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El artículo provee una perspectiva única de lo que es spanglish. Dice que es un idioma o dialecto que combina el inglés con español, uno puede reconocer que tal vez es un dialecto porque un idioma se clasifica como la manera de hablar que es tan diferente a el idioma principal que si se puede distinguir. Pienso que es interesante lo que dice acerca de cómo unas personas piensan que “está destruyendo la belleza… de la lengua… de Cervantes” entonces uno puede reconocer que el spanglish es un tema que es un poco polémico.

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El spanglish, que viene de las palabras spanish (español) e english (inglés), es un nuevo idioma o dialecto que combina el inglés con el español. Se han realizado pocas investigaciones, pero se cree que este idioma vio la luz a principios de los años setenta en California, Texas, Arizona y Nuevo México, cuya comunidad hispana es muy numerosa. Los Estados Unidos cuentan hoy con más de cincuenta millones de hispanoparlantes, y se estima que la mitad de ellos habla spanglish.
Si bien este idioma se propaga cada vez más en los medios de comunicación o en las campañas publicitarias, las opiniones son muchas y variadas.

Por un lado, tenemos a los más optimistas que piensan que gracias a esta lengua, aún un tanto informal, facilita la comunicación y, por ende, la integración de la comunidad hispana en los Estados Unidos. Según Ilan Stavans, ferviente defensor del spanglish, este dialecto no afecta para nada al inglés ni al español, pero podría ser una forma de promover el aprendizaje de la lengua de Shakespeare. Además, en 2003, publicó un libro dedicado al spanglish The making of a new American language, en el que ofrece una traducción del primer capítulo del El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha en ese dialecto. También da clases de este nuevo idioma en la Universidad de Amherst (Estados Unidos) y está elaborando un diccionario.

Por otro lado, tenemos a los detractores que piensan que esta lengua está destruyendo la belleza, la riqueza y el alma de la lengua inglesa y la de Cervantes. Recordemos también que la Real Academia Española, a través de un video titulado "lengua madre solo hay una", critica abiertamente el uso del spanglish en las campañas publicitarias.

Si el tema les interesa, pueden ver la película Spanglish, dirigida por James L. Brooks, que trata sobre este nuevo dialecto.

Pequeño diccionario del Spanglish:

Watch out se dice gauchau.
Average (promedio) se transforma en averaje.
To lunch (almorzar) se convierte en lanchar.
To load (descargar) se vuelve lodear.
Please (por favor) se traduce por plis.
To park (estacionar) se dice parquear.
To wrap (envolver) se transforma en drapear.
To text (enviar un mensaje) se convierte en textear.
Tough (duro) se vuelve tof.
Rent (alquilar) se convierte en rentear.

Y ustedes, ¿qué piensan? ¿Tienen otros ejemplos para aportar a la lista?

Descubra nuestra agencia de traducción

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El spanglish, que viene de las palabras spanish (español) e english (inglés), es un nuevo idioma o dialecto que combina el inglés con el español. Se han realizado pocas investigaciones, pero se cree que este idioma vio la luz a principios de los años setenta en California, Texas, Arizona y Nuevo México, cuya comunidad hispana es muy numerosa.

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Estos datos nos enseñan una razón por la que es importante estudiar espanol. En los EEUU, uno puede observar que se está acumulando la población de hispanohablantes por causas de inmigración y crecimiento de la población y ubicado de hispanohablantes. Este número ha superado la población de hispanohablantes en España.

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With more than 37 million speakers, Spanish is by far the most spoken non-English language in the U.S. today among people ages 5 and older. It is also one of the fastest-growing, with the number of speakers up 233% since 1980, when there were 11 million Spanish speakers. (The number of Vietnamese speakers grew faster, up 599% over the same period).

As Spanish use has grown, driven primarily by Hispanic immigration and population growth, it has become a part of many aspects of life in the U.S. For example, Spanish is spoken by more non-Hispanics in U.S. homes than any other non-English language and Spanish language television networks frequently beat their English counterparts in television ratings.

But what's the future of Spanish?

According to a 2011 paper by U.S. Census Bureau Demographers Jennifer Ortman and Hyon B. Shin, the number of Spanish speakers is projected to rise through 2020 to anywhere between 39 million and 43 million, depending on the assumption one makes about immigration. Most of these Spanish speakers will be Hispanic, with Ortman and Shin projecting between 37.5 million and 41 million Hispanic Spanish speakers by 2020.

Ortman and Shin provide two other projections, both of which highlight the changing demographics of the nation's Hispanic population and the rising importance of U.S. births rather than the arrival of new immigrants to Hispanic population growth.

Today, three-fourths of all Hispanics ages 5 and older speak Spanish. However, that share is projected to fall to about two-thirds in 2020. The share of Hispanics that speak Spanish reached 78% in the 2000s.

As the share of Hispanics who speak Spanish falls, the share that speaks only English at home is expected to rise. About a third (34%) of Hispanics will speak only English at home by 2020, up from 25% in 2010, according to Ortman and Shin.

The story of the Spanish language in the U.S. is still unfolding. Whether it follows the same pattern of decline in use as other non-English languages, such as Italian, German or Polish, remains to be seen. ( The number of Italian, German and Polish speakers in the U.S. declined 55.2%, 32.7% and 25.9% between 1980 and 2010, even though the number of Americans who trace their ancestry to Germany, Poland or Italy grew over the same period.)

Nonetheless, the path that Spanish takes could be different. A 2012 Pew Research Hispanic Trends Project report showed 95% of Hispanic adults-including those born in the U.S.-said it is important that future generations of Hispanic speak Spanish. And today's young Hispanics are more likely than their parents to say they hear messages about the importance of speaking Spanish. But among Hispanics, use of English when consuming news media, television entertainment, music or speaking it is on the rise.

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What is the future of Spanish in the United States?

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With more than 37 million speakers, Spanish is by far the most spoken non-English language in the U.S. today among people ages 5 and older. It is also one of the fastest-growing, with the number of speakers up 233% since 1980, when there were 11 million Spanish speakers.

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Después de estudiar este capítulo, fue un poco sorprendente que no hay un dialecto específico para representar un país pero hay muchas veces múltiples maneras de comunicar un idioma. Uno puede observar que Perú se puede dividir en tres regiones que varían en rasgos de fenómenos fonológicos, incluyendo aspectos como el seseo y el voseo.

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El artículo repasa las características que hace varios regiones en hispanoamérica único cuando comparado a otros regiones en términos fonológicos y léxicos. Al leer, el lector encuentra razones por la que la lengua de español ha desarrollado con un distinción entre el español para la literatura y el espanol de hablar.

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La división del español de América en zonas dialectales

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En adición a los idiomas nacionales de España (catalan, vasco, gallego y el aranés), existen idiomas no oficiales que son hablado en partes especificas en españa. Por ejemplo, Fala Galaico-Extremeña se habla por la frontera de Portugal donde tiene influencia del portugués debido a los asociaciones que tienen las personas que viven cerca de la frontera.

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Existen varios idiomas que se hablan en España. Esto es debido a que durante el transcurso de los siglos, han sido varias las civilizaciones que han pasado por este territorio.Los idiomas oficiales de España, exceptuando el euskera, son lenguas romances. Entre ellas encontramos que es la lengua oficial en todo el Estado según la Constitución.En cambio, las otras cuatro lenguas cooficiales solo se hablan en algunas Comunidades Autónomas.

Desde Traducciones Agora te detallamos qué idiomas se hablan en España para que compruebes la variedad y riqueza cultural de este país:

El catalán es un idioma que se habla en tres comunidades autónomas: Cataluña, Islas Baleares y Comunidad Valenciana. Es el segundo idioma más hablado en España con más de 11 millones de hablantes. Si te interesa saber más, en el siguiente enlace puedes conocer algunas curiosidades de Cataluña.

Es por este motivo que existe una gran demanda de traducciones de español a catalán y traducciones de catalán a español. Existen varios dialectos del catalán que tienen pequeñas diferencias en la pronunciación y escritura en algunas de sus palabras. Por ejemplo, si escuchas hablar catalán a una persona de Mallorca, Valencia o Barcelona, notarás que tienen diferentes matices.

En este punto, existe una gran discusión en torno a si se considera el valenciano un dialecto del catalán o como una lengua distinta.

Recuerda que podemos ayudarte con tus traducciones en catalán gracias a nuestro equipo de traductores de Barcelona, y también con tu traducciones en valenciano con nuestro equipo de traductores en Valencia.

El vasco o euskera

El euskera o vasco se habla en el País Vasco y algunas zonas de Navarra. Es la única lengua que se habla en España que no desciende del latín. Su origen, todavía hoy, es todo un misterio. Estamos hablando de un idioma extremadamente difícil de aprender al no tener similitudes con las otras lenguas románicas de España.

Por este motivo el número de practicantes del euskera no es tan elevado, en proporción, con las otras lenguas oficiales del Estado español. En total la dominan algo más de un millón de personas.

Recuerda que podemos ayudarte con tus traducciones en euskera mediante nuestros traductores de Bilbao.

El gallego es otro de los idiomas en España. Una lengua autonómica que es cooficial en Galicia y que está estrechamente relacionada con el portugués, ya que comparten su origen: el galaico-portugués.

A diferencia de lo que sucede con el vasco, una gran parte de los habitantes de Galicia utilizan más el gallego que el castellano. Principalmente en las zonas rurales, aunque cada día tiene más presencia en las ciudades. Más de 2 millones de personas hablan este idioma a diario.

Nuestra agencia de traductores en A Coruña tienes a tu disposición nuestros profesionales para las traducciones en gallego.

El aranés ha recibido recientemente la cooficialidad en Cataluña. Se habla principalmente en el Valle de Arán, al norte de Lérida. Aproximadamente es practicado por unas 3.000 personas y es una variedad del idioma occitano.

Idiomas de España no oficiales

Aparte de los idiomas oficiales que se hablan en España, existen unos pocos que aún no han sido reconocidos como idioma oficial. No obstante, sí que se hablan en ciertas partes del Estado español y te los listamos a continuación:

Asturiano o bable

Se habla en Asturias.

100.00 personas que lo practican.

Silbo gomero

Este es un lenguaje muy especial ya que se realiza silbado. Su nacimiento se debe a la necesidad de comunicarse eficazmente a través de las montañas y barrancos de la isla.

Practicado en la isla de La Gomera (Islas Canarias).

22.000 hablantes.

Aragonés oriental o chapurriau

Se habla en el este de Aragón, en la zona fronteriza con Cataluña. Esta zona también es conocida como Franja de Aragón.

30.000 practicantes.

Altoaragonés

Se practica en la provincia de Huesca (comunidad autónoma de Aragón).

12.000 personas que lo hablan.

Cántabro o montañés

Se habla en Cantabria.

115.000 que lo practican.

Extremeño o castúo

Practicado en el noroeste de la provincia de Cáceres (comunidad autónoma de Extremadura).

180.000 hablantes.

Fala Galaico-Extremeña

Hablado en el Valle de Jálama, en la frontera de Portugal con Extremadura.

6.000 practicantes.

Se practica en las provincias de Zamora y León (comunidad autónoma de Castilla y León).

23.000 personas que lo hablan.

Árabe dariya

El árabe dariya o árabe marroquí es la lengua habitual, entre otros, de una parte de la población de la ciudad autónoma de Ceuta. Es una variante que popularmente se le denomina "árabe ceutí" y es el producto o resultante de la constante evolución del árabe marroquí.

El rifeño también se conoce por chelja o tarifit. Es una variante de la lengua bereber hablada por los habitantes del Rif, en la zona nordeste de Marruecos. También es hablado por algunos grupos de habitantes de origen rifeño de la la ciudad autónoma española de Melilla.

Si te apetece ver más artículos relacionados con idiomas de España te recomendamos que pases por nuestra sección de idiomas. También te dejamos a continuación un audio que es muy interesante:

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Existen varios idiomas que se hablan en España. Esto es debido a que durante el transcurso de los siglos, han sido varias las civilizaciones que han pasado por este territorio.Los idiomas oficiales de España , exceptuando el euskera, son lenguas romances.

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Recursos para investigar la semántica y la pragmática

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Recursos para investigar la semántica y la pragmática

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El portal de lingüística hispánica ofrece varios actividades y recursos para comprender más acerca de la semántica, la pragmática, y fenómenos relacionados con ambos términos. Lo que mas me intereso de los recursos que ofrece el enlace fue la ironia y el humor, siendo fenómenos del habla que utilizan el semantica y el pragmática en maneras muy creativos.

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Presentación

Para comprender la relación que existe entre el significado y el uso del lenguaje, esta sección se estructura en torno a dos disciplinas: la semántica y la pragmática. Mediante el estudio de la semántica, se analiza el sentido o la interpretación del signo lingüístico a partir de la representación del significado y su referente o elemento real. Se presentan los papeles temáticos, las relaciones semánticas entre palabras y la diferencia entre el significado literal y el figurado (las metáforas y el lenguaje idiomático). Con la pragmática se plantea el estudio del significado en contexto, especialmente cómo los elementos extralingüísticos y la situación comunicativa pueden incidir directamente sobre su interpretación. Se revisan algunos de los principales modelos pragmáticos (los actos de habla, las máximas conversacionales y la teoría de la relevancia), y se describen fenómenos como la cortesía lingüística, la ironía y el humor. Al pasar de la semántica a la pragmática, esta sección sirve asimismo de transición entre la lingüística teórica y la lingüística aplicada. Toda esta información permite analizar y apreciar cómo se representa y se transmite el significado, prestando atención a la relación de dependencia entre emisor, receptor y contexto durante el acto comunicativo.

1. La semántica
1.1. El significado conceptual o denotativo y el significado asociativo o connotativo
1.2. Las relaciones semánticas
1.2.1. Los papeles temáticos
1.2.2. Las relaciones semánticas entre palabras
1.3. El significado literal y el significado figurado
1.3.1. Las metáforas
1.3.2. El lenguaje idiomático
2. La pragmática
2.1. La deíxis
2.2. Algunos modelos pragmáticos
2.2.1. La teoría de los actos de habla
2.2.1.1. Actos de habla de Austin
2.2.1.2. Actos de habla de Searle
2.2.2. Las máximas conversacionales de Grice
2.2.3. La teoría de la relevancia de Sperber y Wilson
3. El estudio de la cortesía lingüística
3.1. Las reglas de cortesía
3.2. Una tipología de las estrategias de cortesía
3.3. La imagen pública
3.4. Sobre la máxima de cortesía
4. La ironía y el humor en el ámbito de la pragmática
4.1. La ironía en el contexto de la cortesía lingüística
4.2. La especificidad lingüística, cultural y multimodal del humor

Introducción a la lingüística hispánica actual: teoría y práctica. London and New York: Routledge.

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Para comprender la relación que existe entre el significado y el uso del lenguaje, esta sección se estructura en torno a dos disciplinas: la semántica y la pragmática. Mediante el estudio de la semántica, se analiza el sentido o la interpretación del signo lingüístico a partir de la representación del significado y su referente o elemento real.

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Siendo capaz de distinguir las categorías de sinónimos

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Siendo capaz de distinguir las categorías de sinónimos

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A agregar a los ejemplos que fueron repasados en clase, el enlace nos da ejemplos de sinónimos totales, sinónimos relativos, y sinónimos de grado (sinónimos graduales). Para distinguir cada par de palabras en una categoría, uno debe comprender la relación que las dos palabras tienen. Los sinónimos absolutos son perfectamente intercambiable en cualquier situación que sea apropiado. Para sinónimos relativos o parciales, solo se pueden cambiar indeterminadamente en unos contextos. Finalmente, sinonimos graduales incrementan en intensidad, diferente a antónimos graduales. Aunque sinónimos graduales son usados, no es tan confiable definir pares de palabras como sinónimos graduales, facilmente cambiando su significado.

