LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature XI/2 (April 2017) p-ISSN 1858-0165 Available online at http://journal.unnes.ac.id e-ISSN 2460-853X 183 THE ERRORS OF SEGMENTAL PHONEMES AMONG LIBYANS ENGLISH STUDENTS STUDYING IN SEMARANG CITY, INDONESIA Abdulghani Mohammed Emran Al-Mergib University, Lybia Dwi Anggani L. B. Universitas Negeri Semarang, Indonesia E-mail: abdo07mohammed@gmail.com. Received: 20 February 2017. Revised: 20 March 2017. Accepted: 31 March 2017 Abstract This study attempts to investigate the errors of segmental phonemes that Libyan English students have when they pronounce English sounds. The participants in the study were fifteen, three females and the rest males, who study in Semarang city, Indonesia, and they were form different majors of master and Doctoral degrees (information system, public health, economic and bio-medic) at Semarang State University and Diponegoro University. The participants have never been to any of the English speaking countries, so they do not have any kind of exposure to a native English environment. The data was collected by two methods; recording test, in order to identify and evaluate the segmental errors, and questionnaire, in order to obtain participants’ perceptions about the expected errors, the reasons behind these errors and how to cope with them. The results showed that the Libyan speakers in this study had errors while they produce consonant clusters and certain English sounds, such as: consonants” /p/ , /v/ , /θ/ , /ð/ , /tʃ/ , /dʒ/ and /ŋ/”, vowels “ /ә/ , /ɛ:/ , /i:/ , /ɑ:/ , /u:/ , /ᴐ:/ and /ɪ/”, and finally diphthongs “/eә/ , /ʊә/ , /әʊ/.” This study also provides some helpful suggestions and recommendation that will reduce future errors regarding English segmental phonemes among Libyan English learners. Keywords: segmental phonemes, consonant clusters, students’ perceptions, pronunciation How to Cite: Abdulghani Mohammed Emran; Dwi Anggani L.B. 2017. The Errors of Segmental Phonemes Among Libyans English Students Studying in Semarang City, Indonesia. Language Circle: Journal of Language and Literature, XI/2. INTRODUCTION Many second language learners want to“sound like natives”, however this dream has yet to be achieved by the majority of second language learners are under the impression that they speak English intelligibly, but the truth is a vast majority of ESL learners make numerous errors. In addition to phonological, lexical and spelling errors, learners also produce pronunciation, rhythm, intonation voice quality errors. To a greater extent, ESL learners are not even aware of the pronunciation errors that they make. There are numerous factors that contribute to the errors second language learners produce, especially in the area of pronunciation. Certainly, the differences between the learners‟ native language and the http://journal.unnes.ac.id/ mailto:abdo07mohammed@gmail.com LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature 11/2 (April 2017) 184 acquired language play an important role in these difficulties. Moreover, there are elements that contribute directly to pronunciation errors. In addition to variations in the phonemic inventory of both languages, age and language transfer also play a strong role in the acquisition process. Its importance has shaped the positive attitudes of some second language learners. Suleiman (1993) stated that according to the participants in his study; learning English provides the individual an advantage as an active participant in today's world, opening new horizons to a better future. A large population of second language learners believes that the main difficulty they experience when speaking English is pronunciation. Generally, they consider pronunciation as the main cause for their communication problems (Derwing & Rossiter, 2002; Al- Kahtany, 1995). The majority of ESL learners want to be indistinguishable from English native speakers. In a study conducted by Derwing (2003), more than half of the interviewees felt that they would receive more respect if they pronounced English well. According to (Giles, 1970; Weener, 1967), it is very important to second language learners to be perfectly understood and not be stigmatized as being “lower class” and have anything they produce be discounted by others. Good pronunciation insures that a message gets transmitted more effectively. Also, abnormal pronunciation means that the person is stained as a “non-native” speaker of that language (Weeren & Theunissen, 1987). Often, native speakers of English evaluate non-native speakers of English negatively. Ryan and her colleagues found out that U.S. listeners of English negatively rated Spanish and German accented English speech (Ryan, Carranza & Moffie, 1977; Ryan & Sebastian, 1980; Ryan & Bulik, 1982). However, not all non- native speakers of English are stigmatized due to their accents. In a study conducted by Cargile & Giles (1998), a Japanese speaker with a “moderate accent” was rated highly by American university students. This study attempted to identify and evaluate the errors of segmental phonemes by the Libyan students of English in Semarang, Central Java, Indonesia. English language, just like any other language, has a rule for combining sound segments to make meaningful words. When the Libyan students produce a language, they face some overlaps because of the very different phoneme systems of both languages Arabic and English. So, when they try to produce a language, they produce the sounds which are closest to the sounds and also exist in their mother tongue. For example, the Libyan speakers of English pronounce beer instead of peer and sheap instead of cheap. This kind of pronunciation problem creates a big hindrance in the process of communication amongst speakers. Briefly, this study concerned mainly on the consonant sounds, vowel sounds, diphthongs and consonant clusters with different positions in the speech according to the sound so it is either initial, medial or final position. The tested consonant sounds are /p/, /θ/, /ð/, /v/, / ᴣ/, /t∫/, /dᴣ/, and /ŋ/. The vowel sounds are /ɪ/, /ɛ/, /ɑ/ and /ә/. The tested diphthongs are /eә/ and /ʊә/. Finally the consonant clusters which combine two, three or four consonant sounds together with vowel sound. Review of the Previous Studies Many researchers have conducted their studies on the mistakes committed by Arab learners while learning English as a Abdulghani Mohammed Emran; Dwi Anggani L.B. 2017. The Errors of Segmental Phonemes Among Libyans English Students Studying in Semarang City, Indonesia. Language Circle: Journal of Language and Literature, XI/2. 185 second or foreign language, such as Harrison, Prator and Tucker (1975), Abdul Haq (1982), Kharma & Hajjaj (1989), Altaha (1995), Wahba (1998), Binturki (2008) and Al- Shuaibi (2009) and some others. Mostly they have focused on the field of phonology, morphology and syntax. In her study, Raya (2016) Claimed that the most errors produced by the Jordan speakers are consonants " /p - v - ʧ - ʤ - ŋ - ɹ - ƚ/ ", vowels "/ɪ - ɛ - ɑ - ɔ: - oʊ - ә /" clusters and stress. All the participants were sharing the same hometown and the same dialects features, the average of the age was 23 and no one of them has lived outside Jordan for over six months. She categorized some errors related to stress, clusters, vowels and consonants and she mentioned the reasons and the differences between Arabic and English producing of the sounds and the organs of pronouncing each sign sound of each language. The study filled the gaps of all reader's questions as Arabic speakers of English language and it explained in details all the pronunciation aspects of consonants, clusters, vowels and stress, also the errors done by the Jordan in particular and the Arabic in general. Turki (2008) demonstrated that Saudi ESL speakers do have difficulty with the voiced interdental fricative /v/ and to lesser extent, with /p/ and /r/. Five native speakers of Saudi Arabian studying in the U.S. were chosen to participate in this study. A words list and a reading passage were used to elicit the target sounds in order to generate data for both context and isolation. For feeding the curiosity of the Arabic and non-Arabic readers, the author may could vary with his participants by choosing speakers of English who never be in an English speaking country and those who ever be there. METHODOLOGY This study is qualitative study and the data was obtained by recording test, to evaluate and identify the errors commit by Libyan students, and questionnaire, to understand the reasons behind these errors and how to cope them. This current study included fifteen Libyan English students from two universities in Semarang, Central Java, Indonesia; namely (Semarang State University and Diponegoro). Those fifteen participants were from different regions in Libya and they were form different majors of master and Doctoral degrees (information system, public health, economic, bio-medic) and their levels of speaking English vary from intermediate to upper intermediate levels. They were tested to identify the common errors of segmental phonemes and how to cope with them. RESULTS The results that exposed from the recording- test were divided into five terms related to the research questions. Those terms were consonant, vowel, diphthongs, consonant cluster and finally students’ perceptions which tried to suggest some recommendations to cope with these