Sibilant contrast production by bilingual speakers of Quanzhou Southern Min and Mandarin

The merger of the Mandarin s~ù contrast, known as "deretroflexion", frequently occurs in Mandarin spoken by bilingual Southern Min speakers, whose L1 lacks the retroflex category.This study explores the production of the Mandarin alveolar-retroflex contrast by bilingual speakers of Quanzhou Southern Min (L1) and Mandarin (L2) in two different vowel contexts (a vs. u).Our bilingual speakers' contrast production was evaluated using a perceptual identification task by L1 Mandarin speakers, showing only a small subset of our sample who maintained the s~ù contrast.We found significant Center of Gravity (CoG) differences between the two target fricatives for "distinctive" speakers, with this difference being larger in the context of a than u.For all speakers, the acoustic difference between the target fricatives increased with increased exposure to and use of Mandarin.