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Web didáctica de Gramática con definiciones, ejemplos, ejercicios y juegos de Adverbios, Oraciones Subordinadas, Conjunciones, Complementos, etc.

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Encontré que este enlace fue muy informativo para reconocer cuáles estructuras son deixis personales, temporales, y espaciales. La introducción describe que las palabras deícticas son como indicaciones de la dirección a la que una oración se directa. Por ejemplo, la oración, “Su pelo es un poco raro.” utiliza un pronombre posesivo, indicando que la oración es deixis personal señalando que la oración está hablando acerca de la persona con el pelo raro.

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La deixis es la parte de la semántica y la pragmática relacionada con las palabras que sirven para indicar otros elementos. Palabras como tú, hoy, aquí, esto, son expresiones deícticas que sirven para señalar personas, situaciones, lugares, etcétera.

La señalización deíctica es frecuente sobre todo en las conversaciones cara a cara.

Ejemplos de deixis por tipos

Expresada con pronombres personales de 1.ª y 2.ª persona: yo (mí, me), tú (te, ti...)
También, con los de de 3.ª persona: él, ella, pero con éstos solo cuando señalan a una persona presente en la situación.
Expresada con pronombres posesivos de 1.ª y 2.ª persona: mi, tu, su, nuestro, vuestro...

Expresada mediante adverbios, locuciones y sintagmas adverbiales de presente ( hoy, ahora...) pasado ( ayer, el mes pasado, hace poco...) o futuro ( el mes próximo, dentro de poco...) y mediante morfemas de tiempo ( Llegó, llegas...)

Mañana tengo que llevar pegamento y tijeras
Nos reunimos esta noche en mi casa

Formulada con adverbios de lugar ( aquí, ahí, allí, allá, cerca, lejos...), demostrativos ( este, ese, aquel...) y verbos de significado locativo ( traer, venir...)

Aquí estamos cómodamente sentados
Falta mucho para llegar a ese lugar?

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Ejemplos de deixis | Ejemplos del lenguaje

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La deixis es la parte de la semántica y la pragmática relacionada con las palabras que sirven para indicar otros elementos. Palabras como tú, hoy, aquí, esto, son expresiones deícticas que sirven para señalar personas, situaciones, lugares, etcétera. La señalización deíctica es frecuente sobre todo en las conversaciones cara a cara.

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El video describe lo que es una metáfora. El hablador nota que hay un término real y un término imaginativo que comparten una semejanza. Aunque la metáfora no es algo que se debe usar literalmente, es muy útil en contextos de literatura, dando un ambiente estético y permitiendo que el lector comprenda los aspectos del objeto real.

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La extensión metafórica es una caracterización de alguna persona, objeto o evento como alguna otra persona, objeto o evento con que comparte...

a. ...el mismo significado.

b. ...algunas características.

c. ...significados opuestos.

d. ...una pronunciación idéntica

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Una poema de una de mis clases de español en el preparatorio: Romance de la conquista de Alhama, escrito por un autor anónimo, nos describe el punto de vista de los moros durante el siglo XV. Aunque se llama un romance, el significado de la palabra es una composición poética que, en este instante, es una poema de lamento.

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Poemas de Romances de Andalucía - ROMANCE DE LA CONQUISTA (de Alhama) - poema de Romances de Andalucía titulado ROMANCE DE LA CONQUISTA (de Alhama)

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biografias poetas andaluces, poesia andaluza, biografias, obras

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La historia de españa contado por lapso de tiempo

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La historia de españa contado por lapso de tiempo

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Lo que encontré muy interesante de este video fue la influencia de los grupos moros en el año 1091, expandiendo hacia el norte hasta el medio de los años 1100s. Observando la agregación de palabras con "al-" a espanol, uno no puede negar que no se ha afectado el idioma a causa de el combate en españa.

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Mapa Histórico de España y Portugal 3000 Años

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Mapa histórico político de España y Portugal 3000 años. (Fuente: Geacron.com) Musica: La Ciencia del Idiota (Jad's 2012, Capicorla Records)

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El fenomeno del verbo 'haber' en el espanol

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El fenomeno del verbo 'haber' en el espanol

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El autor del extracto nos dice que el verbo "haber" es un ejemplo de la evolución de verbos, diciendo que es muy difícil discernir la manera en la cual ha cambiado de "tener". Continúa usando el Poema del Cid para articular la manera que se ha usado haber para un contexto impersonal, a veces utilizando "ser" para indicar existencia. Es decir, "haber" reemplaza palabras en tiempos recientes comparado a textos del pasado.

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La influencia de regiones indoeuropeos al español

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La influencia de regiones indoeuropeos al español

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El artículo describe los rasgos de espanol que vinieron de regiones indoeuropeos a españa. Es importante reconocer que los idiomas cuyos pertenecen a estos grupos son responsables por estructuras léxicas y gramaticales para la mayoría de idiomas de Europa. Palabras derivados del latín y griego deben sus raíces a estos idiomas y son factores que han influenciado espanol.

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El español no es más que una variedad de latín, que ha evolucionado a lo largo de 1500 años desde la caída del imperio romano. A lo largo de ese tiempo, ha sufrido las más variadas influencias, de los pueblos germánicos, de los árabes y de las lenguas originarias americanas. El latín, junto con el osco y el umbro, pertenece a la rama itálica del indoeuropeo, una lengua prehistórica hipotética hablada hace unos cuatro mil años. Unos dos mil años antes de Cristo, oleadas migratorias procedentes de una zona cercana al Mar Caspio o al Mar Negro llevaron su lengua hacia el este y hacia el oeste, alcanzando por un lado la Bretaña y la Hispania y, por el otro, la India, por lo que se los llamó indoeuropeos.

En este largo periplo que duró varios siglos, los migrantes legaron su lengua, que fue cambiando a través de los siglos hasta que en cierto momento los habitantes de diferentes regiones ya no se entendían entre sí y ni siquiera tenían noción del parentesco entre sus idiomas. Los lingüistas dividieron las lenguas indoeuropeas -cuyas herederas corresponden hoy aproximadamente al habla de la mitad de la humanidad- según el tratamiento de las guturales, considerado como línea divisoria de los hechos dialectales del tiempo prehistórico. La distinción se estableció de acuerdo con la pronunciación del número cien (centum), que es kentum en el primer grupo y satem en el segundo.

Los latinos, que obviamente pertenecían al primer grupo, heredaron de los indoeuropeos el carácter sintético de su lengua, con un sistema de declinaciones nominales del cual perdieron, antes de la época clásica, el caso locativo.

Muchas palabras del indoeuropeo llegaron directamente al latín y otras fueron tomadas de diferentes lenguas parientes. Así udero (abdomen, vientre) dio lugar en latín a uterus (útero), pero también al griego hysterá (vientre). Análogamente, la raíz indoeuropea pod- (pie) dio lugar en latín a pes, pedis; en germánico a fot, que se transmitió al inglés antiguo hasta llegar al moderno foot; en francés a pied, en italiano a piede, en portugués a pé, y pie en español, etc.

La palabra latina para rodilla, genus, proviene de la raíz indoeuropea genu-, que también dio lugar en inglés a knee, pasando por el germánico knewam, (Knie en el alemán moderno). Esta raíz aparece también en el sánscrito janas y, a través del romance llega al francés genou, al italiano ginocchio y al portugués joelho.

La raíz weid- (ver) por su parte, está presente en el griego eidon, en el sánscrito veda, en el germánico wir y en el latín video. En las lenguas modernas, los descendientes de esta raíz prehistórica sobreviven en el español y portugués ver, en el francés voyer, en el italiano vedere o en el catalán veure. Todas estas palabras tienen sus correspondientes en sánscrito, idioma que sirvió de puente a los lingüistas entre el indoeuropeo y las lenguas clásicas.

A pesar de la proximidad lingüística que se creía que existía entre el griego y el latín, se sabe hoy que las semejanzas halladas no son diferentes de las que existen entre otras lenguas indoeuropeas y que la gran cantidad de vocablos comunes corresponden más bien a las estrechas relaciones mantenidas por ambos pueblos y el consiguiente trasiego de mercaderes, negociantes y esclavos. Así, los romanos tomaron de los griegos vocablos como palabra, en griego cibernética balineum, machina, talentum, poena, ancora, purpura, gubernare, etc. Esta última kybernetikós, fue retomada modernamente para dar lugar también a

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El español no es más que una variedad de latín, que ha evolucionado a lo largo de 1500 años desde la caída del imperio romano. A lo largo de ese tiempo, ha sufrido las más variadas influencias, de los pueblos germánicos, de los árabes y de las lenguas originarias americanas.

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Rasgos del bilingüismo y “codeswitching”

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Rasgos del bilingüismo y “codeswitching”

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El estudio por unos alumnos de Salem State demuestra muchos términos relacionados a “code switching” que nos enseña que hay muchas variaciones para este fenómeno. Por ejemplo, unas personas a veces prefieren a cambiar adjetivos pero otras tal vez prefieren intercambiar los sustantivos debido a la falta de saber su equivalente en español.

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Bilingual Review
Jan-Apr97, Vol. 22 Issue 1, p3

Kristin R. Becker, VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY

Contents

Introduction

Structural Linguistic Factors: "Out of the Mouth"

Internal Psycholinguistic Factors: "In the Head"

An Information-Processing Model

Momentary Inclination

Frequency of Exposure

Cultural Untranslatability

Emphasis/Contrast

Mode or Topic Shift

Controlling the Addressee

Personalization/Objectivization

External Social Factors: "On the Spot"

Physical Characteristics

Language Proficiency

Language Preference

Speaker's Role Relative to Addressee

Setting

Informal vs. Formal Settings

Topic

Conclusion

References

Bilingual speakers have twice as many options to choose from as monolingual speakers when expressing their thoughts and ideas because their language repertoire is twofold; not only can bilinguals choose from a variety of styles of speech within the same language, but also they can switch from one language, or code, system to the other. According to Zentella, when bilingual speakers--consciously or unconsciously--shift from one code to the other in the same conversation, they are in effect saying, "I belong to two worlds and can function in either, but I am most at ease when I can shift back and forth from one to the other" (1982,54). Lipski describes this need for bilinguals to find a compromise between their two worlds by shifting back and forth from one language to the other: "It reflects an inner drive that cannot find ready expression by remaining within a single language" (1982,191), and Agar states that codeswitching allows bilinguals to more effectively overcome "the untranslatability that mixes language and culture... and shifting relationships between co-occurent languages and cultures" (1991,173,169). Bilinguals assert that this alternation between their two languages allows them to convey their message more precisely, more naturally, and more personally.

Choosing one language set over another and shifting back and forth requires not only communicative competence within both languages, but also a switching competence. Heller asserts that "codeswitching has attracted a great deal of attention over the years, most likely because it violates a strong expectation that only one language will be used at any given time" (1988a, 1). Before bilingual codeswitching became a fertile topic of study among researchers, it was looked at suspiciously as an idiosyncratic speech behavior, which arose from an inadequate mastery of both languages. The outmoded idea that codeswitching is a random process reflecting language deficiency has been rejected by linguists who now claim that it is a rule-governed phenomenon, which can be analyzed both functionally and structurally.

Researchers from various fields--linguistics, sociology, psychology, anthropology, and education--agree that both internal and external factors must be examined in order to adequately describe this bilingual speech behavior. However, the majority of codeswitching literature treats these factors in isolation while focusing almost exclusively on either structural or functional aspects. Although it may be advantageous to categorize the forms and functions of codeswitches, it is not a true reflection of the dynamic nature of language use. Fina asserts that it is "necessary to look for an integrated model of codeswitching taking into account both functional and syntactic constraints and relating them rather than just juxtaposing them" (1989,120), and Scotton expresses concern that the effects of social and psychological factors on structural patterns have been neglected (1993,475).

The desire and need to attain an integrated or synthetic approach to determine when, how, where, and why bilinguals codeswitch provided me the impetus to replace the previous one-dimensional models presented in bilingual codeswitching literature with a three-dimensional model. Although the three dimensions to be analyzed--structural linguistic factors, internal psycholinguistic factors, and external social factors--will be treated independently, this is by no means meant to ignore their interdependence. However, because this article is based on existing codeswitching literature, the intersections between these three dimensions are limited to the evidence already presented in previous research paradigms. Therefore the objective of this synthetic model is to provide a stepping stone between current codeswitching literature and future research by analyzing the form that bilingual codeswitched utterances take, as well as the internal and external factors that trigger these codeswitches. It will include an analysis of three dimensions of bilingual codeswitching: linguistic (structural interaction of the two grammars and the syntactic form of codeswitched utterances), psycholinguistic (internal factors triggering the codeswitch, both conscious and unconscious), and social (external contextual and situational factors triggering the codeswitch). The three-dimensional model will be given subtitles adopted from Zentella's (1990a) "on the spot, in the head, out of the mouth" model, which is an initial step toward the presentation of an integrated codeswitching model.

The bilingual codeswitching behavior analyzed is that of Spanish/English bilinguals. In order to provide an adequate number of clear examples that demonstrate when, how, where, and why Spanish/English bilinguals codeswitch, I have occasionally created codeswitched utterances that, although not actually observed in bilingual speech data, would likely occur given the circumstances of the speech situation. In some instances, I have improvised isolated codeswitched speech samples provided in the codeswitching literature by expanding them to recreate an overall conceivable discourse context. In other instances, I have devised structurally and functionally conceivable codeswitches in order to fill the gaps in some researchers' explanations lacking real speech data. Nevertheless, in all instances I indicate where I have improvised existing bilingual speech data, as well as where I have created unobserved codeswitched utterances. In this way, my own created and improvised speech samples will not be mistaken for observed and recorded speech data presented in current codeswitching literature.

The structural linguistic factors of bilingual codeswitching are observable because they can be heard and recorded by linguists once the codeswitched utterance comes "out of the mouth." According to Zentella these factors "at work in a bilingual's alternation of languages are more linguistic, more anchored in the structure of the languages themselves and in the individual's knowledge of the languages" (1990a, 86). The conventional linguist relies on the bilingual speaker's "out of the mouth" performance in order to analyze the precise form that a switched utterance takes, as well as to determine the linguistic factors that facilitate the switch. Whereas the psycholinguist studies the mental representation of the two languages "in the head," Lipski explains that the conventional linguist studies the "transference from mental image to syntactic realization" (1982,200).

Bilingual codeswitching requires a switching competence, which according to Zentella denotes "a formidable syntactic knowledge by switching at points that maintain the grammatical integrity of both languages at the same time" (1990b, 81). However, in order to maintain the integrity of two separate language systems, bilingual speakers are subject to certain syntactic constraints in that the Spanish and English grammars can interact to generate syntactic realizations that do not violate the grammatical structure of either language.

Merged or Separate Grammars?

Monolinguals usually have a negative attitude toward codeswitching behavior and often assign pejorative names such as "Tex-Mex" or "Spanglish" to this speech phenomenon. As Titone says, "it represents a grammarless mixture of two languages, a jargon or gibberish quite contrary to the monolingual's own rule-governed language" (1988). Valdes-Fallis refutes this unfounded bias by stating that the codeswitched "items introduced by the bilingual are completely unassimilated, and that the bilingual avoids interference in the strict sense by switching languages" (1978a, 65).

