2.2. Square boxes show areas where ST phonemes are not matched by any corresponding phonemes in SH. The phonemes given in parentheses present difficulties at the imitation and substitution levels. Thus in a general way the difficulties faced by a Hindi learner of Tamil in the first set of phonemes given in square brackets should be different from the ones he faces when he tries to produce latter sounds. Now let us consider these difficulties in production through materials recorded in actual class room situations. 2.3. The two sets of vowels consisting of two vowels in each set placed in parentheses in L1 exhibit contrast in length. However, the corresponding sets of vowels in SH have only one vowel in each set. These two vowels are pronounced neither short nor long in SH. They are evenly stressed in all the syllables in a word. So it is indeed one of the major tasks of the teacher to train the students to maintain difference between short and long vowels in pronunciation. However, when a great deal of emphasis is placed to show the contrast between short / o / and long / oo /, the short / o / is wrongly identified with short / u / in the initial syllable. Cg. ST SH o orU LIITLI “One poRU puRu “tolerate’ tOTU tuTU ‘touch” 2.4. The Spoken Tamil un rounded front low vowel / E /* and / EE / are not matched by anything in Spoken Hindi. So the student tends to substitute / E / and / EE / by the stressed front half close vowel / e / because of its close phonetic resem blance to them. 286
