BILINGUALS AND BILINGUALISM

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BILINGUALISM

Why do we study bilingualism?

A large proportion of the world‟s population knows and uses more than one language on a regular basis. Multilingualism is the norm. More than 140 languages are spoken in Manchester. Language planning (social and educational policy) is a political issue often based on academic research.

The following slides show the increase in population of hispanics/latinos/as in the US since 1970. The increase has had a marked effect on discussions of bilingualism in the US.

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14.622.4

35.3

47.8

59.7

73.0

87.6

102.6

9.6

1970 1980 1990 2000 2010* 2020* 2030* 2040* 2050*

Population in millions

Hispanic Population in the United

States: 1970 to 2050

*Projected Population as of July 1

ProjectionsCensus

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 1970, 1980, 1990, and 2000 Decennial Censuses; Population Projections, July 1, 2010 to July 1, 2050

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6.49.0

12.5

15.517.8

20.122.3

24.4

4.7

1970 1980 1990 2000 2010* 2020* 2030* 2040* 2050*

Percent Hispanic of the Total Population in

the United States: 1970 to 2050

*Projected Population as of July 1

ProjectionsCensus

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 1970, 1980, 1990, and 2000 Decennial Censuses; Population Projections, July 1, 2010 to July 1, 2050

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BILINGUALISM

Topics in bilingualism

Who is bilingual? What is a native language?

How does a child acquire two languages?

How does bilingualism influence a human being‟s intellectual and mental growth?

When and how should we learn a second language?

Does a bilingual‟s brain function differently from a monolingual‟s brain?

How and when do bilinguals switch from one language to the other?

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BILINGUALISM

True or False?

Learning more than one language confuses a child and lowers

his/her IQ?

A child should learn one language properly before learning a

second one.

A person cannot be a real bilingual if he learns a second

language late.

Bilinguals have to translate from their weaker to their stronger

language.

Learning two languages may cause cultural identity problems for

a child.

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BILINGUALISM

Approaches

Linguistics – studies the structure and development of the two

languages

Psycholinguistics – studies the psychological basis of bilingual‟s

language competence and performance

Sociolinguistics – looks at how cultures/social groups affect

language performance and language choice

Neurolinguistics – studies the relationship between language and

the brain

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DEFINITIONS

Individual bilingualism vs Societal bilingualism

Bilingualism as an individual attribute: a psychological state of an

individual who has access to two language codes to serve

communication purposes.

Bilingualism as a societal attribute: two languages are used in a

community and that a number of individuals can use two

languages.

Should bilingualism be defined at an individual or a societal

level?

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DEFINITIONS

5 dimensions

Cognitive organisation of two languages

Age of acquisition

Language proficiency

Sequence of acquisition of two languages

Societal factors

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Individual characteristics

COMPOUND VS. COORDINATE BILINGUALS

Compound bilingual: Has one semantic system but two linguistic codes. Usually refers

to someone whose two languages are learnt at the same time, often in the same context.

Coordinate bilingual: Has two semantic systems and two linguistic codes. Usually

refers to someone whose two languages are learnt in distinctively separate contexts

Subordinate bilingual: The weaker language is interpreted through the stronger

language

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THE MENTAL LEXICON OF

MONOLINGUALS

Semantic

system

Has wings

Has feathers

Can fly

Language

code

Orange Apple Apple Bird

naranja mansana mansana pajaro

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THE MENTAL LEXICON OF BILINGUALS

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Semantic system Semantic

System 1

Semantic

System 2

English Spanish English Spanish

Compound bilingual Coordinate bilingual

THE MENTAL LEXICON OF BILINGUALS

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Semantic system

English Spanish

Subordinate bilingual

THE MENTAL LEXICON OF BILINGUALS

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Semantic

System 1

English Spanish

Semantic

System 2

English Spanish

Semantic

System 2

Semantic

System 1

THE MENTAL LEXICON OF BILINGUALS

Whether there are two or more systems

depends on:

Age of acquisition

Learning/teaching method

Similarities and differences between the two

languages

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EARLY VS. LATE BILINGUALS

Early bilingual:

someone who has acquired two languages early in childhood (usually received systematic training/learning of a second language before age 6).