errors. Consonants Table 1 below gave mispronounced consonant sounds produced by the Libyan students. Table 1. Consonants’ Results Sound Frequency LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature 11/2 (April 2017) 186 Initial Medial Final No. Fre q. No. Freq. No. Freq. p 10 66.6% 11 73% 9 60% t 4 10% 3 13.3% 3 10% k --- --- --- --- 1 3.3% b 3 10% 2 6.6% 4 16.6% d --- --- 1 3.3% 4 23.3% g 5 30% 3 26.6% 5 30% f 1 6.6% --- --- 3 6.6% v 8 53.3% 9 60% 10 66.6% θ 10 63.6% 8 50% 8 46.6% ð 5 30% 5 30% 10 66.6% s --- --- 3 10% --- --- z --- --- --- --- --- --- ∫ 4 23.3% 3 26.6% 1 10% ᴣ --- --- 13 56.6% --- --- h 5 26.6% --- --- --- --- t∫ 7 43.3% 7 43.3% 7 43.3% dᴣ 12 83.3% 11 73.3% 11 73.3% m --- --- --- --- --- --- n --- --- --- --- --- --- ŋ --- --- --- --- 12 80% l --- --- --- --- --- --- r --- --- 4 20% 6 40% j 2 6.6% 1 3% --- --- w --- --- --- --- 9 70% The participants were asked to read an individual words and tinny paragraph in order to identify the errors of the consonant sounds. The results were analysed carefully one by one. The voiceless bilabial plosive sound /p/ was replaced with /b/ sound in all the error cases and the table above showed that 10 out of 15 students mispronounce the /p/ sound in the initial position with 67% of errors' frequency of the sound, it also showed that 11 out of 15 students mispronounce the sound in the medial position with 73% of errors' frequency, and 9 students mispronounce it in the final position with Abdulghani Mohammed Emran; Dwi Anggani L.B. 2017. The Errors of Segmental Phonemes Among Libyans English Students Studying in Semarang City, Indonesia. Language Circle: Journal of Language and Literature, XI/2. 187 60% of errors' frequency. The voiceless alveolar sound /t/ mispronounced by 4 participants out of 15 with 10% of the total error's frequency in the initial position, 3 of them with 13% in the medial position and in the final position only 3 participants with 10% of the total errors' frequency. For the voiceless velar sound /k/ looks so familiar for the Libyan students because only 1 student out of 15 with 3% of the errors' frequency miss pronounce it in the final position,whereas they pronounce it perfectly in the initial and medial position. The bilabial voiced sound /b/ was pronounced correctly by most of the students only 3 respondents out of 15 mispronounce it in the initial position with 10% of the total error's frequency, 2 respondents were mispronounce it in the medial position with 7% and 4 of them with 10% in the final position. As the students produced the voiced velar sound /d/, only 1 student mispronounce it in the medial position with 3% of total errors' frequency and 4 of them mispronounce it with 23% in the final position, whereas in the initial position was correctly produced. The table above also showed that 5 students of the total number of the students mispronounce the voiced velar sound /g/ in the final position with 30% as the highest errors' frequency and then the initial with 30% by 5 students as well and the medial position get the lowest errors' frequency with 27% produced by 3 students. The voiceless labiodental fricative sound /f/ produced perfectly in the initial and medial positions by most of the respondents, only 3 of them mispronounce it in the final position when it was formulated by "ugh" alphabets like in the word "laugh" with 7% of errors' frequency. The voiced labiodental fricative sound /v/ was replaced with /f/ sound in the test, there was 8 students mispronounce it in the initial position with 53%, 9 of them mispronounce it in the medial position with 60% and 10 of them in the final with 67% of errors' frequency. For the voiceless dental fricative sound /θ/ almost in the all error's cases were replaced with /d/ sound, 10 out of 15 participants with 64% mispronounce the /θ/ sound in the initial position, 8 with 50% of errors' frequency in the medial position ,and 8 of them as well with 47% mispronounce it in the final position. Again as the voiceless dental fricative sound /θ/, the voiced dental fricative sound /ð/ was also replaced with /d/ sound in all the words, only 5 students mispronounce the sound in initial and medial position with 30% of error's frequency, and 10 of them mispronounce it in the final position with 67%. The voiceless alveolar fricative sound /s/ produced correctly by all of the participants in the initial and final position but when the /s/ sound formulated by the alphabet letter c and followed with vowel sound in medial position, 3 of the participants produce it as the voiceless velar plosive /k/ which covers 10% of the errors' frequency in the test. The voiced alveolar fricative sound /z/ pronounced correctly in the three different positions