Abstract:
The objective of this study was to examine the distinct approaches of the native speakers of Sinhala towards producing the retroflex-trill /r/. The research question was “what pronunciation tendencies, related to the consonant /r/ in Sinhala, could be revealed in the first language acquisition below age 4?” This qualitative research was based on the primary data gathered from the natural speech of 50 native speakers of Sinhala aged between 9 and 48 months, who reside in Matara District, Sri Lanka. The one-hour natural conversations were audio-recorded bi-weekly, over a period of four months. The recordings were transformed into transcriptions. The data was segmented according to the exact age of the participants. An average of five same-age participants contributed data to examine the linguistic performance of a specific age (month). After gathering the sound changes that occurred relating to the /r/, the sub-category of the relevant sound change was named next to each utterance to identify the linguistic tendencies and sub-tendencies. The accurate use of /r/ was separately examined and discussed. Five of the pronunciation tendencies, related to the consonant /r/ in Sinhala, were Omission (deletion of the consonant /r/, and the CV syllable with /r/), Substitution (with glides, laterals, plosives, fricatives, nasals, affricates), Assimilation (only the four types of total assimilation), and Gemination ([akuru]>[akku]/[akki]). Pronunciation of the CCV syllable structure that consists of middle /r/, revealed Deletion of CCV ([ʈrækʈǝre]>[ttǝle:]), Simplification (/r/>Ø [aiskri:m]>[a:iki:ŋ] or Ø> onset C [aiskri:m]>[aisri:m]), Substitution (lateralisation) ([citrǝjak]>[citlijak]), and Insertion ([triko:nǝ]>[tiliko:nǝ]). Lateralisation was used quantitatively higher than other sound changes at the age of 4:0. The onset age of production of /r/ was varied. Only the first four stages of the developmental process (/r/ not yet appeared, the first appearance, temporarily absent, sporadic appearance, perfectly fixed to speech) were found up to the fourth year.
