Phonemic analysis of Maithili and English sounds

Abstract

The study entitled “Phonemic Analysis of Maithili and English Sounds” attempts to identify consonants sounds in Maithili and then compare and contrast them with the consonants of English. The researcher conducted a survey and collected the data from 35 fluent speakers of Maithili native people from Bariyarpatti area of Siraha district, by using purposive non-random sampling procedure. The informants were 25 years above in age; English data were taken from secondary sources, mainly from Geigerich (1982), some of the Maithili data were adopted from Yadav (2011). Major findings of the study are that Maithili has 26 consonants. This number is larger than English Consonants; Maithili does have more oral plosive sounds; 16 unlike English 6. English does have more fricative sounds; 9, which Maithili does have only 2. English does have labio-dental, alveolar and plato- alveolar sounds which are not found in Maithili language. In Maithili, all stops sounds do have voiced aspirated phonemic feature, which does not in English. , Maithili has 14 and English has 15 voiced consonants. Two nasal sounds are identical in term of phonemes in both languages. This thesis is organized in five chapters. The first chapter deals with introduction of the study, statement of the problem, objectives of the study, research questions, significance of the study, delimitations of the study, and operational definition of the key terms. The second chapter deals with review of related literature and conceptual framework which consists review of the related theoretical literature, review of related empirical literature, implication of the review for the study and conceptual framework. The third chapter deals with methods and procedures of the study which consists design, and methods of the study, population, sample and sampling strategy, study area / field data collection tools and techniques, data collection procedures and data analysis and interpretation procedures. The fourth chapter deals with analysis of data interpretation procedures. The fourth chapter deals with analysis of data and interpretation of results which consists analysis of data and interpretation of results, summary of the findings. The fifth chapter deals with conclusion and recommendations.