A STUDY OF ARABIC VOWELS REALIZATION PRONOUNCED BY MADURESE IN RECITING THE QUR’AN

This study focuses on the realizations of Arabic vowels. It aims to find out and explain the realizations of vowels /a/, /i/ and /u/ pronounced by Madurese in reciting the Qur’an. Since Madurese and Arabic have different vowels, the writer uses the realizations of alternating vowels in Madurese to see either the realizations also occur or not when Madurese recites the Qur’an. The phonological environments of each realization are also analyzed in this study.
This study employs descriptive qualitative design as the research design. In addition, the writer used mechanical device and convenience technique sampling to collect the data. Interactive data analysis, then, is conducted to analyze and explain the data. The data of the study are taken from the participants’ pronunciations. There were five Madurese involved in this study. They learn to recite the Qur’an in Madura and from Madurese. They were asked to recite thirty six verses and forty eight Arabic words taken from Qur’an and Iqro’.
This study shows the findings of the Arabic vowels realizations and its phonological environments. It was found that when Madurese recites the Qur’an, the vowel /a/ is realized as [a], [ɤ] and [ɔ], the vowel /i/ is realized as [i] and [ɛ] while the vowel /u/ is only realized as [u]. In terms of the phonological environments of each realization, it was found that the environments of the realization of vowel /a/, [ɤ], are voiced consonants [b, d, ʤ, ð, z, w, j, ɣ] and voiceless glottal consonant [h] while the environments of [ɔ] are trill consonant [r], the uvular consonants [x, ɣ and q] and the pharyngealized consonants [sʕ, dʕ, tʕ, ðʕ]. The low central vowel [a] occurs in the elsewhere environment. While for the realization of vowel /i/, [i], it occurs in all environments while [ɛ] is realized after the trill consonant [r]. Since Madurese only realizes the vowel /u/ as the high back vowel [u], it occurs in all environments. Some of the realizations of the vowels are subject to some variation among speakers and perhaps across dialects. This study also shows that although not all Madurese allophonic alternating vowels found in the realization of Arabic vowels pronounced by Madurese, however it does occur. It indicates that in producing other languages, the first language or mother tongue can give influence towards the production.