by the Libyan students. For the voiceless palato-alvelar fricative sound /∫/, 4 students replace it with /s/ sound when it was formulated by the alphabet letters ''ciat'' in the medial position with 27% and it was the highest error position in the sound and then in the initial sound with 23% produced by 4 students when the sound was formulated by "su" alphabet letters as in the word "sugar" and finally the lowest errors' frequency with 10% in the final position by only one student. For the voiced palat-alvelar fricative sound /ᴣ/, it was replaced with LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature 11/2 (April 2017) 188 voiceless palate-alvelar /∫/ sound in the medial position by 13 respondents with 57% of errors' frequency. The voiceless glottal sound /h/ mispronounced in the initial position by 5 participants with 27% when it was silent like in the word "honour" where is it pronounced correctly in the other pronounced forms. The voiced affricative sound /dᴣ/ was replaced with /ᴣ/ sound by 12 students in the initial position with 83% and 11 students with 73% for both the medial and final positions. The results also showed that the /t∫/sound was replaced with /∫/ sound in the three positions by 7 students with 43.3% of errors' frequency. The bilabial nasal sound /m/, the alveolar nasal sound /n/ and the lateral /l/ sound were produced perfectly by the fifteen Libyan students because the three mentioned sounds and some other sounds as well are present in the Arabic language which helped the student to pronounce them correctly and easily. For the velar nasal sound /ŋ/, there were 12 out of 15 students with 80% replaced the sound /ŋ/ in the final position with heavy pronouncing of /n/ and /g/ sounds mixed together. The /r/ sound produced correctly in the initial position by the Libyan student as it presents in their mother tongue but 4 respondents produced it very heavily in the medial position with 20% of the total errors' frequency and 6 of them produced it heavily and noticeable as well in the final position with 40% of the total errors' frequency. For the /j/ sound it was mispronounced only by 2 students with 7% of the total errors' frequency in the initial position and in the medial position only one student mispronounce the /j/ sound with 3% of errors' frequency. Finally the /w/ was produced correctly by the Libyan students in initial and medial position but it was mispronounced in the final position with 70% of the total errors' frequency by 9 students. Vowels Table 2 below presented the mispronounced vowel sound. Table 2. Vowels’ Results Sound Frequency Initial Medial Final No. Freq. No. Freq. No. Fre q. /ɪ/ 6 40% 9 56.6% --- --- /e/ 9 60% 7 46.6% --- --- /æ/ 3 16.6% 2 10% --- --- /ɒ/ 1 3% 4 13.3% --- --- /ʊ/ --- --- 4 13.3% --- --- /ә/ 13 83.3% 12 80% 10 70% /i:/ 10 80% 9 70% 9 70% /ɑ:/ 9 66.6% 12 76.6% 9 80% /ᴐ:/ 9 66.6% 8 56.6% 10 70% Abdulghani Mohammed Emran; Dwi Anggani L.B. 2017. The Errors of Segmental Phonemes Among Libyans English Students Studying in Semarang City, Indonesia. Language Circle: Journal of Language and Literature, XI/2. 189 /u:/ 9 70% 10 73.3% 7 56.6% /ɛ:/ 5 60% 13 83.3% 9 86.6% We can notice from the table above that Libyan students still mixed up between the short and long vowels in all positions. The highest percentage of errors' frequency went to the schwa short vowel /ә/ in the initial position with 83% produced by 13 English students, 80% with 12 students out of 15 mispronounce it in the medial position and finally 10 of them with 70% of total errors' frequency miss pronounce it in the final position; in the three mentioned errors' cases, the schwa sound was replaced by the short vowel /ɒ/ but mostly was replaced with /ɪ/ sound specially in the medial and final position. Then the long vowel sound /i:/ was mispronouncing by 10 Libyan participants in the initial position with 80%, 9 of them with70% mispronounce it in the medial and final positions; the /i:/ sound was replaced with some other short vowels but mostly by /ɪ/ sound. For the long vowel sound /ɛ:/, There were 5 students mispronounce it in the initial position with 60% of errors' frequency, 13 of them mispronounce it in the medial position with 83% and 9 of them in the final with 87% of error's frequency. The long vowel sound /u:/ was highly mispronounced by 9 participants in the medial position which covered 70% of total errors' frequency, 10 of them with 73% produced it incorrectly in the medial position and 7 participants with 57% of total errors' frequency mispronounced it in the final position; in three cases it was replaced with short vowel sound /ʊ/. The short vowel /u/ was mispronounced in the medial position with only 13% of total errors' frequency