Other researchers' findings confirm this assertion that bilingual codeswitching behavior is an indicator of competence and affirms the absolute separateness of the codes, rather than representing a merging or mixing of codes. They suggest that codeswitching is actually the force that prevents the merging of the English and Spanish grammatical components. In constructing a formal grammar for codeswitching and its rules, Poplack found that "even in portions of discourse in close proximity to one or more switches, the speaker strictly maintained both qualitative and quantitative distinctions between Spanish and English grammars" (1983,123).

Congruent with this finding is Lipski's proposal that indicates the presence of two separate grammatical mechanisms, each of which generates acceptable monolingual utterances. He rejects the notion of a single homogeneous underlying grammar by stating that "a single undifferentiated grammar would of necessity have to include combinations which would be ungrammatical in one or the other of the languages and which would produce unacceptable codeswitched configurations" (1985,83). Lipski's findings are confirmed by Annamalai, who states that "no new grammar is created beyond the grammars of the two languages involved, one of which is glued to the other without changing it" (1989,48).

Cooperation of Two Distinct Grammars

This debate over whether discourse containing codeswitches is generated by the alternate use of the two monolingual grammars or whether a single codeswitching grammar exists, which combines elements of the monolingual grammars, has been abandoned to emphasize the cooperative and integrative elements existing between the two grammars. A proponent of this integrative theory is Lipski, who has found that bilinguals have, "in addition to two essentially distinct grammars, a mechanism that fully integrates the two, to the point where it becomes more useful to speak in terms of a bilingual grammar" (1982,198).

Bilinguals possess a verbal mode that allows them to codeswitch without interrupting their speech flow while drawing on rules from two separate grammars. Poplack observed that bilinguals switch at junctures that are mutually mappable in English and Spanish, despite the large number of permissible switching points within the sentence, which indicates that codeswitching requires knowledge of two grammatical systems. At the same time, however, codeswitching that takes place within the sentence is too intimately connected to be generated separately by rules from two distinct grammars. Additional evidence in defense of this cooperative mechanism existing between the two grammars is Poplack's observation that "codeswitching generally does not entail pauses, hesitations, repetitions, corrections or any other interruption or disruption in the rhythm of speech" (1980,605). If bilinguals did not have such an integrative mechanism to help them codeswitch at permissible junctures within a sentence, it would be impossible to produce smooth codeswitches without prior rehearsal or advance sentence planning.

Generative Model of Codeswitching

The question that immediately arises in the consideration of this proposed cooperative mechanism, which maintains the integrity of both grammars, is how such sentences can be generated by drawing from two separate grammars at the same time. Woolford suggests one answer to this question by proposing a generative model of codeswitching that demonstrates how two monolingual grammars cooperate in the production of code-switched utterances without altering the rules of either grammar in any way. She believes that the bilingual speaker's two monolingual grammars must be structurally compatible in order for codeswitching to occur. Consequently, she selected Spanish and English as her two monolingual grammars under analysis due to the overlapping phrase structure rules that are common to both languages. Woolford relies on the phrase structure rules of each language to demonstrate that "two grammars operate during codeswitching just as they do during monolingual speech, except that each grammar generates only part of the sentence" (1983,522).

Woolford explains that the bilingual speaker can switch back and forth between grammars while freely drawing phrase structure rules from either language. If the phrase structure rule is common to both languages, it cannot be distinguished as either Spanish or English, thereby belonging to both grammars. According to Woolford, "this area of overlap between the two phrase structure components should be thought of as a sort of space warp that allows one speaker to be in two universes, or two grammars, at once" (522). As a result of this overlap, lexicons from either language have equal access to terminal nodes created by common phrase structure rules, and a codeswitch takes place. Woolford presents two clear examples to illustrate how lexical items can be inserted at sentence junctures where the phrase structure rules are common to both languages.

1. [NP Todos los mexicanos] were riled up. [NP All of the Mexicans] were riled up.

2. El hombre [who saw the accident] es cubano. The man [who saw the accident] is Cuban.

In example 1 the subject NP is common to both languages, thereby permitting lexical items from either Spanish or English to attach and still produce an utterance that obeys the phrase structure rules of both languages. In example 2 the embedded relative clause is the only part of the sentence that is not codeswitched, whereas the NP, the copula, and its corresponding adjective phrase are codeswitched. In this case, any of these constituents could have been switched because the entire sentence is generated by phrase structure rules common to both Spanish and English. The embedded relative clause in this example could have been switched to produce a sentence with Spanish lexical items at these terminal nodes, e.g., The man [que vio el accidente] is Cuban.

Notwithstanding, Woolford emphasizes the preciseness of this generative model by stating that "if one of the phrase structure rules used to generate these structures had been unique to one of the languages, there would have been no choice but to fill the nodes created by that rule from the lexicon of that language" (524). Because lexical items from one language cannot appear in a structure unique to the other language, it is clear that bilingual codeswitching is not a random merging of all portions of their two grammars into one.

On the contrary, Woolford maintains that in a codeswitched sentence "the fragments in each language appear phonologically, syntactically, and semantically just as they would if the entire sentence were in that language" (522). In defense of her own seemingly fragmentary method of generating acceptable codeswitched sentences, Woolford reemphasizes the fact that the integrity of the two grammars is maintained: "The fact that these fragments lie adjacent to other fragments in a different language, and must combine with those alien fragments to form a complete and coherent sentence, does not affect the grammatical form of those fragments" (522).

Underlying Grammatical Mechanism

Like Woolford, Sankoll and Poplack found that codeswitching, rather than being a result of imperfect competence in either of the two monolingual language systems, represented an integrated knowledge of the rules of both languages, including their similarities and differences. They constructed a formal account of the grammatical mechanism that underlies discourse containing a codeswitch and, like Woolford, they have found that switches can only occur where the surface structures of both languages overlap.

The quantitative analysis of their switches revealed that both fluent and nonfluent bilinguals were able to codeswitch frequently and still maintain grammaticality in both English and Spanish. The only difference found between fluent and nonfluent bilinguals was the switching type: While fluent bilinguals tend to switch at various syntactic boundaries within the sentence (intrasentential switches), nonfluent bilinguals favored switching between sentences (intersentential switches). Sankoff and Poplack concluded that nonfluent bilinguals are less skilled codeswitchers, and therefore they try to avoid switch points that are "risky." Switching from language to language is easier for them between sentences because it "allows them to participate in the codeswitching mode without the fear of violating a grammatical rule of either of the languages involved" (1981,15).

These results, which demonstrate that fluent bilinguals are more skilled codeswitchers than nonfluent bilinguals, provide further evidence in favor of the assertion that codeswitching is an indicator of bilingual ability, rather than a deficiency in either of the languages involved. Although both types of bilinguals showed a competence in Spanish and English by maintaining the grammatical integrity of both languages, the fluent bilinguals' switches were "riskier" and more skillful because they occurred with high density at various junctures within the sentence. This confirms Sankoff and Poplack's assertion that an underlying grammatical mechanism exists between the two separate grammars that allows fluent bilinguals to switch back and for frequently without interrupting the speech flow. Moreover, it suggests that nonfluent bilinguals have not yet fully developed this underlying grammatical mechanism that serves as a cooperative element between the bilinguals' two grammatical systems. By switching between sentences, nonfluent bilinguals may be generating their discourse from each of the monolingual grammars in order to avoid ungrammatical syntactic realizations in either of the languages.

Poplack's Two General Syntactic Constraints

Poplack investigated the syntactic dimensions of Spanish/English bilingual codeswitches in even greater detail to determine the structural constraints that govern bilingual codeswitching. After detailed analysis of Spanish/English codeswitching performance data, Poplack proposed two general syntactic constraints to indicate where switching can and cannot occur: "The free morpheme constraint, which prohibits the mixing of morphologies with the confines of a word, and the equivalence constraint, which requires that the surface word order of the two languages be homologous in the vicinity of the switch point" (1988,219).

Poplack explains that the free morpheme constraint permits a switch to "occur at any point of the discourse at which it is possible to make a surface constituent cut and still retain a free morpheme. According to this constraint, it is possible to switch full sentences as well as any constituent within the sentences, provided that the constituent consists of at least one free morpheme" (1981,175). The second syntactic constraint, the equivalence constraint, operates simultaneously with the morpheme constraint. The equivalence constraint "states that codes will tend to be switched at points where juxtaposition of English and Spanish elements does not violate a syntactic rule of either language, i.e., at points where the surface structures of the languages map onto each other" (175). This constraint suggests that where the surface structures of Spanish and English do not overlap there is no equivalence, and therefore these parts of the discourse are reserved for monolingual segments.

Poplack indicates the ways in which constituents from Spanish and English map onto each other by providing a list of major switch types found in her bilingual subjects' speech data (1981,176-77):

1. Full sentence: Ella canta canciones insultando a los hombres. That's why you never heard of her.

2. Conjoined sentence: Yo voy por todos esos sitios y I was on 7th Avenue and Broadway.

3. Between major noun phrase and verb phrase: Years ago people se iban a trabajar.

4. Between verb phrase and object noun phrase: What ruined this people is la vagancia de no hacer nada.

5. Between verb phrase and prepositional phrase: Tu quieres bailar with a man; that's your business.

6. Between verb and adverb: Un americano me puede preguntar very nicely, "hace tiempo que yo te estoy viendo asi y perdona que te pregunte."

7. Between noun and adjective: Cojo mi garlic puro.

8. Between determiner and noun: Because if you smash it with the pilon and spray it, you don't get that burning sensation.

9. Between auxiliary and verb: So... you take the ham... as they're ablandando, ya que esta un poquito hirviendo, tu le echas el hueso del jamon.

10. Single noun: La milk esta en la mesa.

11. Interjection: There should be a stop with these kids where there should be discipline, !Contra! You know, open classrooms.

12. Tag phrase: I'm sorry, verdad, you know, anda, I mean, etc ....

A quantitative analysis of Poplack's performance data revealed that the higher the syntactic level of the constituent, the greater the probability of switches. Full sentence switches constituted nearly half the switches, while major constituent boundaries within the sentence--between NP and VP, between VP and object NP, and between VP and PP--were the next most frequently switched items. Not surprisingly, the noun is the single most frequently switched item of the smaller-sized elements within these constituents. Lipski explains why it is natural to find a large number of noun switches in bilingual codeswitched discourse: Nouns provide bilingual speakers with "a ready word which many not be found in one language or which, for whatever reason, seems more appropriately expressed in one language than in the other" (1982,197).

Structural Conflicts between Spanish and English

An interesting application of the equivalence constraint was revealed in the adjectival switches observed by Poplack. Like Poplack, Sridhar and Sridhar witnessed potential structural conflicts with adjectival switches in Spanish and English as a result of their different rules of adjective placement: They state that "even in cases of perfect lexical congruence between the guest item and its host language counterpart (e.g., blanca and white in Spanish and English), the language-specific constraints on the surface structure placement of the items may bring about structural conflicts" (1980,411). Sridhar and Sridhar explain that "adjectives normally precede the noun in English except in certain specific structures (e.g., when preceded by an adverb), and follow the noun in Spanish except when they are members of a closed set (e.g., possessives, ordinals, and other limiting adjectives)" (411).

Despite these potential structural conflicts, Sridhar and Sridhar found that when adjective switches occur they obey both of these language-specific constraints. This finding is congruent with Poplack's data: less than 1 percent of the adjectival switches produced by bilinguals violated the adjective placement rules of Spanish and English. To resolve this language-specific structural conflict, bilinguals applied a rule of predicate adjective construction common to both Spanish and English. Examples of this predicate adjective construction are shown in the following examples found in Poplack (1981) and Sridhar and Sridhar's (1980) observed speech data:

1. Spanish: A mi mama le gusta el arroz amogollado.
English: My mother likes her rice sticky.
Codeswitch: My mother likes her rice amogollado.

2. Spanish: Me lleve el chile ya asado y pelado para hacerlo alla.
English: I picked up the chile already roasted and peeled for making it there.
Codeswitch: Me lleve el chile ya roasted y peeled para hacerlo alla.

In addition to structural conflicts with adjectival switches, Poplack found that her two general syntactic constraints explain why bilinguals avoid negative constructs that are not common to the rule systems of both Spanish and English. She explains that switching is avoided in negative constructions because "English requires the dummy morpheme do or a modal auxiliary or negative support, whereas Spanish negates by inserting the negative particle immediately before the verb" (1981,178).

Woolford, who is also a proponent of the necessity for two languages to have equivalent surface structures for a switch to take place, found two cases in which switching is avoided due to structural conflicts between Spanish and English. First, "unlike English, Spanish is a pro-drop language in which sentences may have no (visible) subject" (1983,532). Consequently, she found that codeswitched sentences without a subject may also occur, but only if the first verbal element is Spanish. Second, because "Spanish has a construction involving postposed subjects that is not shared with English .... it is also the case that the verb must be Spanish for a codeswitch to take place" (533). Examples of these two cases presented by Woolford are presented below:

Case 1: English: He was training to fight.
Acceptable codeswitch: Estaba training para pelear.
Unacceptable codeswitch: *Was training para pelear.

Case 2: English: The big chief arrived.
Acceptable codeswitch: Llego el big chief.
Unacceptable codeswitch: *Arrived the gran jefe.

Poplack's Syntactic Constraints Prevail

According to Scotton, "While many constraints on codeswitching have been proposed (mainly on the basis of Spanish/English switching in the United States)... only two general syntactic constraints still receive any support: the free morpheme constraint... and the equivalence constraint" (1990,86). Lipski examined a corpus of Spanish/English bilingual switches and discovered the same general prerequisite of syntactic congruity that was proposed by Poplack. He states that "the overall superficial form of a given utterance must be essentially the same in each of the two languages... with respect to the general arrangement of constituents and the deployment of the bonds of semantic coherence in order to switch from one language to the other" (1980,37). Lipski denies the claim that absolute syntactic identity is required between the two languages, saying that this claim would be "easily refuted by codeswitches in which minor syntactic deviations may be found" (37). Like Poplack, he proposes general constraints that are not absolutes, as some counter-examples to their data have been reported.

Because codeswitching is subject to other forms of analysis that reflect the dynamic nature of language usage, Clyne stresses the importance of using words such as "tend to, are favored, and are frequent" in order to report tendencies rather than absolutes (1987,744). For example, Fina has reported cases in which the structural conflict between languages is disregarded by fluent speakers in order to create conversational effects. She states that "this conflict may lead to completely ungrammatical sentences.., because considerations of conversational effectiveness may be stronger than fear of structural conflict" (1989,119-20). She provides an example that demonstrates how bilingual speakers occasionally create structural conflicts between the two languages in order to achieve conversational effectiveness:

Ungrammatical codeswitch:

Lo mejor para ella seria que ella se deregister del grado.

According to Fina, the English verb deregister is inserted within a nonequivalent VP without being morphologically adapted. She explains that .the VP is not equivalent because the Spanish construction requires reflexive pronoun + V in subjunctive, i.e., se quitara del registro, whereas the English construction require the infinitive form of the verb, i.e., to deregister. She maintains that "the speaker seems to have chose the English verb instead of the longer and more awkward Spanish expression on a criterion of simplicity and conversational effectiveness" (119). This example from her bilingual subjects' speech data demonstrates how bilingual speakers occasionally produce codeswitched utterances that contradict Poplack's two general syntactic constraints in order to achieve conversational effectiveness and speech economy.

In spite of such counter-examples cited in the literature, Poplack's two general syntactic constraints receive an overwhelming acceptance from other bilingual codeswitching researchers. Jacobson affirms this agreement in a simple yet clarifying statement: "Basically, bilingual speakers tend to avoid the difficulties caused by unmatched grammatical structures" (1990a, 12).

