Ike Dian Puspita Sari, Yazid Basthomi, Nurenzia Yannuar, Evynurul Laely Zen
This study investigates how English pronunciation teachers and students in an Indonesian EFL context perceive non-native English accents within the framework of English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), examining affective, behavioral, and cognitive orientations toward accent diversity. As English increasingly functions as a global lingua franca, the study aims to understand whether pronunciation teaching in Indonesia is shifting from native-speaker norms toward intelligibility-based communication. Using a qualitative single-case study design, the research involved five pronunciation teachers and ninety undergraduate students from a private university in Malang, Indonesia. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and a student questionnaire featuring AI-generated audio stimuli representing seven non-native English accents from Asian and European speakers. Thematic and descriptive analyses revealed a shared movement toward an intelligibility-centered perspective, emphasizing empathy, clarity, and communicative confidence rather than imitation of native pronunciation. Teachers expressed increasing awareness of the importance of mutual understanding, while students showed openness and adaptability to global varieties of English. However, traces of native-speaker ideology persisted, particularly in teachers' perceptions of professionalism and in assessment practices that continued to privilege native-like pronunciation. Overall, the findings suggest an emerging ideological transformation in pronunciation teaching and learning in Indonesian higher education, indicating a growing acceptance of English diversity. The study recommends reorienting pronunciation pedagogy toward inclusive, intelligibility-based approaches and adopting assessment practices that value effective communication across accents. Future research involving multi-institutional and longitudinal designs is encouraged to strengthen the theoretical and pedagogical foundations of intelligibility-centered pronunciation instruction in global EFL settings. Copyright (c) 2026 The Authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Faculty of Letters, Universitas Negeri Malang, Jawa Timur, Malang, Indonesia