by 4 students. For the long vowel sound /ɑ:/, it was mispronounced by 9 out of 15 students with 67% in the initial position, 12 with 77% in the medial position and in the final position there was 9 students with 80% of the total errors' frequency. The long vowel /ᴐ:/ was produced incorrectly by 9 students with 67% in the initial position, 8 of them also produced it incorrectly in the medial position with 57% and finally 10 students with 70% mispronounce it in the final position. The table also showed that 6 out of 15 students mispronounce the /ɪ/ sound in the initial position with 40% of error's frequency of the sound, it also showed that 9 of them mispronounce the sound in the medial position with 57% of error's frequency, in almost the whole errors cases produced as /e/ short vowel sound. The short vowel sound /e/ was mispronounced by 9 of the respondents with 60% of the total errors' frequency in the initial position and 7 of them with 47% mispronounced it in the medial position; the /e/ sound replaced with long vowel sound /i:/ or the short form /ɪ/. The lowest errors percentages went to the short vowels /æ/ and /ɒ/ sounds. For /æ/ sound, it was mispronounced by 3 students with 17% of errors' frequency in the initial position and 2 of them in the medial position with 10%. Finally the /ɒ/ sound was incorrectly produced by only 1 student in the initial position with 3% of errors' frequency and 4 of them with 13% in the final position. Diphthongs Table 3 discussed the mispronounced diphthong sounds. LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature 11/2 (April 2017) 190 Table 3.: Diphthongs’ Results Sound Frequency Initial Medial Final No. Freq. No. Freq. No. Fre q. /eI/ 4 10% 4 20% 3 16.6% /aI/ 6 26.6% 7 33.3% 3 10% /ϽI/ 2 10% 2 6.6% --- --- /әʊ/ 9 63.3% 9 70% 7 60% /aʊ/ --- --- 2 13.3% --- --- /Iә/ --- --- 3 16.6% 1 5% /eә/ 13 83.3% 14 90% 13 83.3% /ʊә/ --- --- 11 73.3% --- --- The participants were asked to read an individual words and tinny paragraph in order to identify the errors of the tested diphthong sounds. Table C showed that the highest diphthongs percentage of errors' frequency is /eә/ with 83% produced by 13 students in the initial, in the medial position with 90% produced by 14 students and 13 students with 83% in the final position. Then, the diphthong /ʊә/ was also highly mispronounced with 73% produced by 11 students in the medial position. The diphthong sound /әʊ/ was produced incorrectly by 9 participant out of 15 in the initial position with 63%, the same sound but in the medial position was incorrectly produced by 9 participants also with 70% of total errors' frequency and in the final position 7 of them mispronounced it with 60%. For the /aI/ sound, 6 respondents out of 15 mispronounced it in the initial position with 27%, 7 of them with 33% mispronounced it in the medial position and in the final position, 3 of the respondents out of 15 with 10% of errors' frequency. The /eI/ sound was pronounced incorrectly by 4 students in the initial position with 10% of errors frequency, 4 of them mispronounced it in the medial position with 20% and 17% of the total errors' frequency in the final position produced by 3 students. The diphthong /ϽI/ was mispronounced by only 2 students with 10% in the initial and 7% in the medial position. The /aʊ/ sound was produced incorrectly by 2 students with 13% in the medial position. Finally, the /Iә/ sound produced incorrectly by 3 students out of 15 with 17% of errors' frequency in the initial position and only 1 student with 5 % in the final position. Consonants Clusters A recording-test was used (see appendix X) to collect the data and then to evaluate and analyse the Libyan errors with the tested consonant clusters. The figure below clarified the frequent of errors in the target vowel sounds. Abdulghani Mohammed Emran; Dwi Anggani L.B. 2017. The Errors of Segmental Phonemes Among Libyans English Students Studying in Semarang City, Indonesia. Language Circle: Journal of Language and Literature, XI/2. 