Bilingualism

and Bilinguals
5.1. Bilingualism in
the World
According to the book Life with Two
Languages by François Grosjean:
“Bilingualism is present in
practically every country of the
world, in all classes of society, and in
all age groups. In fact it is difficult to
find a society that is genuinely
monolingual”.
Bilingualism: “the regular use of 2 or more languages”
 Number of existing languages: 3000 to 4000
• However, some are more important than the rest (i.e. spoken by major of world’s
population)
 He also argues that it is a rather special language phenomenon restricted to a few
countries such as Canada, Switzerland, Belgium, in which every citizen is bilingual.
Bilingualism provides a set of varied patterns:
1. Economic factors lead to bilingualism
o in regions which are on the border of two
language groups
2. Bilingualism is also typical of some
occupations
o workers employed in constructions in Switzerland
or the aged-care system in Italy
3. Bilingualism may also depend on the social
class
o it was described by Tolstoy in War and Peace –
the aristocracy of Russia used to be bilingual in
Russian and French
Facts:
5000 to 8000 different ethnic groups reside in
approximately 200 nation states.
Few nations are either monolingual or mono-ethnic.
These monolinguals also routinely switch from one
language variety – a regional dialect, the standard
language, a specialised technical register, a formal
or informal style, - to another in the course of their
daily interactions.
According to some influential linguists, a multilingual’s ability to move
from one language to another as the occasion demands is but an
extension of the monolingual’s capacity to shift registers and styles.
 People may become bilingual
either by acquiring two languages
at the same time in childhood or by
learning a second language
sometime after acquiring their first
language.
Many bilingual people grow up speaking two languages.
Children of immigrants (parent’s language at home, English at school)
Children of parents from different ethnic groups (the child may learn to speak
to each parent in that parent's language)
Conclusion: a young child who is regularly exposed to two languages from an
early age will most likely become a fluent native speaker of both languages .
The terms bilingualism and multilingualism refer to the knowledge or use of more
than one language by an individual or a community. They have been studied as:
Individual phenomena Societal phenomena
• how one acquires two or is concerned with their institutional
more languages in childhood dimensions, such as:
or later, • the status and the roles of the languages in
a given society,
• how these languages are
represented in the mind, and • attitudes towards languages,
• determinants of language choice,
• how they are accessed for
speaking and writing and for • the symbolic and practical uses of
comprehension languages, and
• the correlations between language use and
social factors such as ethnicity, religion, and
class
Official bilingualism refers to the policy adopted
by some states of recognizing two languages as
official and producing all official documents, and
handling all correspondence and official dealings,
including Court procedure, in the two said
languages.

It is distinct from personal bilingualism, the

capacity of a person to speak two languages.
 5.2. Theories on Bilingualism.
Bilingual Competence
The broad definition views bilingualism as a
common human condition that makes it possible
for an individual to function, at some level, in
more than one language.

The question of how to define bilingualism

or multilingualism has engaged researchers
for a very long time.
People used to be considered bilingual if they were fluent speakers of both
languages, with equal abilities in each; however, in reality this is hardly ever
the case.
A more current definition encompasses the following:
 the ability to produce meaningful utterances in two (or more) languages,
 the command of at least one language skill (reading, writing, speaking,
listening) in another language,
 the alternate use of several languages.

Reason: the needs and uses of the languages are usually quite different
that bilinguals rarely develop equal fluencies in their language.
According to Francois Grosjean, researchers currently view the
bilingual not as the sum of two complete or incomplete
monolinguals, but rather as a specific and fully competent speaker‐
hearer who has developed a communicative competence that is
equal, but different in nature, to that of the monolingual.

 From the perspective of this framework, a bilingual

individual is not necessarily an individual with native
competence in two languages.
The reasons that bring languages into contact and hence foster
bilingualism are many:
 migrations of various kinds (economic, educational,
political, religious),
 nationalism and federalism,
 education and culture,
 trade and commerce,
 intermarriage, etc.
Francois Grosjean defines the complementary principle as follows:
"Bilinguals usually acquire and use their languages for different
purposes, in different domains of life, with different people.
Different aspects of life normally require different languages."

It is precisely because the needs and uses of the

languages are usually quite different that
bilinguals rarely develop equal and total fluency
in their languages.
Researchers concerned about the age
of acquisition of bilingualism classify Age of acquisition
bilingual individuals as either early or
late bilinguals and further subdivide
early bilinguals into: Early Late
 simultaneous bilinguals (those who
acquired two languages
simultaneously as a first language) simultaneous elective
or
 sequential bilinguals (those who
acquired the second language (L2) sequential
after the first language (L1) was
acquired).
How and when are languages used?
A useful approach is by domains (location, a set of relationships,
and a set of topics) rather than functions.