Urciuoli maintains that "linguistic forms do not constitute some ultimate reality: linguistic forms and structural relations only exist insofar as they are deduced from use" (1985,366). Despite the overwhelming approval that her two general syntactic constraints received from other linguists and researchers, Poplack recognizes that her results "suggest that it is possible to predict where switching is more likely to occur and not occur, but that... rule application will vary in the presence of well-defined extralinguistic factors" (1981,182).

Nevertheless, this chapter has shown that bilingual codeswitching is an indication of competence; bilingual speakers demonstrate a skillful integration of two distinct language systems, usually without corrupting the grammatical integrity of either language.

Once bilingual codeswitches have been structurally analyzed by directly observable "out of the mouth" speech data, the psycholinguist must go one step back in order to determine the psychological factors that triggered the switches in the first place. Given that "in the head" factors of bilingual codeswitching are not directly observable, there is no ready methodology that can unequivocally determine the exact psychological motivation for a particular switch by a given bilingual speaker. However, this is not to say that the study of the internal mechanisms at work in the "bilingual brain" should be abandoned; instead, like the conventional linguist, who reports on tendencies instead of absolutes, the psycholinguist elaborates recurring patterns instead of particular cases.

A seemingly straightforward way to determine the psychological motivations for a particular switch would be to ask bilingual speakers directly to describe their intrinsic motivation for alternating between languages immediately following a given switch. However, psycholinguists have found such a methodology to be invalid because codeswitches are often triggered internally by unconscious factors and, consequently, bilingual speakers are often unaware of their spontaneous alternation between languages. Gumperz indicates that this inattentive speech behavior, which often characterizes bilingual codeswitching behavior, is actually a specific instance of more general linguistic behavior: "To ask a bilingual to report directly on the incidence of particular switched forms... is equivalent to asking an English-speaking monolingual to record his use of--for example--future tense in his last spoken sentence" (1976,4).

In addition to evidence that indicates that bilingual codeswitches are often triggered by unconscious psychological factors, it has been discovered that bilingual codeswitches can also be triggered by conscious psychological factors. Psycholinguists have found that bilingual speakers use codeswitching as a communication resource to achieve their communicative intentions, or to express some notion that they feel is better expressed in the other language.

Unconscious Factors

The first part will explain what happens when first-language and second-language lexicons meet in the same mind to produce Spanish/English codeswitched utterances. The ways in which two different symbol systems interact to trigger unconsciously a bilingual speaker to switch to the other code will be analyzed in terms of an information-processing model: this model will indicate how bilinguals receive, store, manipulate, and transmit linguistic information from two separate language systems. In addition, in order to provide evidence to support the finding that lexical deficiency in one of the languages is to the principal reason for bilingual codeswitches, unconsciously triggered codeswitches will be assigned to three distinct categories: (1) switches triggered by momentary inclination at the production stage of speech, (2) switches triggered as a result of frequent exposure to given items in one language, and (3) switches triggered as a result of cultural untranslatability.

Kolers developed the information-processing model to study the ways in which the bilingual memory stores and manipulates two distinct symbol systems during language acquisition and language production stages. Kolers's experiments are based on his assertion that much of human thinking is expressed in words. He investigated the interaction of words or symbols from the bilingual's two language systems in order to describe the mental operations involved in codeswitching behavior. Prior to his experiments, Kolers proposed two hypotheses to describe possible ways that Spanish/English bilinguals store lexicons from each language: One hypothesis states that lexicons from both languages are stored centrally in an interdependent memory; the other hypothesis states that the lexicons from each language are assigned to separate or independent memories, determined by the language in which the information was received.

He used a metaphor to help clarify this issue of storing verbal symbols in the mind. In the case of the interdependent memory hypothesis, Kolers regarded the mind as one central storage tank, with the two languages acting as different taps in order to produce language chunks in two separate codes. In the case of the independent memory hypothesis, Kolers suggests that bilinguals would store language-specific lexicons in two separate tanks.

Not unlike conventional linguists, who found that bilinguals neither possess two totally separate grammars nor two completely merged grammars, Kolers's results indicate that a bilingual speaker combines parts of both hypotheses. He tested his hypotheses by administering interlingual word associations and by presenting bilingual subjects with information in one language and then testing them in the other language. His performance data revealed little or no difference in response time for identifying words on a list, even if the stimulus was presented in the other language, thereby suggesting a mechanism of interconnection between the two languages. More specifically, his findings revealed that regardless of the language used by the test giver, about a fifth of bilingual responses were the same in both Spanish and English. Kolers states that this is "too large a percentage to warrant the belief that the meanings of words were stored completely in linguistically separate tanks" (1968,82). At the same time, Kolers rejects the central tank hypothesis, indicating that "the large number of responses (about a quarter of the total) confined to one language or the other enabled us to reject the idea that the meanings existed in a single tank for which the languages were merely taps" (82).

These findings, which deny the absolute validity of either of the two bilingual memory hypotheses to suggest instead a mechanism of interconnection, indicate that in some cases lexicons are stored in overlapping ways, whereas in other cases they are stored in language-specific ways. Kolers's bilingual subjects' performance data revealed that words referring to concrete objects that are common to most people and cultures are more likely to elicit similar responses in both of the bilinguals' languages. This piece of evidence supports the common story tank hypotheses. On the other hand, abstract words and words related to speakers' emotions were more closely bound to the language by which they were stored or experienced. This finding provides supporting evidence for the separate storage tank hypothesis.

Kolers's evidence in favor of a compromise between these two hypothetical models is supported by other researchers' findings. Lipski states that

the entire question of polar opposites in the bilingual storage of language is probably invalid and that bilingual competence may be characterized simultaneously by a shared component and a pair of separated components .... The evidence is far from clear, but all signs point to the principled interaction of the two. (1982,199)

Sridhar and Sridhar confirm this assertion by stating that "the right approach seems to be to avoid both the strong linguistic independence model and the merged system model in favor of an interactionist model of overlapping systems" (1980,413).

Current codeswitching literature indicates an overwhelming denial that the principal reason for bilingual codeswitching is due to the speaker's lack of knowledge of the equivalent lexical item in the other language. Lipski states that current studies "refine such facile claims of lexical and semantic inadequacy... which frequently sought to belittle or mock the linguistic behavior of bilinguals" (1980,196). Lipski maintains that sufficient evidence has been found "to indicate that the bilingual speaker knew the appropriate words in both languages and simply produced the one that was closest to the tip of the tongue" (1980,36).

Lance's findings coincide with Lipski's assertion that codeswitches are often unconsciously triggered by the bilingual speaker's momentary inclination: "When the situation excludes one language, the speakers can use only English or only Spanish. But when the situation allows more freedom, the speaker uses the construction that is closest to the tip of the tongue" (1970,343). Valdes-Fallis, agreeing with this conclusion, states that "in those situations when either code is permissible, codeswitching seems to be merely a question of momentary inclination" (1976,53). Although Aguirre maintains the same assertion, he refers to this idea of momentary inclination as availability: "The switching occurs not because the speaker does not know the right word but because the word that comes out is more readily available" (1985,60).

Psycholinguists have demonstrated that lexical items will be more available to bilingual speakers in language A than in language B if they are exposed to these verbal symbols at a higher frequency rate in language A. They explain that bilinguals develop the habitual use of certain lexicons in one of their two languages simply because these items are more commonly used in either language A or B, but not both. Consequently, bilinguals' codeswitches to these language-specific items are unconsciously triggered, and bilinguals are often unaware of their alternation between languages.

Bilinguals unconsciously develop the habit of accessing these items of frequent exposure by codeswitching, even though they may know the equivalent lexicon in their other language:

Although Spanish equivalents might be known for some of the items it is improbable that the subjects ever had occasions in which they were required to produce these terms in Spanish. A plausible justification for this codeswitching, therefore, is the frequent exposure to these items in English which led to a habitual use of them in the same language by the speakers. (Huerta 1980, 220)

Huerta maintains that bilinguals tend to switch to English to refer to items relating to the business world and modern technology because they most likely learned such vocabulary outside the home from speakers of English or books written in English. In addition, she demonstrated that linguistic economy may also be related to the frequency of exposure and habitual use of certain lexical items in one of the bilingual's two languages. For example, because the English word washer is more linguistically economical than the Spanish equivalent maquina de lavar, bilinguals in order to save time unconsciously switch to English when referring to this household machine.

Redlinger elaborates on Huerta's findings with his own bilingual subjects' performance data, which reveal that Spanish/English bilinguals normally switch to English when introducing vocabulary items into the discourse that relate to occupations, education, and medicine. He states that "such items may have been first encountered through characteristically Anglo institutions or otherwise identified with them in some significant way" (1976,50). Like Huerta, he explains that these switches are unconsciously triggered, in that a switch to English to discuss such items has become a habit for the bilingual. He provides some examples to illustrate Spanish/English bilingual codeswitches when referring to occupational, educational, and medical terms (48):

1. Occupational terms:

Mi esposa era pura housewife.

Soy un supervisor.

2. Educational terms:

Termine high school en California.

Tuvo dos anos de grade school nomas.

3. Medical terms:

La llevaron al delivery room.

Siento pains en la cintura.

Valdes-Fallis confirms this conclusion of habitual use as a result of the frequency of exposure to certain items in a given language: she found that numerical terms, e.g., money and time, caused some of her bilingual subjects to switch to English due to their frequent exposure in the English-speaking domain: "y me salia cada vez que iba como fifteen o twenty dollars" (1976,66).

According to Titone, "There are deep roots seated in the hidden core of the bilingual personality.... Codeswitching is the outcome of a strong impulse from within which is almost compulsory... because different images or different memories and concepts need the sound and rhythm and connotations belonging to different cultures" (1988,19-20). This provides further evidence to indicate that many bilingual codeswitches may be unconsciously triggered by internal mechanisms. Lipski reinforces this idea of psychological impulses by stating that codeswitching represents "an inner drive which cannot find ready expression by remaining within a single language" (1985,73). Agar describes this duality that characterizes a bilingual speaker's personality and speech behavior: "Often bilingual speakers have split minds; all the particularities which language conveys... are embodied in the bilingual twice; he is neither here nor there; he is a marginal man" (1991,172).

This duality that characterizes the bilingual's speech repertoire is often resolved unconsciously by alternating between languages in cases of cultural untranslatability. Linguists unanimously agree that certain culturally bound items cannot be translated to a different language without sacrificing relevant cultural connotations. Bassnett-McGuire expresses her denial of the notion that full equivalence can be achieved through translation, stating that "even so-called synonyms don't present a case of complete equivalence, since each unit contains within itself a set of non-transferable associations and connotations" (1980,15). For example, the Spanish word bocadillo is not equivalent to the English word sandwich, even though they are given as equivalent translations in a bilingual dictionary. As evidence of this, Spanish speakers have even adopted the word sandwich as an Anglicism to distinguish a generic U.S.-style sandwich (meat/cheese between slices of bread) from the bocadillo (stuffed baguette).

Other examples that illustrate this idea of lexical nonequivalence across languages are words that speakers employ to convey affective connotations. For example, an English speaker would find it difficult to find an equivalent expression I Spanish to convey the affective connotations associated with expressions such as "sweetie pie," "pumpkin," and "cutie." It would be equally difficult to find equivalent expressions in Spanish to convey the negative connotations associated with expressions such as "blockhead," "airhead," and "snob." This is not to say that Spanish speakers do not have lexical items to describe such concepts; rather, they describe these concepts with different verbal symbols, thereby conveying nuances of meaning that are unique to the Spanish language and culture. For example, the Spanish adjective mona, whose denotation is similar to the English adjective cute, cannot be translated to English without losing its rich connotative meanings. These types of culturally bound words, which convey concepts and affective meanings unique to a given culture, are subject to this loss and gain associated with translation, whereas more concrete items, e.g., table/mesa, sky/cielo, and wall/pared, are less resistant to translation.

Bassnett-McGuire quotes Edward Sapir, who expresses this idea of cultural untranslatability with clarity and conciseness: "No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which different societies live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with different labels attached" (1980,1).

The unconscious codeswitching behavior of Spanish/English bilinguals is an example of this reconciliation between two worlds, which are distinct and overlapping at the same time. Kolers's Information-Processing Model has demonstrated that the bilingual memory can also be described as having two distinct yet overlapping components to help bilinguals reconcile their two symbol systems in a systematic way. Moreover, psycholinguistic researchers' earlier claims of lexical deficiency as the principal reason for bilingual codeswitching have been refuted by showing that unconsciously triggered codeswitches can be attributed to a bilingual's momentary inclination, a higher frequency of exposure to certain lexical items, and the untranslatability of culturally bound items.

Conscious Factors

Bilingual codeswitches are not always triggered by unconscious factors; on the contrary, bilingual speakers also make conscious choices to alternate between languages in order to influence the outcome of their conversations with others. Zentella maintains that bilinguals "depend on the in-the-head extralinguistic knowledge to use appropriately intra-turn codeswitching to achieve specific communicative purposes" (1990a, 82). Heller confirms the idea of intentionality that often characterizes bilingual codeswitches: "Codeswitching, as any other communicative resource, can be a tool and can be used to create the kinds of meanings speakers want to create" (1988c, 271).

There are four strategies that Spanish/English bilinguals have recourse to in order to convey additional stylistic meaning and achieve personal communicative intentions: (1) emphasis or contrast, (2) mode or topic shift, (3) controlling the addressee, and (4) personalization or objectivization.

In the most general sense, bilinguals use codeswitching as a way to emphasize a particular message by creating situations that force the addressee to interpret their language switch. Fina reveals this idea to explain why codeswitching can be analyzed as a conversational strategy: "The first and more general answer is that the shift from one language to another can be viewed as a kind of signal issued by the speaker to the hearer to search for additional meaning" (1989,120). Fina explains that bilingual speakers achieve emphasis by creating contrast within sentences, between sentences or in longer stretches of discourse by "performing linguistic operations that in monolingual discourse require different devices" (1).

Bilingual speakers emphasize or contrast a given message by shifting codes to change the tone of the conversation. This may be accomplished by inserting lexically switched items, which, as Silva-Corvalan states, "offer a more colorful, more emotive, or more concise way of conveying a message" (1983,75). For example, a bilingual speaker may switch to English to emphasize the quality of something, e.g., "Esa pelicula fue awesome." Of course, an emphatic switch can go in either direction: "That movie was guay." This reinforces the issue of cultural untranslatability: whereas some lexical shifts are triggered unconsciously to enable bilingual speakers to reconcile between two cultures and two languages, others are employed as stylistic devices to create contrast.

According to Urciuoli, Spanish/English bilinguals create contrast in their codeswitched utterance by emphasizing "the Englishness or Spanishness of a form" (1985,371). The switch to English or Spanish may not alter the content of the message, but it may emphasize the message by changing the tone of the conversation. Lipski indicates that these emphatic shifts in conversational tones can be as subtle as a switched tag expression, such as "?verdad?, este, I mean, right? or an attention-getting device such as oye or mira" (1985,14). On the other hand, Huerta-Macias describes other less subtle cases in which Spanish/English bilinguals achieve emphasis by codeswitching to mark an interjection. The following codeswitched speech, which illustrates how a bilingual speaker might achieve emphasis by codeswitching to mark an interjection, is recreated from an actual Spanish/English bilingual conversation recorded by Huerta-Macias (1981,160) and expanded here to recreate a conceivable discourse context:

Mother: ¿Por qué siempre vas a la casa de tu amigo para estudiar?

Son: Porque me concentro mas ahi.

Mother: ¿Y pot que no puedes concentrarte aqui en casa?

Son: No se, mama. Porque no.

Mother: Ven, hijo, por que no intentas estudiar aqui esta noche?