191 Table 4. consonant clusters' results Consonant Cluster type Number of the students Frequency CC 13 86.6% CCC 14 90% CCCC 12 80% The participants were asked to read sentences that contain the three kinds of consonant clusters, two three and four consonants combined together. Table 4.4 above clarified that 13 students out of 15 mispronounce the words with two consonant clusters with 86.6% of error frequency, 14 of them mispronounce it with 90% in the three consonants type and finally 12 students with 80% of error frequency mispronounce the words with four clusters. Student's perception The student's perceptions were collected after the recording-test is done via a questionnaire. The questionnaire contains eight main terms which tried to ask about their opinions and their expected errors in the test specifically and pronunciation of English generally. Below is the analysis for each term. Table 5. Frequency of consonants Sound Number of students Frequency Pronouncing /b/ instead of /p/ 9 60% Pronouncing /f/ instead of /v/ 9 60% Pronouncing /d/ instead of /θ/ 11 73.3% Pronouncing /d/ instead of /ð/ 13 86.6% Pronouncing /∫/ instead of /ᴣ/ 5 33.3% Pronouncing /∫/instead of /t∫/ 11 73.3% Pronouncing /ᴣ/ instead of /dᴣ/ 13 86.6% Pronouncing /n/ & /g/ instead of /ŋ/ 12 80% Pronouncing /e/ instead of /ɪ/ 4 26.6% Pronouncing /ᴧ/ instead of /ɜ:/ 12 80% Pronouncing /ɑ/ instead of /ɑ:/ 13 86.6% Pronouncing /ɪ/ instead of /ә/ 8 53.3% LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature 11/2 (April 2017) 192 Pronouncing /eɪ/ instead of /eә/ 12 80% Pronouncing /u:/ instead of /ʊә/ 14 93.3% Pronouncing ɑːskɪd instead of ɑːst 11 73.3% Pronouncing gɪfts instead of gɪfs 14 93.3% Pronouncing tekst instead of teks 13 86.6% . Sounds' Errorsthat they mispronounce the sound /θ/ and pronounce /d/ instead, 13 students which is 86.6% answered that they mispronounce the /ð/sound with /d/ as well, only 5 students said that they did an error in pronouncing /ᴣ/ sound and replace it with /∫/, the /t∫/ sound was replaced with /∫/ sound by 11 students which mean 73.3% of the total number of the students, 13 students replaced /dᴣ/ sound with /ᴣ/ with 86.6% as they answered in the questionnaire, 12 students said that they mispronounced the sound /ŋ/ and pronounced the sounds /n/ & /g/ sounds which cover 80%, according to the questionnaire, only 4 students pronounced /e/ instead of /ɪ/ sound and that means only 26.6% of the students total number, the /ɜ:/ sound was replaced with /ᴧ/ sound by 12 students with 80%, the long vowel /ɑ:/ pronounced as the short vowel /ɑ/ by 13 students with 86.6%, the /ɪ/ sound produced as /ә/ by 8 students and that covered 53.3% of the students' total number, the diphthong /eә/ was produced as /eɪ/ with 80% by 12 students, the diphthong /ʊә/ with the three consonant clusters type got the highest expected error by 14 students which means 93.3% of the students' total number, the two consonant clusters got 73.3% by 11 students and finally the four consonant clusters type got 86.6% as 13 students answered they mispronounce it. Table 6 below discussed the number of Libyan student that were motivated to improve their English. Table 6. Expected Errors in the Recording Test Scale 1 2 3 4 5 No. -- - 2 3 7 3 When I asked the students about their expected errors in the recording-test, 9 students out of 15 which means 60% of the students answered that they did an error as they pronounced /p/ as /b/ and /v/ as /f/, 11 of them which covers 73.3% said English I used Likert-Scale to find out the students' motivation to improve their English none of the students answered with the level number 1 whereas 2 of them answered the second level which covered 13% of the total number of the students, 3 of them got the third level with 20% of the overall students, 7 Abdulghani Mohammed Emran; Dwi Anggani L.B. 2017. The Errors of Segmental Phonemes Among Libyans English Students Studying in Semarang City, Indonesia. Language Circle: Journal of Language and Literature, XI/2. 193 students chose the fourth level with 47% and only 3 chose the fifth level which adopted only 20% of the total number of the students. I asked the students if they tried to overcome the pronunciation errors they do while they speak English, table X below explained the students’ answers. Table 7. Students' Motivation to Improve their Pronunciuation Sc ale 1 2 3 4 5 No . 1 3 5 3 3 The students' perceptions about overcome the mispronunciation of the sounds was answered as the following: One students answered with the first level with 7% of the students' number and he commented that he is not interesting to overcome his pronunciation as long as he still understand by the other side, 3 of them with 20% answered the second level, 5 of them with 33% got the third level, finally the fourth and fifth levels was answered by 3 students with 20%. The students were asked about the ways they use to improve their pronunciation performance. Table below simplify the students answers. Table 8. Students' Opinions about the Methods to Improve their Pronunciation Skill Listening to music Watching English movies Talking with native English speakers 8 6 8 Reading English books Educational English videos 4 5 Table 8 summarized the percentage of each way of the suggested methods in the table above that Libyan students used to improve their pronunciation skill. Eight students out of fifteen which covered 53% of the whole