Late bilingual:

someone who has become a bilingual later than childhood (after age 12).

Discussion: Is there a “critical period” for second language learning?

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EARLY VS. LATE BILINGUALS

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How do we determine the age of acquisition?

BALANCED VS. DOMINANT BILINGUALS

Balanced bilingual: someone whose mastery of two languages is

roughly equivalent.

Dominant bilingual: someone with greater proficiency in one of his or

her languages and uses it significantly more than the other language.

Semilingual: someone with insufficient knowledge of either

language.

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SUCCESSIVE VS. SIMULTANEOUS BILINGUALS

Successive bilingualism: Learning one language after already knowing another. This is the situation for all

those who become bilingual as adults, as well as for many who became bilingual earlier in life. Sometimes also called consecutive bilingualism.

Simultaneous bilingualism: Learning two languages as "first languages". That is, a person who is a

simultaneous bilingual goes from speaking no languages at all directly to speaking two languages. Infants who are exposed to two languages from birth will become simultaneous bilinguals.

Receptive bilingualism: Being able to understand two languages but express oneself in only one. This is

generally not considered "true" bilingualism but is a fairly common situation.

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ADDITIVE VS. SUBTRACTIVE BILINGUALS

Additive bilingual:

The learning of a second language does not interfere with the

learning of a first language. Both languages are well developed.

Subtractive bilingual:

The learning a second language interferes with the learning of a

first language. The second language replaces the first language.

Additive or subtractive bilingualism is related to the different

status associated with the two languages in a society.

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ELITE VS. FOLK BILINGUALS

Elite bilingual:

Individuals who choose to have a bilingual home, often in order to enhance social status.

Folk bilingual:

Individuals who develop second language capacity under circumstances that are not often of their own choosing, and in conditions where the society does not value their native language.

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SUMMARY: DEFINITIONS

Coordinate vs. Compound bilingualism

Early vs. Late bilingualism

Balanced vs. Dominant bilingualism

Simultaneous vs. Successive bilingualism

Additive vs. Subtractive bilingualism

Elite vs. Folk bilingualism

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LANGUAGE ACQUISITION OF BILINGUAL

CHILDREN

Bilingual acquisition is a complex phenomenon.

Monolingual children usually learn language from parents.

But bilingual children may learn languages not only from

parents but also from grandparents, playmates, babysitters,

childcare, school teachers and TV.

Their exposure to languages fluctuate over time and

situation/environment.

Childhood bilingualism is poorly understood by many and

regarded with scepticism by others.

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LANGUAGE ACQUISITION OF BILINGUAL

CHILDREN

Compared to monolingual children, bilingual children have

less exposure to each of their languages and, therefore,

they never master either language fully and never become

as proficient as monolingual children.

How do we measure language proficiency?

How do we determine if bilingual children‟s language

development is normal?

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LANGUAGE ACQUISITION OF BILINGUAL

CHILDREN

Compared to monolingual children, bilingual children have

less exposure to each of their languages and, therefore,

they never master either language fully and never become

as proficient as monolingual children.

How do we measure language proficiency?

How do we determine if bilingual children‟s language

development is normal?

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LANGUAGE ACQUISITION OF BILINGUAL

CHILDREN

Young bilingual children may know fewer words in one or both of their languages in comparison with monolingual children of the same age.

This is understandable because young children have limited cognitive / memory capacities, and bilingual children must store words from two languages, not just one.

Also, because bilingual children learn words in each language from different people, they sometimes know certain words in one language but not in the other.

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LANGUAGE ACQUISITION OF BILINGUAL

CHILDREN

When adding the vocabulary that bilingual children know in

both languages, they generally know the same number of or

even more words as their monolingual peers.

