Heritage Languages Are Not Weak! How Bilinguals Benefit from Language Diversity

Laia Arnaus Gil; Johanna Stahnke; Isabel  Silva Colaco; Natascha Müller

Heritage Languages Are Not Weak! How Bilinguals Benefit from Language Diversity

Data publikacji: 2024

Romanica Cracoviensia, Tom 24 (2024), Tom 24, numer 3, s. 317-328

https://doi.org/10.4467/20843917RC.24.024.20979

Autorzy

Pobierz pełny tekst

PDF

Tytuły

Heritage Languages Are Not Weak! How Bilinguals Benefit from Language Diversity

Abstrakt

Bilingual children’s first two languages are often characterized as majority languages (ML) and heritage (HL) languages, since they can develop in a different pace: the HL becomes the “weak” language with increasing age, especially when time outside the family increases. Our study compares longitudinal data of seven French-German/Italian children (age range 1;4–5;4) who acquire French as an HL or ML with the respective groups of monolingual peers. Language competence was assessed via MLU. The main results are: Surprisingly, HL French develops similarly to ML French and monolingual French. By contrast, German and Italian as HLs develop less target-like than their monolingual peers and as ML languages. We explain these results on the basis of language diversity and variety of contacts.

Słowa kluczowe

heritage language, majority language, mean length of utterance, French, German, Italian

Bibliografia

Pobierz bibliografię

Arnaus Gil Laia, Müller Natascha, Hüppop Marina, Poeste Meike, Scalise Elena, Sette Nadine, Sivakumar Abira, Tirado Espinosa Mabel, Zimmermann Katharina Sonja, 2019, Frühkindlicher Trilinguismus: Französisch, Spanisch, Deutsch, Tübingen: Narr.

Arnaus Gil Laia, Müller Natascha, Sette Nadine, Hüppop Marina, 2020, “Active bi- and trilingualism and its influencing factors”, International Multilingual Research Journal, 15, 1–22, https://doi:10.1080/19313152.2020.1753964.

Barnes Julia D., 2011, “The influence of child-directed speech in early trilingualism”, International Journal of Multilingualism, 8, 1, 42–62, https://doi:10.1080/14790711003671861.

Behrens Heike, 2006, “The input-output relationship in first language acquisition”, Language and Cognitive Processes, 21, 2–24, https://doi:10.1080/01690960400001721.

Benmamoun Elabbas, Montrul Silvina, Polinsky Maria, 2013, “Heritage languages and their speakers: Opportunities and challenges for linguistics”, Theoretical Linguistics, 39, 129–181, https://doi:10.1515/tl-2013-0009.

Carroll Susanne, 2017, “Exposure and input in bilingual development”, Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 20, 1, 3–16, https://doi:10.1017/S1366728915000863.

Champaud Christian, 1994, The Development of Verb Forms in French Children at Around Two Years of Age: Some Comparisons with Romance and Non-Romance Languages, paper presented at the First Lisbon Meeting on Child Language, Lisbon, Portugal.

Chevalier Sarah, 2015, Trilingual Language Acquisition: Contextual Factors Influencing Active Trilingualism in Early Childhood, Amsterdam: Benjamins.

Cipriani Paola, Pfanner Lucia, Chilosi Anna Maria, Cittadoni Lorena, Ciuti Alessandro, Maccari Anna, Pantano Natalia, Poli Paola, Sarno Stefania, Bottari Piero, Cappelli Giuseppe, Colombo C., Veneziano Edy, 1989, Protocolli diagnostici e terapeutici nello sviluppo e nella patologia del linguaggio. Protocollo n. 1/84, Ministero della Salute della Repubblica Italiana: Stella Maris Foundation.

De Cat Cécile, Plunkett Bernardette, 2002, “Qu’est-ce qu’i (l) dit, ¿celui+Là?: notes méthodologiques sur la transcription d’un corpus francophone”, (in:) Romanistische Korpuslinguistik: Korpora und gesprochene Sprache. Tübingen: Narr. CD-rom.

De Houwer Annick, 2004, “Trilingual input and children’s language use in trilingual families in Flanders”, (in:) Trilingualism in Family, School and Community, Charlotte Hoffmann, Jehannes Ytsma (eds.), Bristol, Blue Ridge Summit: Multilingual Matters, 118–135.

De Houwer, Annick, 2007, “Parental language input patterns and children’s bilingual use”, Applied Psycholinguistics, 28, 411–424, https://doi:10.1017/S0142716407070221.

Dewaele Jean-Marc, 2000, “Trilingual first language acquisition: Exploration of a linguistic miracle”, La Chouette, 31, 41–45, available at: https://bbk.ac.uk/llc/french/chouette.htm (accessed on 20 December 2024).