students answered that they do listen to music and talking with English native speakers to improve their erformance in pronunciation and they believe it is useful for them. Six students with 40% prefer to watch English movies even though they still misunderstand the movies language but they believe it is helpful for them to overcome their pronunciation obstacles. Only four students with 27% do read books in order to improve their pronunciation and finally five of them which covered 33% watch educational English videos which they think it can work as the way to improve their sounds production. I asked the participants what they think the reason behind mispronouncing some sounds in English language. Table 9 discussed some expected factors of the errors. LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature 11/2 (April 2017) 194 Table 9 Students' Opinions about the Reasons of their Poor Pronunciation Shyness Lack of equipment The big number of students in the class room 4 5 3 Teacher s are not willing to assist me The mother tongue influence Curriculum's weakness 4 8 4 Below is the percentage of the reasons that Libyan's students thought were behind their poor pronunciation The answers varied from one student to another and some of them said other reasons which we will discuss in the next questionnaire's terms. Four students with 27% said they feel shy as they speak English, five of them 33% blame the official institutions by the lack of equipment which so helpful to improve their pronunciation performance. Only three student with 20% said that the big number of the students in the classroom played an important role in the process of their poor pronunciation. Four students 27% believe that the teacher just wanted to finish the whole curriculum without regarding to the students' performance. The influence of the mother tongue got the highest level with eight students with 53% whom believe it is the main reason for their prosaic performance. Finally, only four students with 27% answered that the curriculum they studied, was not covering the whole sounds in details or even with simple clarification. The last three terms were detailed questions and I started with what kind of pronunciation errors do you have in English? Some students said that they cannot pronounce the sounds which are not existed in Arabic language, other students answered that they cannot differentiate between the sounds which produced by th, ch and ious letters as in thorn, weather and so on, they still confuse where and when should they pronounce the segmental phonemes of some letters specially those letter which combing together to make new sounds. Some of them also answered that they cannot pronounce the English words which contain more than five letters, they feel like it is so complicated even though if it is familiar for them, other students said they do pronounce the sound /r/ very noticeable specially at the end of the word, and they cannot hide it while they speak in English, whereas the rest of the students got enough only with the obstacles I mentioned above. The second term was the reason in the students' perception which they think is the main factor in mispronouncing some English sounds. The highest responded went to the very great influence of the Arabic language on their tongues as they speak English and some sounds are not existed in the Arabic language so they use the closest unit sound. Other Abdulghani Mohammed Emran; Dwi Anggani L.B. 2017. The Errors of Segmental Phonemes Among Libyans English Students Studying in Semarang City, Indonesia. Language Circle: Journal of Language and Literature, XI/2. 195 students answered that they rarely practicing English either with native speakers or even with their colleagues, a student answered she is not motivated or interesting to improve her pronunciation. The last and the third term was how the student cope with these errors. The highest responded went to practicing English everyday with native or even non- native speakers of English and listening to English everyday either by music or movies. Some students prefer to have courses by specialized teachers to help them overcome these errors they have, other students answered they need to motivate their selves and decide what they exactly can gain by mastering English other students believe that books and audio books are so useful for them to improve their pronunciation proficiency. CONCLUSION The primary focus of spoken language is communication, where listening represents the most important skill in both listening to understand and listening to imitate (pronunciation). Skills such as these can successfully be developed through language laboratory exercises that train learners to achieve