Even when differences like these occur, they are short term

and are likely to disappear by the time the children begin

school.

Bilingual children's overall proficiency in each language

reflects the amount of time they spend in each.

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WILL LEARNING TWO LANGUAGES CONFUSE

CHILDREN/

Young bilingual children often mix the two languages and cannot keep them separate.

Language mixing is taken as evidence that learning two languages confuses children.

Mixing: a fusion of two languages with the inability to differentiate one language from the other.

Mixing happens most frequently during early phase of language development, before or around age 2;0 (years; months), whereas later on, bilingual children can easily separate the two linguistic systems.

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WILL LEARNING TWO LANGUAGES CONFUSE

CHILDREN

Phonological mixing Kats – Katt (swedish) & Kass (Estonia)

[both katt and kass mean „cat‟ in English]

Lexical mixing I want mansana

[I want apple]

Semantic mixing I lost the bus

[lost = missed in Spanish]

Syntactic mixing A house red

[colour adjectives follow the noun in Spanish]

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WILL LEARNING TWO LANGUAGES CONFUSE

CHILDREN

Children mix because they are confused by learning two languages? or,

Because they lack the appropriate items in one language but have them in the other language?

Unitary language system hypothesis

Vs.

Separate language system hypothesis

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UNITARY LANGUAGE SYSTEM HYPOTHESIS

A 3-stage model for early bilingual development proposed

by Volterra & Taeschner, 1978:

I. the bilingual child has only one lexical system comprising words

from both languages [1.6-2.1]

II. development of two distinct lexical systems although the child

applies “the same syntactic rules to both languages” [2.5-3.3]

III. differentiation of two linguistic systems, lexical as well as

syntactic [2.9-311]

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UNITARY LANGUAGE SYSTEM HYPOTHESIS

Bilingual children first have a single fused linguistic representation.

They begin to differentiate their two native languages by age

3;0.

Implication: Young bilinguals have language delay relative to monolinguals.

Support for this hypothesis: Volterra & Taeschner (1978)

Young bilinguals in the one-word stage acquire words mostly in one but not both languages. e.g., if the word ` bird ' is acquired one language, it is not acquired in the other language.

This suggests that young bilinguals do not initially differentiate between their two native vocabularies.

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UNITARY LANGUAGE SYSTEM HYPOTHESIS

Challenges to this hypothesis Bilingual children mix because they lack appropriate lexical items

in one language but have them in the other language. Thus, they

borrow vocabularies from the other language.

Mixing declines as a child comes to recognize adult-imposed

standards of behaviour and shows awareness of his own ability to

meet them.

Slobin (1972, 1973) argues that bilingual children mix because of

acquisitional strategies that are independent of language

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SEPARATE LANGUAGE SYSTEM HYPOTHESIS

Genesee F. (1989, Journal of Child Language) argued that:

“...contrary to most extant interpretations, bilingual children

develop differentiated language systems from the beginning

and are able to use their developing languages in

contextually sensitive ways. A call for more serious attention

to the possible role of parental input in the form of mixed

utterances is made.”

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SEPARATE LANGUAGE SYSTEM HYPOTHESIS

According to Genesee:

“The most proficient bilinguals mix the most and in the most sophisticated ways without violating the rules of either language. It is normal for children growing up in these communities to mix their languages extensively because they are simply learning the patterns of communication that are common in their community. It can be difficult and unnatural, if not impossible, to keep the languages completely separate. If most people in the children's wider community use only one language, the children will eventual learn the monolingual patterns.”

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SEPARATE LANGUAGE SYSTEM HYPOTHESIS

The language mixing seen in bilingual children is constrained by grammatical rules.

Influenced by sociolinguistic factors such as language mixing pattern of parents.

Language mixing is not a consequence of confusion but instead demonstrates the bilingual child's distinct representations of the two languages from an early age.

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