Pronunciation skills

The research interest relates to refugees whose first languages are Arabic and Persian (as well as the Dari variety) and who intend to study in Germany. The research project is funded by the Hessian Ministry of Science and Art. In addition to the University of Kassel, the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen and Marburg are also participating in the Ministry's measure with their own individual projects.

In the long term, the Kassel project aims to develop an empirically based and scientific language-oriented pronunciation training course for refugees with study prospects that can be used in German courses for this target group. Two individual projects on the social acceptance of foreign language accents and phonetic deviations in the German language and on the influence of the 'age' factor on foreign language pronunciation skills form the basis for this, the findings of which will be incorporated into the design of the pronunciation course.

In the first year of the project, two pilot pronunciation courses were held for prospective refugee students whose native languages are Arabic and Persian (Dari). Methods and techniques for teaching intonation and articulation were tested. Contrastive studies on the participants' languages of origin and pronunciation tests were carried out in advance to determine potential pronunciation deviations and identify topics.