accurate perception and production of the sounds of the new language. Moreover, when listening to a foreign language, it is necessary to know the sounds, rhythms, intonation and stress patterns of that language. A language laboratory will provide the right environment where the learners can practice such pronunciation tasks, which will benefit the students' intelligibility. Further study is also needed to investigate the possibility of giving more space to English pronunciation in the curriculum. The materials and classroom activities included in secondary and tertiary syllabi in Libyan institutions, settings scarcely incorporate Pronunciation teaching. A number of recommendations will be made for the teaching of perception and pronunciation of English in the context of the English Curriculum taught at Libyan universities and schools. Focus on speech sound production in isolation and in context, higher priority should be given to the production of English speech, which represents a major learning problem for Libyan learners. In this respect, the emphasis in production should be on getting the sounds right at the word level, dealing with words in isolation and with words in controlled sentence environments. This way of speech production enables learners/instructors to recognize which sounds are the most difficult to distinguish, e.g. in minimal pairs like /v/, /f/ love and laugh ,and /b/,/p/ as in pack /pæk/, back /bæk /which can have a negative impact on intelligibility when not properly distinguished. Moreover, production instructions should place more effort on language as Communication, as this will motivate successful production. Pronunciation must be as necessary component of intelligibility in which the learners should surpass the threshold level so that their production does not hinder their communicative abilities. Both of Libyan teachers and learners need specific assistance by specialized teachers in English language teaching. Teachers should obtain a high level of intelligibility, since they represent a model for English input to their students. Therefore, they should receive special assistance that enables them to do their job properly. For example, listen-and- imitate techniques, language laboratory exercises, free conversations, minimal pair LANGUAGE CIRCLE: Journal of Language and Literature 11/2 (April 2017) 196 drills, etc are required. Phonetic description of the articulator system of the target language is also important ,since it offers the learners an opportunity to develop explicit knowledge about the perceptual representations of the second language sounds. This is because learners cannot produce speeches sound correctly unless they acquire correct perceptual information about the second language. Future researchers should pay more attention to speech intelligibility problems, teaching pronunciation, perception listening skills, etc as issues that receive relatively little attention. Their investigations should use experimental evidence to account for the learning problems concerned, rather than using impressionistic views. Results which are obtained by means of experiments have some degree of certainty and are scientifically more credible than impressionist judgments, especially when the impressions are voiced by observers who are not native speakers of the target language. Use of language labs to teach foreign languages, Language laboratories are needed to maintain a high level of training in foreign or Second language learning. Learners need to acquire an accurate perceptual representation of the speech sounds of the target language, which is a necessary. Prerequisite for pronouncing the foreign speech sounds adequately. The language Laboratory forms the most suitable place to practice phonetic exercises. I strongly suggest for the Libyan learners to listen regularly to English sounds and words using audio aids like cassettes, CDs, audio books and sound dictionaries. These tools are very useful for practicing pronunciation. It is also worth looking at the dictionary for checking the correct pronunciation of words. Taking cues from the results, further large-scale and comprehensive investigations should be conducted to cover other areas that have to do with the speech intelligibility issue in the Libyan classroom. Therefore, research will be required in the Following themes insufficient practice, wrong implementation and partial learning represent major causes of such problems. So, a further study that treats the use of the language laboratory to teach English phonetics and listening comprehension skills in Libyan English teaching is recommended. REFERENCES Al-Shuaibi, A. (2009). 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