English Interdental Fricative Production in Dutch Heritage Speakers Living in Canada

Abstract: This study investigates the production of /θ/ and /ð/ by three groups of English-speakers in the community of Norwich, Ontario, Canada. English monolinguals, heritage Dutch speakers (early bilinguals), and L1 Dutch/ L2 English speakers (late-learning bilinguals) /θ/ and /ð/ production was measured in both naturalistic and reading tasks. Heritage Dutch speakers produce ENT#091;θENT#093; and ENT#091;ðENT#093; at similar rates to Monolingual English speakers, but the two groups exhibit different allophonic realizations, especially when /ð/ is word-initial and /θ/ is word-medial....