 For each of the domains a bilingual is likely to have a

preferred language.
 Language choice is discussed in terms of the following
domains: the family, the playground and street, the school,
the church, literature, the press, the army, the courts and
governmental administration.
 Bilinguals have a set of domain-related rules of
language choice.
 The home-school or the home-work switch is probably
the most common, with one language learned at home
from parents and the second learned at school and
used at work.
 When there is a language shift in progress, certain
traditional domains can be preferred in the use of one
language.
 The nature of bilingual competence
Coordinate bilinguals
The person learns the languages in
separate environments, and words of
the two languages are kept separate
with each word having its own specific
meaning.
Example: a Cameroonian child
learning English at school
This may also be referred to as
subtractive bilingualism.
Compound bilinguals
The person learns the two languages
in the same context where they are
used concurrently, so that there is a
fused representation of the languages
in the brain.
Example: a child is brought up by
bilingual parents, or those from two
different linguistic backgrounds
This is additive in nature.
 compound bilinguals, words and phrases in different languages are the
same concepts. That means, a 'chien' and a 'dog' are two words for the
same concept for a French-English speaker of this type. These speakers
are usually fluent in both languages.
 coordinate bilinguals, words and phrases in the speaker's mind are all
related to their own unique concepts. That means, a bilingual speaker of
this type has different associations for ‘chien’ and for 'dog'. In these
individuals, one language, usually the first language, is more dominant
than the other, and the first language may be used to think through the
second language.
 5.3. Bilingual Behaviour The interference
occurs in a case
The phenomenon of bilingualism is the prime example of
where a speaker
language contact and it can lead to interference.
consciously or
Types of interference: unintentionally
Semantic - learning the meaning of words in another brings in
language by attaching them to the words of the first pronunciation,
language sentence formation
and vocabulary of
Phonetic - accent
the source language
Related to conventional rules - interrupting or saying while using a target
please – poftim language
Code-switching
means moving from one code (language, dialect, or
style) to another during speech for a number of
reasons such as:
• signaling solidarity,
• reflecting one's ethnic identity,
• showing off,
• hiding some information from a third party,
• achieving better explanation of a certain concept,
• converging or reducing social distance with the
hearer,
• diverging or increasing social distance or
• impressing and persuading the audience
(metaphorical code-switching)
Definition of Code Switching

 When two or more languages

are in use in one single
conversation side by side and
express an authentic form from
both of the basic language.
 “The practice of alternating
between two or more languages
or varieties of language in
conversation” - Oxford Dictionary
 Bilinguals often switch between
their two languages in the middle of
a conversation.
 These code-switches can take
place between or even within
sentences, involving phrases or
words or even parts of the words.
 The switching of words is the
beginning of borrowing, which
occurs when the new word
becomes more or less integrated
into the second language.
bilinguals often develop a mixed code:
The various contemporary Englishes, such
as Jamaican English and New Zealand
English, can be seen as mixed codes, with
the addition of local lexicon.
Code mixing and code switching serve
the same functions, the most
prominent one being identity marking.
A speaker may use a particular code to
signal a specific type of identity.
metaphorical switching - a bilingual’s
language is associated with identities and
functions (members of different ethnic
groups). It is a powerful mechanism for
signalling social attitudes or solidarity.
Examples:
 English or French for modernity,
sophistication or authority in many
parts of the world;
 Sanskrit for nationalistic and
traditionalistic image in India;
 Arabic and Persian for Islamic
identity.
 Language shift occurs when the language
of the wider society (majority) displaces the
minority mother tongue language over time
in migrant communities or in communities
under military occupation

It shifts towards the language of the

dominant group, and the result could be the
eradication of the local language.
Shifting can be the result of various factors:
a) Economic, social and political factor
o The dominant language is associated with social status and
prestige;
o Obtaining work is the obvious economic reason for learning
another language;
o The pressure of institutional domains such as schools and the
media;
b) Demographic factors
o Language shift is faster in urban areas than rural;
o The size of the group is sometimes a critical factor;
o Intermarriage between groups can accelerate language shift.
 Groups that chose to isolate themselves
Language both linguistically and culturally from the
mainstream. In these cases, the isolation
loyalty, the was self-imposed.
ability or lack of
it of speakers of
Groups which were segregated and
a language to isolated by the outside society
stand up to the
pressure of • Native Americans and the various Spanish speaking
native and immigrant groups. When they were
more powerful denied access to jobs, housing and education, they
were at the same time cut off from the easy access
languages to the English that was assumed to be the way to
assimilation.
the national a nationalistically inspired and state-supported initiative to
effort to preserve Irish in the western areas where it was still
revive the use spoken, and to teach it through the schools in the other
of Irish in areas where there were few speakers left
Ireland
the a strong ideologically based process realised between 1890 and 1914, mainly
revitalisation in the Ottoman Palestine, by returning Zionists who were looking to build a
new nation using an old language
of Hebrew
In agricultural settlements, in new towns like Tel Aviv, and in
communal settlements, Hebrew was revitalised.

Reversing language shift

 The efforts to save the French language

• the culture and identity in Quebec threaten to

divide the province from the rest of Canada

Reversing In Spain

language
• the post-Franco policy of granting semi-autonomy to
the regions has led to strong-government-supported
campaigns for Basque and Catalan
shift
In the Baltic States

• the collapse of the Soviet Union has permitted the

restoration of the power of Estonian, Latvian and
Lithuanian
 For emigrate individuals
If families from a
When a language is from a minority group,
minority group live
highly valued as an the degree and
near each other and
important symbol of frequency of contact
see each other
ethnic identity for with the homeland can
frequently, thus
the minority group; contribute to language
interacting;
maintenance;

Institutional support
Ensuring that the from domains such as
minority group education, law,
language is used at administration, religion
formal settings such and the media can
as schools or worship make a difference
places will increase between the success
language and failure of
maintenance; maintaining a minority
group language.

There are a number of ways by which a

language can be maintained and preserved:
 Language revival
• Language revival occurs when a
community becomes aware that its
language is in danger of
disappearing and takes steps to
revitalises it.
• In 1840, two thirds of the Welsh
people spoke Welsh, but by 1980,
only 20% of the population spoke
Welsh, therefore the Welsh people
began a revival process of Welsh
language by using a Welsh-language
TV channel and bilingual education
programs that used Welsh as
medium of instruction at schools.