Dewaele Jean-Marc, 2007, “Still trilingual at ten: Livia’s multilingual journey”, Multilingual Living Magazine, 68–71, https://biculturalfamily.org (accessed on 20 December 2024).

Dewaele Jean-Marc, 2018, “Why the dichotomy ‘L1 versus LX user’ is better than ‘native versus nonnative speaker’”, Applied Linguistics, 39, 236–240, https://doi:10.1093/applin/amw055.

Dewaele Jean-Marc, Bak Thomas, Ortega Lourdes, 2021, “Why the mythical ‘native speaker’ has mud on its face”, (in:) Changing Face of the “Native Speaker”: Perspectives from Multilingualism and Globalization, Nikolay Slavkov, Nadja Kerschhofer-Puhalo, Sílvia Melo-Pfeifer (eds.), Berlin: De Gruyter, 23–43, https://doi:10.1093/applin/amw055.

Eichler Nadine, Jansen Veronika, Müller Natascha, 2012, “Gender in French-German, Italian-German, Spanish-German and Italian-French children”, International Journal of Bilingualism, 17, no. 5, 550– 572, https://doi:10.1177/1367006911435719.

Garraffa Maria, Sorace Antonella, Vender Maria, 2023, Bilingualism Matters: Language Learning Across the Lifespan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Hager Malin, 2014, Der Genuserwerb bei mehrsprachig aufwachsenden Kindern Eine longitudinale Untersuchung bilingualer und trilingualer Kinder der Sprachenkombinationen deutsch-französisch/italienisch/spanisc, französisch-italienisch/spanisch und deutsch-spanisch-katalanisch; Wuppertal: Bergische Universität Wuppertal, http://elpub.bib.uni-wuppertal.de/edocs/dokumente/fba/romanistik/diss2014/hager/da1401.pdf (accessed on 20 December 2024).

Hager Malin, Müller Natascha, 2015, “Ultimate attainment in bilingual first language acquisition”, Lingua, 164, 289–308, https://doi:10.1016/j.lingua.2015.05.014.

Hoffmann Charlotte, 1985, “Language acquisition in two trilingual children”, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 6, 6, 479–495, https://doi:10.1080/01434632.1985.9994222.

Hulstijn Jan H. 2019, “An individual-differences framework for comparing nonnative with native speakers: Perspectives from BLC theory,” Language Learning, 69, 157–183, https://doi:10.1111/lang.12317.

Jekat Susanne, 1985, Die Entwicklung des Wortschatzes bei bilingualen Kindern (Französisch/Deutsch) in den ersten vier Lebensjahren, Master’s thesis, Universität Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany. Unpublished work.

Koehn Caroline, 1994, “The acquisition of gender and number morphology within NP”, (in:) Bilingual First Language Acquisition. French and German Grammatical Development, Jürgen M. Meisel (ed.), Amsterdam: Benjamins, 29–51.

Krumreihn Jana, 2016, Erwerb der Subjekt-Verb-Kongruenz im Französischen eines bilingualen Kindes, Bachelor’s thesis, Bergische Universität Wuppertal, Wuppertal, Germany. Unpublished work.

Krumreihn Jana, 2019, Erwerb der Subjekt-Verb Kongruenz bei mehrsprachigen Kindern mit Französisch als Erstsprache, Master’s thesis, Bergische Universität Wuppertal, Wuppertal, Germany. Unpublished work.

Kupisch Tanja, Rothman Jason, 2018, “Terminology matters! Why difference is not incompleteness and how early child bilinguals are heritage speakers”, International Journal of Bilingualism, 22, 564–582, https://doi:10.1177/1367006916654355.

Kupisch Tanja, Barton Dagmar, Hailer Katja, Klaschik Ewgenia, Stangen Ilse, Lein Tatjana, Van Deweijer Joost, 2014, “Foreign accent in adult simultaneous bilinguals”, Heritage Language Journal, 11, 123–150, https://doi:10.46538/hlj.11.2.2.

Lieven Elena, Stol Sabine, 2013, “Early communicative development in two cultures”, Human Development, 56, 178–206, https://doi:10.1159/000351073.

Maneva Blagovesta, 2004, “‘Maman, je suis polyglotte!’: A case study of multilingual language acquisition from 0 to 5 years”, International Journal of Multilingualism, 1, 2, 109–122, https://doi:10.1080/14790710408668182.

Masullo Camilla, Casado Alba, Leivada Evelina, Sorace Antonella, 2023, “Register variation and linguistic background modulate accuracy in detecting morphosyntactic errors. OSF (Open Science Framework)”. https://www.google.de/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjonIXVnb6LAxUNR_EDHQRAEfQQFnoECBUQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fosf.io%2Fcbk68%2Fdownload%2F%3Fformat%3Dpdf&usg=AOvVaw2XuZT5eos7yx95QJ8f2Akf&opi=89978449.