Son: I can't! I just can't concentrate here!

It is apparent that the son became frustrated with his mother's repetitive pleading before finally switching to English to show her how serious he was about not wanting to study at home.

Another way to emphasize messages is by repeating particular items in both languages. Lipski provides two examples from his collected speech data to illustrate how Spanish/English bilinguals do just that: "Yo soy segundo... I'm second; stay here, Roll ... te quedas aqui, Roll" (1985,13). Gumperz's data reveal that this emphatic repetition is not always realized as a literal repetition of items in both languages, as in Lipski's example. He demonstrates that repetitions can take a somewhat modified form by putting the same message in a different way in the other language. He provides the following examples from his collected performance data to support this assertion (1976,22):

1. The three old ones spoke nothing but Spanish... nothing but Spanish. No hablaban ingles.

2. I got to thinking, well this and that reason... vacilando el punto...?sabes?

Various researchers have demonstrated that bilingual codeswitching can be used as a strategy to indicate a shift in discourse modes, e.g., from narration to comment or from assertion to question. Bilingual speakers frequently employ these mode shifts as asides to highlight a momentary break in the main focus of the conversation. Fina provides examples to demonstrate how Spanish/English bilinguals use mode shifts strategically to add personal commentary to the conversation (1989,136):

1. A shift from narration to commentary at the end of a joke: ... and the Mexican says, Ah lucky that I opened the door; if I hadn't opened the door we wouldn't have hit him. [Everybody laughs.] Esta muy bueno ese chiste.

2. A shift from narration to commentary in the description of a movie: Era muy sangrienta... muchas matanzas, cabezas cortadas, manos rotas... it was awful!

The following are created conceivable codeswitches that illustrate mode shifts from an assertion to a question:

1. A shift from assertion to question in a weather discussion: I think this is the coldest winter we've ever had. My car wouldn't even start this morning with a jump. ?Crees que manana hara tanto frio?

2. A shift from assertion to question in a discussion about Spain: Espana es un pais extraordinario. La gente es majisima y la geografia preciosa. Do you think you'll ever get there some day?

In addition to codeswitching to indicate a shift in discourse modes, bilingual speakers alternate between languages to change the topic of the conversation. A given topic shift may represent a simple way for bilingual speakers to signal that they have finished talking about topic A and are now ready to discuss topic B. For example, a bilingual speaker may be informally discussing the weather in Spanish with a client and then codeswitch to English in order to signal a desire to discuss the terms of a contract. On the other hand, a topic shift may also represent a bilingual speaker's attempt to evade a particular topic. The following is an imaginary, yet feasible, bilingual conversation, which illustrates how a Spanish/English bilingual might codeswitch to strategically evade a compromising topic:

Situation: A mother and father find out that their daughter is failing her algebra class.

Mother: Can you please tell me why you waited until now to tell us.

Daughter: I guess I was afraid you'd be angry.

Father: What do you intend to do to improve your grade?

Mother: I'll tell you one thing I intend to do. I plan to ground her to her room every night after school for the next month.

Daughter: ?Os dije que he sacado un sobresaliente en mi ultimo examen de frances?

It is obvious that the daughter switched topics by codeswitching to evade the issue of being grounded to her room for the next month. The strategy of changing topics is often utilized by monolingual speakers as well; however, bilingual speakers have an advantage by being able to magnify a shift in topic by employing a simultaneous shift in language.

Bilingual speakers may utilize their bilingualism as a tool to control addressees by codeswitching to exclude them from the conversation. Of course, this codeswitching strategy may only be used when a communicative exchange involves more than two participants, including at least one monolingual addressee.

In addition, bilingual speakers often use codeswitching as a controlling device to make direct and indirect requests. Most of these switches attempt to persuade the addressee by making suggestions; however, others seek to control the interlocutor by means of commands. Researchers agree that in the case of Spanish/English bilingual codeswitches sometimes the direction of the language switch conveys subtle meanings, whereas other times it neither adds nor detracts from the speaker's communicative intentions when making requests. Lipski's findings reveal a context in which the direction of the language shift may provide the Spanish/English bilingual with more persuasive power: "In the United States Hispanic communities it is usually a shift from English to Spanish which conveys the subtle insinuation of favors, since Spanish is felt to be 'closer to the heart'" (1985,13).

Valdes-Fallis explains that "the bilingual speaker merely uses such shifts as additional devices to make requests at those points at which monolingual speakers might exploit international contours or other syntactic patterns" (1981,105). She provides an example to demonstrate how bilingual speakers can strategically express an indirect request by switching to their other language (104);

Situation: A young Chicana is experiencing mechanical difficulties with her car. She is explaining her problem to a Chicano mechanic.

Mechanic: Is it stalling on you again?

Woman: Yeah... especially this morning.

Mechanic: Maybe you're not letting it warm up enough.

Woman: No, lo que necesita es que alguien que sepa de carros me lo inspeccione.

Mechanic: Bueno, pues si quieres que le meta mango, I'll be glad to.

Valdes-Fallis suggests that in this particular example, the woman codeswitched to Spanish to make an indirect request, while playing the "traditional feminine role of helplessness" in the face of mechanical difficulties, thus influencing the outcome of the conversation: "The same remark in English might have further emphasized her English-related qualities of independence and competence" (105).

Whereas indirect requests can be described by their subtlety, direct requests can be described by their sharpness. Valdes-Fallis provides an interesting example from her collected speech data that shows how a mother's indirect request in English went unnoticed, thereby prompting her to switch to Spanish to make a direct request by means of a command (1981,101):

Situation: The mother is trying to get her son to explain what happened in the fight that he had had earlier that day with his best friend.

Mother: And then what?

Son: Well, we didn't really say nothing... Poncho got on his bike and went off. [The son is chewing gum noisily.]

Mother: Listen, your gum is driving me up a tree.

Son: He... took off... and... [He is still chewing the gum noisily.]

Mother: Tira el chicle y luego me dices.

This example demonstrates how the mother makes a direct request by utilizing a complete language switch as a verbal strategy to underscore that she means business. Valdes-Fallis explains that "while previously she had acted as a trusted confidante, she now steps back into her role as a parent" (101).

It has been demonstrated that the direction of the language shift in Spanish/English codeswitching may or may not influence the outcome of the conversation. Notwithstanding, because most of the Spanish/English bilingual subjects under investigation live in Hispanic communities, they tend to use Spanish as their intimate and personal code in order to convey a sense of intimacy and community solidarity; the English code is often reserved for more objective and impersonal communicative exchanges associated with the external community. (The above example between the woman and the mechanic might reflect this situation, rather than the explanation posed by Valdes-Fallis.)

Gumperz refers to this bilingual codeswitching strategy described as a personalization or objectivization of messages as the "we/they code opposition" (1976,39). The "we code" refers to the language associated with the bilingual's ethnic background; the "they code" refers to the language associated with the external community, i.e., for the Hispanic community members, Spanish represent the "we code" and English represents the "they code." According to Zentella, Spanish/English bilinguals who wish to maintain this separation between internal and external speech communities must learn to use the we/they codes in appropriate ways at an early age:

Children who grow up wanting to be a part of their community can be expected to learn to codeswitch well if codeswitching is an identity marker of membership. The child who does not learn how to codeswitch well may be jeopardizing his/her social development. (1981,130)

Spanish/English bilinguals skillfully and strategically alternate between languages to influence the outcome of their conversations. By consciously switching from one language to the other, the bilingual sends a signal to the addressee to search for additional meaning beyond the content of the message. Consequently, the bilingual speaker's internal extralinguistic motivation for switching is released externally as extralinguistic information. Timm vividly describes this conscious decision to go back and forth between two languages for stylistic purposes: "Bilinguals may converse in either language or switch back and forth between the two, spinning a variegated tapestry of bilingual talk as topics and moods shift, and as speakers' stylistic embellishments add further to the interweaving of the two languages" (1975,476).

Spanish/English bilingual codeswitches can be triggered either consciously or unconsciously by internal psychological factors. Moreover, previous simplistic claims that suggested that bilingual speakers switch languages only when a word doesn't come to mind in the first language have been disproved by current psycholinguistic research. Lipski states that "actual observations of codeswitched discourse in natural settings belie the simplicity of this claim, and indicate rather a complex array of internal psychological factors" (1985,12). Despite the complexity of internal psycholingusitic factors, Spanish/English bilingual codeswitching can be described in systematic ways, provided that recurring patterns are reported instead of oversimplistic absolutes. Agar reinforces this need to report on recurring patterns by asserting that seemingly "either/or" questions are frequently answered by "both/and" responses in order to account for the unique ways that bilinguals organize and convey meanings (1991,171).

According to Aguirre, "Codeswitching is not an indication that the speaker is linguistically incongruent with his social surrounding. Rather, codeswitching is an active process of negotiation that insures a high degree of linguistic and social congruency within a give social context" (1988,84). Fantini reinforces this assertion that bilingual codeswitching behavior is extremely sensitive to contextual features; he describes bilinguals as "linguists and ethnographers who learn to attend to social cues" while simultaneously demonstrating linguistic competence in two languages (1982,87).

Members of Spanish/English bilingual speech communities share rules that prescribe not only when and where each language may be used, but also, as states by Zentella, how "the particular mix of 'on the spot' factors and their changing configurations contribute to the choices bilingual speakers make as they decide to use Spanish or English, or to switch from one to the other" (1990a, 81). Spanish/English bilingual speakers' alternation between languages is determined by three "on the spot" contextual factors of speech acts: (1) the participants involved in the speech act, (2) the setting where the speech act takes place, and (3) the topic of the conversation.

In addition to the bilingual codeswitches triggered by internal psychological factor to satisfy the bilingual speaker's personal communicative intentions, Spanish/English bilinguals also base their code selection on external social factors in order to adhere to prescribed bilingual community speech norms.

Participants

Among the three on-the-spot external social factors affecting whether or not bilinguals perform codeswitches, participant characteristics involved in the speech event have a greater effect on code choice than the setting or topic characteristics. Regardless of the setting where the speech act takes place, sociolinguists have found that if a Spanish or English monolingual enters the conversation the language will be switched accordingly. With regard to the topic of conversation, Silva-Corvalan explains that "even if the topic were to trigger switching, the speaker would consciously suppress a codeswitch in a situation where it would create a communication breakdown" (1983,73).

Scotton suggests that the priority given to the addressees of a particular speech act is a natural response given that a codeswitch "occurs and is meaningful only in reference to the other participants in the interaction" (1977,6). Sociolinguistic research indicates that bilingual speakers do not ordinarily engage in codeswitching unless they are familiar with the listener's linguistic background and attitudes in order to avoid inappropriate speech behavior. Codeswitching literature reveals that bilinguals attend to a variety of external social cues in order to make language choices that are appropriate to the participants involved in the speech episode.

When addressing a stranger, the physical features of the participant are the most observable cues available to the bilingual speaker as an indication of linguistic background. Bilingual speakers assess the listener's ethnicity, gender, and age in order to match the linguistic code to the addressee's social identity. Sociolinguistic speech data indicate that Spanish was the linguistic code selected when the addressees were of Hispanic descent, whereas English was the code selected when the listeners were of Anglo descent. McClure provides an example that demonstrates how bilingual speakers are surprised when this selection guide deceives them. She explains that a green-eyed redhead visited the family of one of her students, and her student's four-year-old brother was shocked to find that she spoke Spanish: "?Como es que habla como nosotros?" (1981,78).

Zentella's data reveal that in addition to this ethnic component of the bilingual speaker's code selection, two other physical characteristics figure in their ethnographic assessment: gender and age. She found that Spanish/English bilinguals frequently choose Spanish for women and English for men when the speech situation is ambiguous in regard to appropriate language choice. She also found that Spanish was more frequently used with younger children, whereas English was most often selected for young adult and adult participants (1990a, 81).

In general, Zentella found that "bilingual subjects speak the best language of the addressee" (1990a, 80). However, the speech situation does not always provide bilingual speakers with enough social cues to assess the addressee's language proficiency, and they need to make what Jacobson describes as "exploratory choices by beginning interactions with a series of probes aiming to establish shared presuppositions" (1990a, 6).

Once the fluent bilingual--as linguist and ethnographer--has determined the language proficiency of the other participants by means of exploratory choices, sociolinguistic data reveal consistent patterns associated with language selection. The presence of a monolingual is the most predictable case because the speech event is automatically defined as a monolingual setting, thereby prohibiting the selection of the bilingual's other language. On the other hand, if the other participants can also be described as fluent Spanish/English bilinguals, sociolinguists predict that all bilingual speakers will most likely alternate between languages. In the case that one of the bilinguals was not as fluent as the other participants, researchers' data have shown that the nonfluent bilingual's native language would be selected as the appropriate linguistic code for that particular speech act.

When all participants in the speech act can be described as fluent bilinguals, the speaker's language preference for one of the two languages or for a blend of the two codes influences the interlocutor's response. Valdes-Fallis found that when the message is sent in either Spanish or English, but not both, bilingual interlocutors use the last language used by the speaker in order to follow suit with a sequential response. On the other hand, when the message is sent as a blend of the Spanish and English code systems, the bilingual interlocutor responds symmetrically with a codeswitched response resembling that of the original speaker (1976,70). Genishi assigns the word inertia to describe this tendency for Spanish/English bilinguals to speak the language or languages in which they were just addressed (1981,145).

Valdes-Fallis indicates that sequential and symmetrical responses are not obligatory in that not all speakers feel obligated to use the last language used in the verbal exchange. She explains that the speaker's role or status relative to the addressee is frequently the determining factor. When engaged in an interaction with a participant whom they perceive to be of higher status, Spanish/English bilingual speakers tend to respond in ways that are congruent with the speaker's originally coded message. In contrast, when bilingual speakers perceive themselves to be of a higher status they may or may not respond with codeswitched utterances resembling the language used by the other participants involved in the speech act (1978a, 66).

Valdes-Fallis assigns the term associative response to describe the codeswitched responses produced by bilinguals who tended to associate their own switching patterns to those used by the other participant. She explains that associate responses are particularly common in situations that involve total strangers or the interaction of a superior with an inferior, e.g., teacher/student or boss/employee. In a speech situation involving total strangers, the participants are unaware of their role relative to the other participant. Consequently, associative responses allow bilingual speakers to please the other speaker and, in general, communicate in a polite manner. Along these same lines, participants perceived as having an inferior status relative to other interlocutors employ associative responses in order to show respect to authority and, in general, to act in socially pleasant and appropriate ways.

Valdes-Fallis investigated a specific instance of role perception and its relevance to the production of associative responses by examining conversations between Mexican American females and male interlocutors. She found that there is a difference between speech alternatives chosen when Mexican American females converse with males, as opposed to their female counterparts. The speech data indicate that these women tend to produce more associative responses when speaking to males than when speaking to other females. Valdes-Fallis attributes this difference to Mexican American women's perceived role relative to their male interlocutors: "Mexican American women reflect their traditional social conditioning and thus view themselves as having lesser status than males in general (1978a, 72).

Fantini found that the role relationship between bilingual speaker interlocutors had an effect on codeswitched utterances even at an early age. He examined the verbal exchanges between his nine-year-old Mexican American son, Mario, and girls who came to their home to babysit. In spite of Mario's knowledge that these babysitters were English monolinguals, he insisted on speaking in Spanish with them on numerous occasions. Fantini states that "this tendency probably resulted from his previous linguistic relationship with all persons in a caretaker role" (1982,90). He explains that during a five-year period, Mario had nursemaids from Latin America with whom he used only Spanish. Fantini asserts that "it is only natural that Mario felt inclined to use Spanish with his babysitters as well, given their particular role and relationship to him" (90).

