Research On The Attitudes Of Chinese English-major Students Toward The Native-english-speaker Accent

Native-English-speaker accent have been highly praised in the field of English as a second and foreign language teaching for a long time. However, English globalization has modeled different English varieties and evolved diverse English accents.Although academic circles have questioned about traditional English pronunciation norm, many findings of empirical studies show that English learners still adhere to native-English-speaker pronunciation norm. In the light of Chinese status as the largest country in English education, the fact of insisting on “language standards” for a long period of time and the current situation of insufficient researches on Chinese-English-major students’ attitudes toward English pronunciation, this research would concentrate on Chinese-English-major students to explore their attitudes toward native-English-speaker pronunciation norm in the context of English globalization.This study aims at three questions:(1) Which English accent do Chinese-English-major students prefer to acquire?(2) Why do they prefer that certain English accent?(3) Whether they are able to distinguish different English accents?This study takes the Verbal-guise test, questionnaire and interview as the means for data collection, aiming at 127 Chinese-English-major students from Hebei university of Science and Technology. Different types of data would adopt different approaches to process. SPSS was employed to analysis the quantitative data obtained from tests and questionnaires. Based on overall evaluation, the variables of students’ gender, grade and home region were also analyzed. Qualitative data obtained from interviews were classified and merged to have contrast analysis in accordance with the sound principle.The results of this study are that(1) students(75%) generally prefer to learn native-English-speaker accent and expect to achieve native-like English accent. Students from rural areas(78%) show more preference to learn native-English-speaker accent than those from urban areas. Students in Low grades showed more preference to learn native English accent than those in High grades(60%). Female show more preference to learn native English accent than male(55%).(2) Students consider native-English-speaker accent as Standard English accent(75%).(3) Although majority of students(75%) expect to acquire native-like English accent, they cannot identity nationality and ethnicity of each speaker accurately(53.4%), even confused certain native English accent with non-native English accent, and viewed native English speakers as owner of English(75%).General attitude and reason indicated by research results, especially students’ identification to native-English-speaker accent and discrepancy of distinguishing ability to different English accents, indicate the hegemony of native-speakerism discourse in the field of English teaching, which constitutes an essential factor in pedagogical reform of Chinese English major. Meanwhile, Verbal-guise test employed in this research are in shortage in domestically related researches, which could provide reference for related research in the future. The deficiency of the research is that sample size is relatively small. The next research should expand the research sample, embracing English-major students form different universities, to verify and expand the findings of this research.