Meisel Jürgen M., 1990, “INFL-ection: Subjects and subject-verb agreement”, (in:) Two First Languages. Early Grammatical Development in Bilingual Children, Jürgen M. Meisel (ed.), Dordrecht: Foris, 237–298.

Meisel Jürgen M., 1994, “Getting FAT: Finiteness, agreement and tense in early grammars”, (in:) Bilingual First Language Acquisition. French and German Grammatical Development, Jürgen M. Meisel. Amsterdam: Benjamins, 89–129.

Meisel Jürgen M., 1997, “The acquisition of the syntax of negation in French and German: Contrasting first and second language development”, Second Language Research, 13, 3), 227–263, www.jstor.org/stable/43104545 (accessed on 20 December 2024).

Meisel Jürgen M., 2009, “Second language acquisition in early childhood,” Zeitschrift für Sprachwissenschaft, 28, 1, 5–34, https://doi:10.1515/ZFSW.2009.002.

Miller Max, 1979, The Logic of Language Development in Early Childhood, Berlin: Springer-Verlag. Montrul Silvina, 2010, “Current issues in heritage language acquisition”, Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 30, 3–23, https://doi:10.1017/S0267190510000103.

Montrul Silvina, 2012, “Is the heritage language like a second language?”, EUROSLA Yearbook, 12, 1, 1–29, https://doi:10.1075/eurosla.12.03mon.

Montrul Silvina, 2016, The Acquisition of Heritage Languages, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Morgenstern Aliyah, Benazzo Sandra, Leroy Marie, Mathiot Emmanuelle, Parisse Christophe, Sekali Martine, 2009, L’enfant dans la langue. De l’observation du naturaliste à l’analyse du linguiste, Paris: Presses de la Sorbonne Nouvelle.

Müller Natascha, 1990, “Developing two gender assignment systems simultaneously”, (in:) Two First Languages. Early Grammatical Development in Bilingual Children, Jürgen M. Meisel (ed.), Dordrecht: Foris, 193–234.

Müller Natascha, 1994, “Gender and number agreement within DP”, (in:) Bilingual First Language Acquisition. French and German Grammatical Development, Jürgen M. Meisel (ed.), Amsterdam: Benjamins, 53–88.

Müller Natascha, Arnaus Gil Laia, Eichler Nadine, Geveler Jasmin, Hager Malin, Jansen Veronika, Patuto Marisa, Repetto Valentina, Schmeisser Anika, 2015, Code-Switching: Französisch, Italienisch, Spanisch. Eine Einführung, Tübingen: Narr.

Müller Natascha, Kupisch Tanja, Schmitz Katrin, Cantone Katja F., Arnaus Gil Laia, 2023, Einführung in die Mehrsprachigkeitsforschung, Tübingen: Narr.

Patuto Marisa, Hager Malin, Arnaus Gil Laia, Eichler Nadine, Jansen Veronika, Schmeisser Anika, Müller Natascha, 2014, “Child-external and -internal factors in bilingual code-switching: Spanish, Italian, French and German”, (in:) Language Contact around the Globe. Proceedings of the LCTG3 Conference, Amei Koll-Stobbe, Sebastian Knospe (eds.), Frankfurt am Main: Lang, 191–209.

Poeste Meike, Müller Natascha, Arnaus Gil Laia, 2019, “Code-mixing and language dominance: Bilingual, trilingual and multilingual children compared”, International Journal of Multilingualism, 16, 459–491, https://doi:10.1080/14790718.2019.1569017.

Polinsky Maria, Scontras Gregory, 2019, “Understanding heritage languages”, Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 23, no. 1, 4–20, https://doi:10.1017/S1366728919000245.

Quay Suzanne, 2008, “Dinner conversations with a trilingual two-year-old: Language socialization in a multilingual context”, First Language, 28, 1, 5–33, https://doi:10.1177/0142723707083557.

Quay Suzanne, 2011, “Trilingual toddlers at daycare centres: The role of caregivers and peers in language development”, International Journal of Multilingualism, 8, 1, 22–41, https://doi:10.1080/14790711003671853.

Rothman Jason, 2009, “Understanding the nature and outcomes of early bilingualism: Romance languages as heritage languages”, International Journal of Bilingualism, 13, 2, 155–163, https://doi:10.1177/1367006909339814.

Rothman Jason, Treffers-Daller, Janine, 2014, A prolegomenon to the construct of the native speaker: Heritage speaker bilinguals are natives too!, Applied Linguistics, 35, 1, 93–98, https://doi:10.1093/applin/amt049.

Sivakumar Abira, Sette Nadine, Müller Natascha, Arnaus Gil Laia, 2020, “Die Entwicklung des rezeptiven Wortschatzes bei bi-, tri- und multilingual aufwachsenden Kindern”, Linguistische Berichte, 263, 229–264.

