Speech Rhythm in Cameroon English: A Cross-generational Study

Recent years have seen an increase of sociolinguistic interest in World Englishes and second language acquisition (Buschfeld 2020; Lacoste 2012). How- ever, little attention has been given to the language of children and adolescents as well as to suprasegmental variation in postcolonial contexts. This paper aims to contribute to this growing body of research by providing insights into patterns of rhythmic variation among pre-adolescents and their parents in Cameroon. Drawing on conversational data collected in a primary school in Yaoundé through sociolinguistic interviews, map drawing tasks, and memory games, the study in- vestigates the speech rhythm of four children and five adults. Speech rhythm was calculated using duration-based metrics (%V, ΔC, nPVI-V, rPVIV-V). The reported results indicate that the children’s rhythm is more syllable-timed than that of their parents and suggest insights into the process of accommodation to L2 speech rhythm.