As part of a larger project that investigates the issue of identities in Hong Kong, this study anchored on the sociocognitive paradigm in second language acquisition (SLA) explores the potential relationship between one's identity and perceived language accentedness. Our study set in Hong Kong (HK) aims to extend Gatbonton and colleagues' works (e.g. [2005]. Learners' ethnic group loyalty and L2 pronunciation accuracy: A sociolinguistic investigation. TESOL Quarterly, 39(3), 489–511. ; [2008]. The ethnic group affiliation and L2 proficiency link: Empirical evidence. Language Awareness, 17(3), 229–248. ; [2011]. Ethnic group affiliation and patterns of development of a phonological variable. Modern Language Journal, 95(2), 188–204. ) that examine the relationship between ethnic group affiliation (EGA) and language proficiencies in diglossic contexts. HK is a multi-glossic context where Cantonese, English and Mandarin are the official languages, and they perform distinctive functions in various public and private domains. Through analysing participants' (n = 65; born between 1970s–1990s) self-identification and their reported accentedness in English and Mandarin, we address the question of whether EGA as a set of social factors has a bearing on a person's linguistic achievements. Findings indicate that participants' identification with the Chinese/ HK identity is related to their perceived accentedness in the targeted languages in intricate ways that do not align completely with our predictions. We conclude by calling for further socio-cognitively informed research that investigates multiglossic situations where languages/ language varieties complement or compete with each other. Copyright ©2024 Taylor & Francis Ltd.

The main purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness for L2 English learners of a new direct approach to segmental pronunciation instruction that combined articulatory instruction with abdominal enhancement techniques. The participants were Cantonese speakers in Hong Kong, where the school curriculum relies chiefly on indirect instruction within a task-based language teaching (TBLT) framework. Thus a second purpose of the study was to examine whether the direct approach may be a useful addition to the Hong Kong curriculum. Randomly-assigned experimental and comparison groups of recent school graduates completed pronunciation tasks embedded within a TBLT framework. However, the experimental group had direct attention drawn to the segmental sounds, including advice and feedback on how to produce them, while the comparison group did not. Both groups completed a pretest/posttest reading-aloud task. The segments targeted in this test (and in the instruction) involved selected long vowel/diphthong sounds, voiced fricative consonants, and /t/ and /d/ in syllable-final consonant clusters. Results showed the experimental group significantly outperformed the comparison group overall and in each of these segmental categories, highlighting the importance of the direct articulatory–abdominal instruction. The results also suggested such instruction should be given greater attention in the Hong Kong curriculum. Copyright © 2022 Routledge.