Second-Language Speech

This volume provides a good cross-section of current research on second-language speech by leading investigators in the field. The complexities of the acquisition, production and perception of the sounds of a new language call for a plurality of scientific approaches from a number of disciplines. Issues in second-language speech such as the influence of the first language, the contexts of speech-sound learning, the perception-production relation, the nature of the speech/language capacity, and the explanatory potential of theory - phonetic, phonological and psycholinguistic - are here addressed in ways that show how real or imagined disciplinary boundaries may be fruitfully bridged. The study of second-language speech has benefited from a notable upsurge of interest and activity over the last decade; the research in this collection constitutes clear evidence of the new vitality in this field.