Stahnke Johanna, 2022, “The acquisition of French determiners by bilingual children: A prosodic account”, Languages, 7, 200, https://doi:10.3390/languages7030200.

Stahnke Johanna, Arnaus Gil Laia, Müller Natascha, 2021, “French as a Heritage Language in Germany”, Languages, 6, 122, https://doi:10.3390/languages6030122.

Suppes Patrick, Smith Robert, Leveillé Madeleine, 1973, “The French syntax of a child’s noun phrases”, Archives de Psychologie, 42, 207–269.

Van Dijk Chantal, Van Wonderen Elise, Koutamanis Elly, Kootstra Gerrit Jan, Dijkstra Ton, Unsworth Sharon, 2021, “Cross-linguistic influence in simultaneous and early sequential bilingual children: A meta-analysis”, Journal of Child Language, 49, 5, 1–33, https://doi:10.1017/S0305000921000337.

Informacje

Informacje: Romanica Cracoviensia, Tom 24 (2024), Tom 24, numer 3, s. 317-328

DOI: https://doi.org/10.4467/20843917RC.24.024.20979

Typ artykułu: Oryginalny artykuł naukowy

Autorzy

Laia Arnaus Gil

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1023-6717

Bergische Universität Wuppertal

Johanna Stahnke

https://orcid.org/0009-0001-4742-7533

Bergische Universität Wuppertal

Isabel Silva Colaco

Bergische Universität Wuppertal

Natascha Müller

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9357-430X

Bergische Universität Wuppertal

Publikacja: 2024

Status artykułu: Otwarte

Licencja: CC BY

Udział procentowy autorów:

Laia Arnaus Gil (Autor) - 25%

Johanna Stahnke (Autor) - 25%

Isabel Silva Colaco (Autor) - 25%

Natascha Müller (Autor) - 25%

Informacje o autorze:

Laia Arnaus Gil is a post-doctoral fellow in Romance Linguistics at the University of Wuppertal. She received her PhD on the early acquisition of Romance and German copula and auxiliary verbs in 2012. She worked in a research project on code-switching in early bilingualism and directed, together with Natascha Müller, the research project on early trilingualism, both funded by the German Research Foundation. She is currently leading a research project funded by the universities of Hamburg and Wuppertal to investigate Catalan, Spanish and German as heritage (HL) and majority (ML) languages. She is further working on her teaching degree (“Habilitation”) on the (early) multilingual acquisition of Romance attributive adjectives and the language-external factors promoting HL-competence. She is member of several research groups which examine early multilingualism from a linguistic perspective, family language policies and the role of different factors for HL-competence.

Johanna Stahnke is a member of Natascha Müller’s research group at the Bergische Universität Wuppertal since 2016. She studied French and English at the University of Hamburg and received her PhD degree in Romance Philology from the University of Hamburg in 2016. Her dissertation presents an empirical analysis of conversational repair in different genres of spoken French. Her current research is concerned with multilingual first language acquisition involving Romance languages (French, Italian, Spanish) and focuses on the interaction between syntax and phonology, for example in the acquisition of determiners. Multilingual children can be accelerated with respect to determiner prosodification in French because of cross-linguistic influence from another language with more (transparent) phonological evidence for prosodic structuring. Further research interests include heritage languages and the acquisition of subjects (and subject position) in French and Spanish.

Isabel Silva Colaco pursues a multidisciplinary academic path at the University of Wuppertal, where her studies encompass French, computer science, and philosophy. As a fluent native speaker in both Portuguese and German, she combines her academic pursuits with a profound passion for Romance Linguistics. Holding a Bachelor’s degree, Isabel is currently immersed in pursuing her Master’s degree, channelling her enthusiasm into research on linguistics and first language acquisition. She is committed to advancing knowledge in her field while integrating insights from her diverse academic background.

Natascha Müller holds the chair of Romance Linguistics at the University of Wuppertal since 2004. Her main research interests are multilingualism and Romance languages. She received her PhD in Romance Philology and her teaching degree (“Habilitation”) from the University of Hamburg. Her research group has reported several pioneering and groundbreaking results and innovative aspects related to language dominance in multilingual children – such as measures for (relative) language exposure (dominance), novel analyses for cross-linguistic influence in multilingual children who nevertheless separate and control their languages, as well as innovative methods to study language mixing in multilingual children by elicited imitation and testing of large groups of children in a monolingual vs. a multilingual setting. Recently, her group has observed acceleration effects in grammatical development of multilingual in comparison to monolingual children.

Korekty artykułu:

Języki publikacji:

Angielski

Liczba wyświetleń: 148

Liczba pobrań: 57

Heritage Languages Are Not Weak! How Bilinguals Benefit from Language Diversity

Pobierz xml