McClure's bilingual subjects' speech data confirm the finding that interactions between children that involve caretaker-child relationships are almost always in Spanish. She observed that if younger Spanish/English bilingual children were hurt, they were comforted by an older child in Spanish even if an immediately preceding interaction between the children might have taken place in English. In accordance with Valdes-Fallis's findings in regard to associative responses, McClure reported that bilingual children who perceive their addressee to be of a higher status relative to their own social identity codeswitch in ways that reflect the language choice of their superior: "Children at play have been observed to switch from Spanish to English when switching from a peer relationship to a teacher-pupil relationship" (1981,76).

These findings indicating that Spanish/English bilingual children automatically switch to the English code when addressing a teacher demonstrate how the setting where the speech act takes place influences Spanish/English bilingual codeswitching behavior. However, before specific instances of bilingual speech acts within particular bilingual settings can be addressed, it is necessary to consider the broader Spanish/English bilingual community established in the United States.

Redlinger states that "a bilingual comes into being because he is subject to linguistic pressure from speakers of two languages rather than one" (1976,42). He explains that in the case of Mexican Americans, this linguistic pressure to speak English originated primarily through economic necessity: "If Mexican Americans were to participate in the Anglo-dominated economic structure of the community, they had to be able to communicate effectively in English" (43).

Gal agrees with Redlinger's assertion that bilingual minorities are subject to the linguistic pressures of the broader Anglo-dominated society in the United States. She states that "a standard dialect gains its legitimacy from state sponsored institutions such as education, which inculcate the dialect's authority, imposing it on all speakers, regardless of their linguistic preferences" (188,249). Gal contends that Spanish/English bilingual minorities in the United States resist such "symbolic domination" by maintaining their own linguistic code.

Genishi confirms this tension between the dominant and the oppositional code by stating that an ethnic minority's maintenance of its own linguistic variety "serves as an identity-marker to maintain a separation between the ingroup and the outgroup" (1981,134). Scotton explains that this ingroup notion of solidarity is evident in both "recent and long-standing immigrants, who maintain tangible or strong psychological ties with their original community; after all, immigrants are persons with one foot in each of two camps" (1993,482).

Having set the Spanish/English bilingual situation within the broader United States society, more specific instances of Spanish/English codeswitching behavior can now be analyzed within particular social domains. Sociolinguists have unanimously agreed that bilingual speakers' language choices are a direct reflection of the degree of formality associated with a given social domain. Consequently, informal bilingual settings will be contrasted with formal bilingual settings to demonstrate how the we/they code dichotomy of the broader linguistic community is maintained.

Gumperz states that "the tendency is for the ethnically specific, minority language to be regarded as the 'we code' and become associated with in-group and informal activities, while the majority language serves as the 'they code' associated with the more formal, stiffer and less personal out-group relations" (1976,8). His data reveal that English tends to be the language used in the formal business or work world, whereas Spanish is primarily spoken among family and friends in informal contexts outside the workplace. Lattey confirms this assertion that codeswitching occurs more frequently in informal speech situations than in formal ones: "The constraints of a formal communication situation... rule out combinations that have a casualizing effect; constraints of the monolingual setting rule out cross-language switching" (1979,52).

Zentella, who examined specific instances of informal and formal bilingual speech settings, provides an explanation of why informal contexts permit bilingual codeswitches, whereas formal ones do not allow for such alternation between languages:

The "we" language, the mother language spoken at home, is endowed with many positive affective variables such as intimacy and solidarity, but it is considered low in prestige. The "they" language, in contrast, enjoys high status because it is linked with the outside world of power and money. (1990b, 81)

Zentella's collected performance data reveal that the street and the home are the two bilingual settings where Spanish/English bilinguals most frequently engage in codeswitching behavior: switches occurred at a rate of 19.5 per hour on the street and 12 per hour at home; she found few codeswitches in more formal discourse, such as making store purchases (1990a, 81). Her data also demonstrate that the formality of particular conversations was reflected in bilingual speakers' codeswitching practices, provided that the overall speech situation permitted such shifting between formal and informal speech styles. For example, bilingual speakers are more likely to codeswitch when narrating (27 codeswitches per hour) and telling jokes (14 per hour), as opposed to making purchases (1 per hour) or answering interview questions (2 per hour) (83).

McClure confirms this finding, indicating that the formality of the discourse type and the actual setting where the speech act takes place conform to one another. She reports that formal adult-directed interviews inhibit codeswitching behavior, whereas everyday informal conversations allow Spanish/English bilinguals to alternate freely between their two languages (1981,79). Along these same lines, Genishi reports that teacher-structured tasks associated with the formal classroom setting inhibit bilingual codeswitching behavior, while freeplay activities associated with the informal playground setting encourage the free alternation between Spanish and English (1981,134).

The topic of conversation is the third "on-the-spot" contextual factor that may influence Spanish/English bilingual codeswitching behavior. However, the majority of sociolinguists agree that the topic of a given verbal exchange does not have as great an influence on language selection as the characteristics of the participants involved and the setting of a given speech exchange. Sociolinguists maintain that the bilingual speaker would suppress a codeswitch triggered by a topic shift if it were to represent inappropriate speech behavior relative to the participants involved and the setting where the speech act takes place.

Nevertheless, the discussion of certain topics is more likely to occur in one language than in the other, given that bilingual speakers tend to associate different verbal symbols and experiences in culture-specific and language-specific ways. For example, Lavandera reports that her Spanish/English bilingual subjects "generally prefer to use Spanish to tell childhood stories or to talk about things which happened many years ago" (1981,52). McClure confirms this evidence that certain topics result in speaker preference for either Spanish or English: "Topics related to the family, child care, kinship, food preparation, and Mexican holidays are most often discussed in Spanish; whereas sports, school, television, and American holidays such as Halloween and Thanksgiving are more often discussed in English" (1981,79).

Timm accounts for these Spanish/English codeswitches triggered by the topic of the conversation by addressing socio-psycholinguistic dimensions of bilingual codeswitching:

A switch to Spanish is a device for indicating personal feelings or affection... and is likely when the topic of conversation turns to aspects of Mexican culture or life in the barrios. Conversely, a switch to English often signals a speaker's feeling of detachment or objectivity... or it may reflect a shift of topic to matters typically Anglo-American" (1975,475).

Huerta-Macias confirms Timm's contentions in regard to topics that appear to be associated with either the Spanish social domain or the English social domain: "It appears that the discussion of a topic which is not family related, or which deals with a subject outside the home, particularly when the topic related to work or school, resulted in a switch to English" (1981,159).

According to McClure, "As the bilinguals' experiences increase and education fosters specialized areas of knowledge, topic will probably become increasingly important as a determinant of language selection" (11981,80). Related to this idea of specialization is the finding that terminology reflecting specialized technology and consumer goods is frequently codeswitched by Spanish/English bilingual speakers. Sanchez explains that because the workplace and the marketplace are controlled by English speakers in the United States, buying and selling is also an English-dominated activity. In addition, he contends that the media is the chief reason that this specialized consumer terminology is codeswitched to English: "The power of consumption is so strong given all inducements put out by the media, that consumerism serves to disseminate the dominant ideology and language in Spanish dominant homes" (1978,195).

The media's habitual presentation of these English-coded consumer goods tends to trigger Spanish/English bilinguals to habitually codeswitch to English in reference to these items. Moreover, Sanchez explains that as it becomes easier to buy consumer goods rather than make them, consumers become dependent on ready-made goods. Consequently, formerly homemade items are replaced by ready-made U.S. items: tortillas are replaced by packaged bread and rolls; caldo is replaced by canned chicken noodle soup. Sanchez provides some examples from his collected speech samples of codeswitched utterances that reflect this new wave of consumer goods (195):

1. Todos sus vestidos son wash and wear.

2. Mama, no tenemos handwipes.

3. ?Quien quiere cheesecake?

4. Lo dejo en el day care.

5. ?Donde estan mis blue jeans?

6. Quiero un hamburger con fries y un milk shake.

Spanish/English bilinguals are keenly aware of three principal "on the spot" contextual factors during communicative exchanges: participants, settings, and topics. Although any one of these factors can override the others in any one speech situation, sociolinguists maintain that bilingual subjects are most sensitive to the characteristics of the participants in the speech exchange in order to avoid potential communication breakdowns. However, given the socially dynamic nature of bilingual speech situations involving language choices, it is nearly impossible to unequivocally assign one of these three contextual factors as the trigger of a particular codeswitched utterance. Instead, all three factors come into play at varying degrees, allowing a Spanish/English bilingual to achieve adequate verbal expression while concurrently adhering to speech norms prescribed by the broader bilingual community.

Spanish/English bilingual codeswitching is not an ad hoc mixture of two languages. Conventional linguists, psycholinguists, and sociolinguists have examined this behavior, and their findings unanimously recognize it as an indication of competence in two languages, thereby disproving earlier suspicions of language deficiency. In fact, linguists have found that it is precisely the ability to perform structurally and functionally appropriate language switches that distinguishes fluent from nonfluent bilinguals in many bilingual speech communities.

Zentella explains that bilinguals must learn not only rules for the linguistic code they are attempting to master, but also the speech norms associated with that language: "True fluency and ultimate bilinguality is achieved when the learner's control of phonological, grammatical, and discourse structures is accompanied by their culturally appropriate use in the fight setting, at the right time, in the right way" (1990a, 75). Research findings described above verify that Spanish/English bilinguals codeswitch in ways that are structurally congruous with both language systems, as well as functionally congruous with social contexts.

Spanish/English bilingual codeswitches reflect linguistic competence and social appropriateness, and indeed bilingual speakers strategically alternate between Spanish and English to influence the outcome of their conversations. Not only do bilinguals have recourse to monolingual verbal skills to realize their personal communicative intentions-such as the alteration of intonation contours or syntactic structures--but also they can exploit their ability to alternate between languages. Consequently, their personal intentions are magnified because they are able to emphasize and contrast their messages in more pronounced ways.

In addition to these conversational strategies employed within specific speech contexts. Spanish/English bilinguals living in the United States use codeswitching as a strategy to maintain their dual identity and negotiate the cultural differences associated with the "we code" and the "they code." Zentella asserts that by alternating between both languages, Spanish/English bilinguals are "allowed to make a graphic statement about the way they live with a foot in each of their 'dos worlds/two mundos'... in order to hold onto some of their Spanish in the face of ever-mounting pressures to become English monolinguals" (1990b, 81-82).

Poplack's research highlights this negotiation between two languages and two cultures, indicating that bilinguals seek a compromise between their two worlds by constantly going back and forth between them. She explains that Spanish/English codeswitching represents the speech norm in some bilingual communities: "Codeswitching between English and Spanish was such an integral part of the community's linguistic repertoire that it could be said to function as a mode of interaction similar to monolingual language use" (1988,217).

Linguists agree that bilingual communities that practice codeswitching to fully express their dual identity should by no means be judged as linguistically inadequate or inferior to monolingual communities. In regard to bilingual culture and codeswitching practices, Penalosa states that "cultural and linguistic relativists contend that there are no universal standards with which to judge the worth or adequacy of cultures or language varieties. In this sense, no language variety is more adequate than another,... provided that it allows for instrumental and expressive communication" (1981,6).

Despite this acceptance of codeswitching as an adequate form of communication, linguists have until recently avoided the investigation of bilingual codeswitching. Ornstein-Galicia explains that "linguists have previously avoided all but 'standard languages'... to focus on an ideal speaker-listener in a completely homogeneous community who knows his language perfectly" (1981,19). However, he is confident that linguistic science will never return to the days when language was analyzed in a vacuum, detached from the broader speech community.

Language structures cannot be analyzed in isolation without also giving consideration to both internal psychological factors and external social factors. An integrated model of Spanish/English codeswitching has been provided here by synthesizing the internal and external explanations for bilingual codeswitching, which are almost always treated separately in codeswitching literature. Grammatical or structural constraints should be studied in close connection with functional constraints in order to give adequate consideration to affective and situational aspects of bilingual codeswitching behavior.

Codeswitching is a structured activity, from both a grammatical and a functional perspective, and the alternation between Spanish and English does not occur in unconstrained ways. Furthermore, because Spanish/English codeswitching practices represent an interactive behavior, they require the same interactive treatment in order to be justly analyzed. One-dimensional models frequently fall victim to simplifications and absolutes, which cannot account for the dynamic nature of bilingual codeswitching. These narrower models must be replaced by synthetic models to explain the interaction of "out of the mouth" structural linguistic factors, "in the head" psycholinguistic factors, and "on the spot" social factors in order to describe Spanish/English codeswitching behavior in a systematic way.

The author wishes to acknowledge Professors Glenn Gilbert and Lee Hartman and Professor Emeritus Hensley C. Woodbridge, all of Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, for their valuable input and feedback.

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By Kristin R. Becker, VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY
Copyright of Bilingual Review is the property of Bilingual Review and text may not be copied without the express written permission of Bilingual Review except for the imprint of the video screen content or via the print options of the this software. Text is intended solely for the use of the individual user.

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Spanish/English Bilingual Codeswitching: A Syncretic Model

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Bilingual Review Jan-Apr97, Vol. 22 Issue 1, p3 Contents Introduction Structural Linguistic Factors: "Out of the Mouth" Internal Psycholinguistic Factors: "In the Head" An Information-Processing Model Momentary Inclination Frequency of Exposure Cultural Untranslatability Emphasis/Contrast Mode or Topic Shift Controlling the Addressee Personalization/Objectivization External Social Factors: "On the Spot" Physical Characteristics Language Proficiency Language Preference Speaker's Role Relative to Addressee Setting Informal vs.

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El artículo repasa los fundamentos de sintaxis y explica lo que significa “constituyentes” en relación a sintagmas. Uno de los puntos interesante del articulo es como la secuencia de palabras se puede cambiar pero la posición de cada palabra, sea sustantivo, preposición, etc., es muy importante para interpretar el significado de la frase.

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Después de la clase donde estudiamos los usos de se, yo queria sabre lo que significaba usar “le” en un oración de se del objeto indirecto o de se “sin culpa”. En este artículo, hay una explicación que dice que un objeto directo y indirecto se combinan en una oración para convertir le or les a “se”. Junto con esto, da más ejemplos en usar otros tipos de oraciones con se.

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Diferenciando las oraciones simples y compuestas por relaciones de coordinación y subordinación

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Diferenciando las oraciones simples y compuestas por relaciones de coordinación y subordinación

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El artículo nos informa acerca de lo que uno puede clasificar como un oración simple o compuesta. Según la información dado en clase, un oración simple es compuesto de solo un predicado mientras una oración compuesta es coordinada o subordinada. El artículo hace mas claro como distinguir los tipos de oraciones coordinadas y subordinadas por las oraciones conjuntas o por un SN (sujeto) emparejado con un SV (predicado).

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Formas de sujeto, verbo y objeto en varios idiomas

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Formas de sujeto, verbo y objeto en varios idiomas

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Después de estudiar las estructuras de SVO en oraciones, me interesó como otros lenguajes usan el sujeto, verbo, y objeto. Evaluando si una idioma utiliza SOV, SVO, o VSO nos puede informar la probabilidad de usar las preposiciones. En comparación a inglés, el español es muy flexible y puede exhibir VSO, OVS, etc.

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Este extracto informa el lector acerca de cómo se han cambiado los morfemas del latín a español. Una diferencia que se puede notar entre los dos idiomas es la ausencia del género neutro en varias palabras. Este detalle me hizo reconocer que el inglés ha perdido la necesidad de tener aspectos masculinos y femeninos atribuidos a las palabras.

