s/ comes before any voiced consonant in a word or an utterance, the 
sound /s/ is pronounced like the voiced consonant sound /z/: 
mismo
/mizmo/, 
chisme
/tʃizme/, 
isla
/izla/, 
deshielo
/dezʝelo/, 
es duro, las vacas
etc. Nonetheless, Spanish /s/ and /z/ are always allophones of one 
phoneme
89
.

Case 4. Adding the neutral sound /ə/ at the beginning of the words 
that start with consonant clusters, for example, /sp/, /st/, /sm/, /sl/, /sk/, 
/sw/, /sn/. 
Example 1. They get this information from statistical studies.
The sound /ə/ is added to the beginning of both words and some