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Viendo los plurales de español en una manera visual y lógica

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Viendo los plurales de español en una manera visual y lógica

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El video hace un buen trabajo en informar la audiencia como formar los plurales usando un formato visual y un poco formulativo. Usa terminología que fue repasado en el último capítulo como "palabras agudas" y "monosilábica". También incluye los excepciones a las reglas que proponga como palabras naturalmente plurales, o pluralia tantum, como "tijeras".

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Aprender español: los plurales (nivel básico)

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Categorización de idiomas basado en morfología

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Categorización de idiomas basado en morfología

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Este presentación demuestra que, dependiendo en los morfemas que una palabra usa, los afijos presentes y los componentes de las palabras, es posible clasificar una lengua en tres categorías: polisintética, fusional, o aglutinante. El español es fusional porque puede contener más de una morfema en una palabra y puede combinar morfemas para transmitir información gramatical. Encontré la complejidad de cada idioma discutido en la presentación muy interesante.

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La diferencia entre dialectos y lenguas del Perú

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La diferencia entre dialectos y lenguas del Perú

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Así cómo existe la variación lingüística en un nivel mundial, existe la variación lingüística en un país en donde podría existir lenguas nativas además del lenguaje principal del país. En Perú, existe idiomas andinas y amazónicas en adición al castellano que el artículo enfatiza como siendo idiomas y no cómo dialectos.

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El español de Sudamérica y las razones detras sus variaciones

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El español de Sudamérica y las razones detras sus variaciones

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El vocabulario en Chile, Argentina, Uruguay y Paraguay se pueden diferenciar en maneras de variaciones léxicas y geográficas. Un ejemplo de variación geográfica es el voseo donde sustituyan el “vos” por “tu” y también cambian los mandatos informales en relación con la conjugación de “vos”. En clase, encontramos que en México se dice “fresa” pero en Chile y Argentina se dice “frutilla”, un ejemplo de variación léxica o una diferencia en el vocabulario.

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Las características del español de Sudamérica: Argentina, Chile, Paraguay y Uruguay

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The University of Kansas Collaborative Digital Spanish Project (Acceso) is an open-access, digital learning environment designed to promote the acquisition of Spanish and the development of cultural understanding of the varied groups of people who share Spanish as a common language.

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¿Generalmente, cuál tipo de lengua es español?

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¿Generalmente, cuál tipo de lengua es español?

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a. Polisintético
b. Aglutinante
c. Fusional
d. Ninguna de estos

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Los tildes se ha cambiado a través de muchos años y es debido a las guerras que se han peleado por ellos. La razón por esto ocurriendo es debido al magnitud que los tildes tienen en cambiar el significado de la escritura y del hablar. Es interesante como la formación de la Real Academia Española ha desviado la atención de violencia para establecer un estándar del español formal usado en escritura y situaciones sensatos.

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Cuando yo estaba aprendiendo ortografía en el colegio, la profesora insistía en la diferencia entre "sólo" y "solo": el primero significa "solamente", el segundo "en soledad". Es decir, con tilde era un adverbio, y sin tilde un adjetivo. Así pues, "Fui solo" significaría "fui sin compañía" y "fui sólo", "solamente fui (no hice otra cosa)".

La mala noticia para los que lucharon a sangre y fuego por aprender la distinción entre "sólo" y "solo" es que la Real Academia Española recientemente quitó la obligatoriedad de esta tilde. La Academia recomienda poner la tilde solo en casos de verdadera ambigüedad entre el adverbio y el adjetivo. Pero los observantes de la ortografía, más papistas que el papa, se quejan de que la Academia haya quitado la tilde de "solo" y viven reclamándola de regreso, como si les hubieran quitado un tesoro muy preciado.

Los tiempos cambian, y así ha cambiado la función de la Real Academia. Desde su fundación en 1713 y la publicación del primer diccionario en 1726, su función era orientar el uso estándar de la lengua española. Entiéndase "estándar" como el uso de la lengua en lo escrito y en situaciones formales, de una manera unificada para todos los hablantes de una lengua.

Antes de 1713, por ejemplo, no existían las tildes. Los escribanos en las colonias no solo escribían sin tildes, sino que utilizaban la "z" y "s" o la "y" y la "ll" según su propio criterio. Además, el uso de las abreviaturas era tan extremo que podían encontrarse cosas como "pa q el scno Rl lo firmara" en lugar de "para que el escribano real lo firmara".

¿Por qué se tardó tanto en fundarse la Real Academia, si la conquista y colonización española empezó en 1492? Pues bien, hasta 1700 España estuvo dominada por la Casa de los Hasburgo, cuyo estilo administrativo no fue muy efectivo para mantener su hegemonía. Después llega la Casa de Borbón, una dinastía de origen francés. Los borbones sí quisieron hacer sentir su poder en todo el Imperio. Reorganizaron el territorio en virreinatos e hicieron reformas económicas para unificar los mercados, y así "globalizar" la economía hispánica.

La creación de la Real Academia responde a ese afán de globalización de los borbones. Al unificar el uso de la lengua, se consolida simbólicamente el absolutismo monárquico. Es muy significativo que los borbones, además, prohibieran el uso de lenguas indígenas, lo que demuestra la violencia de ese absolutismo lingüístico, de la mano con un proyecto político.

Hoy en día la Academia no es la misma. Para sobrevivir, se ha visto obligada adaptarse a los cambios sociales y lingüísticos, sin perder su función orientadora en el uso de la lengua estándar. Un paso adelante es la creación de las academias latinoamericanas, que empezó a gestarse en la década de 1960. Las academias latinoamericanas emiten sus conceptos sobre el uso formal del español en los diferentes países hispánicos. Por esta influencia, la Academia ya acepta el uso de "vos" y sus conjugaciones, como "mirá" o "tenés".

Otra función de la Academia a través de su diccionario es orientar la lectura de los clásicos. Por esta razón, la Academia no puede eliminar entradas como "ansina", "mesmo" o "murciégalo", que son parte del español tradicional, aunque hoy en día suenen mal. Estas entradas están en el diccionario desde el siglo XVIII.

La Academia, a través de su plataforma electrónica, no solo pone a disposición del usuario la totalidad del diccionario, sino que ofrece unos recursos muy valiosos para el conocimiento de la lengua. Mi recurso favorito es la función "conjugar". Si usted tiene la duda sobre si se dice "yo aprieto el botón" o "yo apreto el botón", busque la palabra "apretar" en www.rae.es.

Luego, verá un cuadrito al lado de la palabra que dice "conjugar". Haga click en ese cuadrito. El sistema le mostrará la conjugación completa de "apretar", con lo que puede constatar que la forma estándar es "yo aprieto".

El diccionario de la Academia no contiene formas conjugadas. Por esta razón, buscar "apreto" o "haiga" en el diccionario no le permitirán resolver dudas sobre la conjugación estándar. Si quiere saber si la Academia acepta "haiga" como conjugación alternativa, busque "haber" y haga click en "conjugar". No se deje llevar por la palabra "haiga" como "carro lujoso" que aparece en el diccionario como entrada principal.

Otros recursos que tiene la Academia son las bases de datos, muy útiles para los investigadores. La Academia ha recopilado y digitalizado textos escritos en castellano desde el siglo XIII hasta el presente, y todos ellos están disponibles por Internet. Los textos antiguos están en una base de datos llamada Corpus Diacrónico del Español (CORDE). Además, en la página de la Academia se pueden consultar todas las ediciones del diccionario desde el siglo XVIII. Los textos recientes se pueden encontrar en dos bases de datos: Corpus de Referencia del Español Actual (CREA) y Corpus del Español del Siglo XXI (CORPES XXI).

Los recursos en línea de la Academia son totalmente gratuitos. La Academia se ha negado a vender publicidad, así que no recibe ninguna ganancia material por su labor. Es decir, el gobierno español financia el trabajo de la Academia a pesar de la crisis económica. Todos los países hispánicos disfrutamos de esa labor.

La tilde de "sólo", entonces, tiene una carga ideológica muy fuerte para una simple tilde. Representa todo el pasado monárquico y espléndido que muchos de los colonizados todavía quieren de regreso, para sentir que hacen parte de la gloria de un Imperio que solo sobrevive en la lengua. La tilde de "sólo" nos permite olvidar que somos una serie de países fragmentados por fronteras artificiales. Cuando la misma Academia quita la tilde de "sólo", no hace más que recordarnos esta realidad.

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Esta es la oscura historia de las tildes en la escritura

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Cuando yo estaba aprendiendo ortografía en el colegio, la profesora insistía en la diferencia entre "sólo" y "solo": el primero significa "solamente", el segundo "en soledad". Es decir, con tilde era un adverbio, y sin tilde un adjetivo. Así pues, "Fui solo" significaría "fui sin compañía" y "fui sólo", "solamente fui (no hice otra cosa)".

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La yuxtaposición en aprendizaje entre los adultos y los niños

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La yuxtaposición en aprendizaje entre los adultos y los niños

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En ¿Por Qué? 101 Questios About Spanish, se hace aparente que los ninos son mas capaces de crecer fluente en un lenguaje que adultos, pero también no es imposible para un adulto para comenzar a aprender una nueva idioma. Además de ser optimista en el aprendizaje, cientificos han encontrado que la diferencia de aprendizaje entre los dos grupos es más pequeño de lo que pensamos.

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This week a new paper was published in the journal Cognition titled " A Critical Period for Second Language Acquisition " that used a new, viral Facebook-quiz-powered method of gathering a huge linguistic dataset to provide new insights into how human beings learn language and what effect age has on that process.

In a nutshell, this team found that if you start learning a language before the age of 18, you have a much better likelihood of obtaining a native-like mastery of the language's grammar than if you start later. This is a much older age than has been generally assumed and is really interesting for reasons I'll get into a bit later.

This data has also given us a really amazing insight into language learning in general and shows that adults of any age can obtain incredible mastery nearly as quickly as children.

Unfortunately, a number of journalists have misinterpreted this paper badly, resulting in a lot of articles falsely stating things as embarrassing and misleading as " Becoming fluent in another language as an adult might be impossible ", when in fact the opposite is shown. If you see an article saying that you need to start learning a language before you're 10 to become fluent, be assured that it's simply lazy reporting. The truth is much more interesting and encouraging.

We know this, because in an incredible move, the researchers have released the entire dataset they based this paper off of, letting us take a look. Let's go through some interesting things that this amazing data shows us about learning languages and why it should motivate you to try.

Many late learners become native-like

Looking through the data, it's quite clear that there is a statistical advantage to starting your learning earlier. If you compare the average score of learners who started at different ages, there is a clear advantage to having started earlier.

However, looking more closely at the data for the students who started learning after the age of 20, there are a lot of late learners who outperformed many native English speakers.

First, we need to specify what "native-like" performance on this quiz is. Looking at the quiz results of the group of users who are tagged as native English speakers, we have a range of scores from 100% (which 12% of native speakers scored) down to scoring 90% for the bottom 5% of native speakers. To me, this indicates that scoring anything above a 90% on the test means you're performing at least as well as many native speakers would.

Many articles have breathlessly stated that it's just impossible to achieve native-like mastery if you start after the age of 10 (or 18, depending on the article), but is that true? Certainly on average the later learner seems to have a rarer time getting there, but is it impossible?

The data tells us that it's not. On average less likely, certainly, but there are thousands of people who took this quiz, got a score in the range that a native speaker would, and started learning the language after the age of 20.

Thousands of adults who started learning after 20 years old scored in a native-level range

Instead of looking at the median of this late-learning group, let's just look at the top quartile of the speakers who started learning after the age of 20. We can graph that adjusted by how many years since they started studying the language.

Here we can see that many of the later learners score easily within the range that native speakers do (above the 0.9 line). In fact, if we graph the results of the top quartile of after-20 learners with the median scores of the other groups (those who started learning before 5, before 10 and before 20 years old), it doesn't look much different.

Given the same amount of time, the top quarter of learners from the over-20 group do just as well as the average of those who started before 10.

(After about 20 years of learning exposure, the over-20 group line gets pretty wobbly, since we have less and less data to work with - starting at 20 and having 20 years of exposure makes the youngest group there at least 40 years old).

Comparing apples to apples

But why would we do this? Shouldn't we compare the medians of all of the groups, like the very first graph? Shouldn't we compare apples to apples - it's not really fair to compare the median of one group with the best of another, right?

Well, the problem is that there is no way to compare apples to apples with this dataset, and the authors point this out.

This is because the "drop" in learning advantage happens at 17 or 18 years old according to this paper, but why is that? What happens at 18 years old? Is it that there is some incredible and magical brain-change that happens? Or is it that people's lives fundamentally change on average - you go to college, you enter the workforce, you move out of your parents house, etc?

"For instance, it remains possible that the critical period is an epiphenomenon of culture: the age we identified (17-18 years old) coincides with a number of social changes, any of which could diminish one's ability, opportunity, or willingness to learn a new language. In many cultures, this age marks the transition to the workforce or to professional education, which may diminish opportunities to learn." - from A Critical Period

If you start "studying" a language at the age of 5, you're not sitting down with a book and explicitly learning the language for an hour a day. You're almost certainly in a classroom environment where that language is spoken, possibly for several hours per day. If you start learning a language after you're 20 years old, you almost certainly cannot be in a classroom for several hours per day.

This brings up a big problem with the interpretation of this data. It gives us a lot of information, but it doesn't give us the most important thing, which is the total amount of exposure that these students have had. I would argue that on average, your exposure per day to a language if you start after the age of 20 is going to be way lower than if you start when you're 5.

If you're in an English speaking school for 5 hours a day as a kid and your parent is studying the same language for an hour a day while you're there and the kid learns 5 times faster than the parent, is it fair to then conclude that kids learn better than adults?

It's highly possible that this learning difference by age is not due to some magic change in brain plasticity, but simply that adults don't have as much time to be exposed as children and often hit a point where it stops being helpful to improve after a while. They become totally fluent at this slower pace and reaching native-level mastery provides little additional advantage. Maybe it's not that it's harder for older learners or that they're not capable, maybe it's just that they don't have the same opportunity.

Comparing the top quartile of the post-20 group is a simple guess to isolate a cohort of language learners who may have had more opportunity for exposure. I would guess that the post-20 learners would have much less uniform types of opportunities than children, whose experiences are probably much more similar in nature. It's certainly not perfect, but it does indicate that there is a cohort in the post-20 crowd that does very well.

This quiz is incredibly hard

There are a couple of other interesting things to note here. The first is how hard this quiz is. Even for the learners who started studying the language as a young child, it takes at least 7-8 years of exposure before any of the groups are consistently scoring above a 90% on this test.

This test is not about fluency, it's about highly pedantic grammatical accuracy. If you got through this entire test at all, you're probably pretty close to basic fluency.

If you're thinking that this paper provides some reason why you're not fluently speaking French after your 3 months of using some language-game app, you are wrong. Children won't learn a language masterfully that way either.

"Studies that compare children and adults exposed to comparable material in the lab or during the initial months of an immersion program show that adults perform better, not worse, than children (Huang, 2015; Krashen, Long, & Scarcella, 1979; Snow & Hoefnagel-Höhle, 1978), perhaps because they deploy conscious strategies and transfer what they know about their first language." - from A Critical Period

Adults are actually better in many ways at learning a language up to a point of general fluency, but getting to where you can answer the most subtle of grammatical points with the accuracy of a native speaker takes a decade no matter how old you are when you start.

That so many adults who started learning a language after 20 years old (or even later) did so well on this test should be encouraging. If you want to put in the effort, it's entirely possible to perform at a native level on an incredibly difficult test like this -  thousands of people did just that.

It doesn't matter what language you come from

This paper also gives us some really interesting insights from a broad range of backgrounds. They had nearly 3/4 million people take the quiz and got demographic data from everyone.

The first thing to notice is how little data they actually were able to get from people who started after the age of 20. It's a tiny fraction of their dataset.

The other thing is how many different languages learners came from.

It's common to say "this language is hard to learn" or "that language is so easy", but this data showed that these things may not be true. They found that there was little difference in the learning speeds or ultimate attainment of English coming from any linguistic background.

"In fact, the differences across language groups were small (see Fig. S14) and generally not reliable." - from A Critical Period

Studying a language for a year can make you quite fluent

Finally, the thing I would like everyone to take away from this is how good adults can be at language learning. It may be harder for us to get to where we could pass for a native, but that's probably pretty obvious and not why most of us start learning a language, right? You're not trying to be a spy.

Take a look at my previous graph of the various language groups. You can see that even after a year of studying, the 20+ year old start group is commonly scoring 80-85% on this incredibly difficult grammar test.

Sure, it takes another 10 years to get to where you might pass for a native on this test, but look at what you can do in a single year!

Don't use poorly reported studies like this convince you not to try learning a language. The truth is that you're almost certainly very good at it. People consistently learn new languages in a year or two from no knowledge to very capable, fluent levels and in my personal experience, much faster than children given the same amount of time.

That last mile, getting from fluent to native-like, is statistically more difficult, as this paper shows, but like any good 80/20 rule, the first 80% of the results takes 20% of the time.

"What is remarkable about language is that we are (nearly) all extremely good at it, including adult learners." - from A Critical Period

You can become fluent in a language in a few years of work, I see it all the time. This paper further proves that even starting much later in life, it's still possible (if not as common) to reach incredibly high levels of mastery.

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MIT Scientists prove adults learn language to fluency nearly as well as children

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This week a new paper was published in the journal Cognition titled " A Critical Period for Second Language Acquisition " that used a new, viral Facebook-quiz-powered method of gathering a huge linguistic dataset to provide new insights into how human beings learn language and what effect age has on that process.

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Conexión de la afasia de Wernicke con la afasia de Broca

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Conexión de la afasia de Wernicke con la afasia de Broca

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El profesor Roberto Tamayo describe el proceso que el cerebro se realiza para percibir la palabra escuchada. El video está más especifíco en la union de las áreas de Broca y Wernicke, que es por una fibra conocido como el "fascículo longitudinal medial" en la que conecta la percepción sensoral con los procesos motores.

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Temas: Neuroanatomía del lenguaje, Afasia de Broca, Afasia de Wernicke. FMH-USMP. Lima, Perú 2015

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Maduración y trastornos del habla y lengua

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Maduración y trastornos del habla y lengua

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Este sitio describe las etapas y trastornos del desarollo del habla y el lenguaje. Según el texto, el habla es un expresión de la lengua y el lenguaje es una manera de expresar ideas lógicamente. El sitio es relevante con la lectura en temas de el progresión natural en el lenguaje y la comunicación entre adultos y bebés.

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¿Cómo se desarrollan el habla y el lenguaje?

Los primeros 3 años de vida, cuando el cerebro está en proceso de desarrollo y maduración, es el período más intensivo en la adquisición de las habilidades del habla y el lenguaje. Estas habilidades se desarrollan mejor cuando el niño está expuesto consistentemente a un mundo lleno de imágenes, sonidos y al habla y el lenguaje de los demás.

Existen períodos clave en el desarrollo del habla y el lenguaje de los bebés y los niños pequeños. En estos períodos clave el cerebro está más capacitado para absorber el lenguaje. Si se dejan pasar estos períodos y no se expone al niño al lenguaje, será más difícil que el niño lo aprenda.

¿Cuáles son las etapas del desarrollo del habla y el lenguaje?

El bebé muestra las primeras señales de comunicación cuando aprende que con el llanto logra obtener alimento, consuelo y compañía. Los recién nacidos, además, comienzan a reconocer los sonidos importantes a su alrededor, por ejemplo, la voz de la madre o de quien lo cuida. A medida que crecen, los bebés comienzan a distinguir los sonidos del habla que componen las palabras de su lenguaje. A los 6 meses de edad, la mayoría de los bebés reconocen los sonidos básicos de su lengua materna.

No todos los niños desarrollan las habilidades del habla y el lenguaje de la misma manera. Sin embargo, todos los niños siguen una progresión natural o una serie de etapas para dominar las habilidades del lenguaje. Más adelante encontrará una lista de las etapas del desarrollo normal de las habilidades del habla y el lenguaje en los niños, desde recién nacidos hasta los 5 años de edad. Estas etapas ayudan a los médicos y a otros profesionales de la salud a determinar si el niño está siguiendo el desarrollo normal o si necesita ayuda. A veces, los niños demoran en alcanzar estas etapas debido a que tienen pérdida de la audición, y en otros casos debido a algún trastorno del habla o del lenguaje.

¿Cuál es la diferencia entre trastornos del habla y trastornos del lenguaje?

Los trastornos del lenguaje incluyen problemas para entender lo que otros dicen (lenguaje receptivo) o dificultad para compartir ideas (lenguaje expresivo). El trastorno específico del lenguaje, TEL (Specific Language Impairment, SLI) es una limitación que demora el dominio de las habilidades del lenguaje. Algunos niños con un trastorno específico del lenguaje podrían tardarse para comenzar a hablar hasta los tres o cuatro años de edad.

Los niños que tienen dificultad para producir correctamente los sonidos del habla, o que dudan o tartamudean al hablar, podrían tener un trastorno del habla. La apraxia del habla es un trastorno que dificulta la unión de sonidos y sílabas en el orden correcto para formar palabras.

¿Qué debo hacer si sospecho un retraso en el habla o el lenguaje de mi hijo?

Si está preocupado, hable con el pediatra de su hijo. Éste tal vez le recomiende que vea al fonoaudiólogo o patólogo del habla-lenguaje, que es un profesional de la salud capacitado para la evaluación y el tratamiento de los trastornos del habla y el lenguaje. El fonoaudiólogo conversará con usted sobre el desarrollo general y de comunicación de su niño. También hará pruebas verbales a su hijo durante la evaluación. La prueba de audición generalmente se incluye en la evaluación porque los problemas auditivos también afectan el desarrollo del habla y el lenguaje. Dependiendo de los resultados de la evaluación, el fonoaudiólogo podrá sugerir actividades que usted puede hacer en la casa para estimular el desarrollo del niño. En algunos casos, también recomendará terapia individual o de grupo, o sugerirá más evaluaciones con un audiólogo (el profesional de la salud capacitado en la identificación y la medición de pérdida de la audición) o con un psicólogo del desarrollo (el profesional de la salud especializado en el desarrollo psicológico de los bebés y los niños).

¿Qué investigaciones se están llevando a cabo sobre los problemas del habla y el lenguaje durante el desarrollo?

El Instituto Nacional de la Sordera y Otros Trastornos de la Comunicación (NIDCD, por sus siglas en inglés) patrocina una amplia gama de investigaciones para entender mejor el desarrollo de los trastornos del habla y el lenguaje, mejorar las herramientas de diagnóstico y perfeccionar los tratamientos más efectivos.

Un área de estudio continuo es la búsqueda de mejores métodos para diagnosticar y entender los diferentes tipos de retraso del habla. Un amplio estudio en el que se ha dado seguimiento a más de 4,000 niños está reuniendo datos a medida que los niños crecen con el fin de establecer señales y síntomas confiables para identificar trastornos específicos del habla, que se podrán utilizar más adelante para desarrollar pruebas precisas de diagnóstico. Por otra parte, hay estudios genéticos que buscan identificar la relación entre ciertas variaciones genéticas y las deficiencias específicas del habla.

Investigadores patrocinados por el NIDCD han descubierto una variante genética vinculada específicamente al trastorno específico del lenguaje, un trastorno que retrasa el uso de palabras en el niño y disminuye el ritmo al que éste domina las habilidades del lenguaje durante la edad escolar. Este hallazgo es el primero que relaciona la presencia de una mutación genética específica con un tipo de deficiencia hereditaria en el lenguaje. Otras investigaciones exploran el papel que podría desempeñar esta variante genética en la dislexia, el autismo y los trastornos del habla y la audición.

Un estudio a largo plazo sobre el impacto de la sordera en el cerebro está explorando cómo el cerebro crea nuevas conexiones para enfrentar la sordera. Hasta hoy, las investigaciones han demostrado que, al observar objetos en movimiento, los adultos sordos reaccionan de modo más rápido y preciso que los adultos que pueden oír. Las investigaciones existentes siguen explorando el concepto de la "plasticidad del cerebro"-cómo el cerebro es influenciado por las condiciones de salud o las experiencias de vida-y cómo puede usarse para desarrollar estrategias de aprendizaje que estimulen el desarrollo saludable del habla y el lenguaje en la niñez temprana.

Un taller reciente coordinado por el NIDCD reunió a un grupo de expertos para explorar las inquietudes relacionadas a niños con trastornos dentro del espectro autista que carecen de un lenguaje verbal funcional a los 5 años. Debido a que estos niños son muy diferentes entre sí, y no comparten una serie de características o patrones similares que los pongan en ventaja o desventaja cognitivas, ha sido difícil desarrollar pruebas estandarizadas de evaluación o tratamientos efectivos. El taller incluyó una serie de presentaciones para familiarizar a los participantes con los retos que enfrentan estos niños. Así pudieron identificar un número de vacíos y oportunidades que existen actualmente y que podrían ser considerados en estudios futuros.

¿Qué son la voz, el habla y el lenguaje?

La voz, el habla y el lenguaje son las herramientas que utilizamos para comunicarnos con los demás.

La voz es el sonido que hacemos cuando el aire de los pulmones pasa a través de los pliegues vocales en la laringe haciéndolos vibrar.

El habla es la acción de hablar, o sea una de las formas en que expresamos nuestra lengua. Incorpora la coordinación precisa de acciones musculares de la lengua, los labios, la quijada y el tracto vocal para producir los sonidos reconocibles que constituyen el lenguaje.

El lenguaje es un conjunto de normas compartidas que permiten a la gente expresar sus ideas de modo lógico. El lenguaje puede expresarse en forma oral (verbal) o por escrito, o mediante señas u otros gestos, por ejemplo, parpadeando o moviendo la boca.

Etapas del desarrollo de la audición y la comunicación del bebé

Recién nacido hasta los 3 meses

Esta lista se basa en el folleto ¿Qué tal habla y oye su niño? de la Asociación Americana del Habla, Lenguaje y Audición (American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, ASHA).

¿Dónde puedo obtener más información sobre las etapas del desarrollo del habla y el lenguaje?

El NIDCD mantiene un directorio de organizaciones que proveen información acerca del proceso normal y trastornos de la audición, el equilibrio, el gusto, el olfato, la voz, el habla y el lenguaje. Actualmente, el directorio está disponible solamente en inglés.

Use las siguientes palabras clave para encontrar organizaciones que pueden responder a sus preguntas y ofrecer información sobre las etapas del desarrollo del habla y el lenguaje. Esta información está disponible en inglés.

Para más información, comuníquese con nosotros al:

Centro de Información del NIDCD
1 Communication Avenue
Bethesda, MD 20892-3456
Llamada gratuita: (800) 241-1044
Llamada gratuita TTY: (800) 241-1055
Correo electrónico: nidcdinfo@nidcd.nih.gov

Publicación de NIH núm. 10-4781 S
Septiembre de 2010

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Etapas del desarrollo del habla y el lenguaje

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Los primeros 3 años de vida, cuando el cerebro está en proceso de desarrollo y maduración, es el período más intensivo en la adquisición de las habilidades del habla y el lenguaje.

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Acquisición de lenguaje de acuerdo a Chomsky

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Acquisición de lenguaje de acuerdo a Chomsky

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Este video visualmente establece las diferencias de la filosofia de acquisición de lenguaje entre varios filósofos famosos con Noam Chomsky. Usando el ILH, puedemos entender que el aprendizaje de una lengua según Chomsky es innato y se construye sobre reglas universales gramáticas desemejante a los animales. Fundamentalmente, Chomsky dice que la aquisición de la lengua es innato con una gramática universal.

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Seseo, ceceo, yeísmo y otros fenomenos fonológicos

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Seseo, ceceo, yeísmo y otros fenomenos fonológicos

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El artículo da una esquema de la estructura de varios fenómenos fonológicos, describiendo los lugares donde son utilizados y los frases equivalentes en inglés. Encontré muy interesante como el autor del artículo incorporar las relaciones de países en el pasado como los españoles y los grupos indigentes para explicar los cambios lingüísticos que ocurrieron para desarrollar los cambios fonológicos en español.

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There are so many regional differences when speaking the Spanish language that at times even native speakers get confused. Diana Mejía explains how the variations evolved and what to look out for.

A Cuban, an Argentine and a Spaniard walk into a bar... but will they all get the joke? Even assuming that the Spaniard does indeed speak Castilian, these native Spanish language speakers may have a difficult time understanding one another - at least until the drinks are poured!

Let's backtrack for a minute, and return to the time of the colonisation of the Americas. In the Iberian Peninsula, a plethora of Romance vernaculars such as Catalan, Galician and Andalusian were spoken regionally.

Nonetheless, the colonisation of the New World coincided with the period when Castilian was taking a dominant role in the peninsula, prevailing as the official language of the unified Spanish Kingdom. And so, Castilian, better known now as Spanish, took root in the New World.

The evolution of the Latin American vernacular happened slowly, as waves of immigration steeped the continent in tradition and history, blending and clashing with those of the indigenous populations.

The three people at the bar would each have been speaking a form of Spanish whittled away by hundreds of years of divergence from their common ancestor. This evolution of the Latin American vernacular happened slowly, as waves of immigration steeped the continent in tradition and history, blending and clashing with those of the indigenous populations and their languages.

The Cuban speaker, for example, may have been using words of African origin peppered into their vocabulary, a byproduct of the slave populations brought over in the 16th century to work the sugar plantations. Meanwhile, the Argentine's lilt would have been clearly influenced by the recent mass immigration of Italians in the late 19th and early 20th century.

Latin American Spanish is not only a reflection of its first settlers, but also the totality of its population, including immigrants and natives. And with close to 400 million speakers across more than 20 countries, the amount of local variations in grammar and pronunciation are difficult to imagine.

Fortunately, there is little difference in literary, scientific and the otherwise standardised written language, so picking up a newspaper in Madrid or Montevideo shouldn't be a problem!

In this piece, we will look at some of the most obvious divergences in the Spanish spoken around the continent and in the Iberian Peninsula.

An archaic pronoun?

One of the first lessons many Spanish-learners in Latin America are taught is to ignore a whole column in their verb charts, correctly explained as something they would only need to learn if they planned on travelling to Spain. Those are the ones corresponding to vosotros (second person plural), which is used instead of ustedes to refer to groups of people.

The pronoun corresponding to this form is os and is as seldomly used in Latin America as vosotros.

The use of os, vuestro or vosotros in Latin America may be heard at a sermon or in a very solemn discourse. Used outside of this context, it may make someone think of a 16th century novel they read in high school - or the last Spaniard they met.

In Spain ustedes (plural) corresponds to usted (singular) as a formal pronoun. In Latin America it's used as the second person plural in all contexts regardless of formality.

El voseo

On the other hand, parts of Latin America use the pronoun vos, which takes the place of tú and has its own conjugation, which is very regular:

* Vos sos / tú eres (ser - irregular)

In Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and much of Central America, its use is the general norm, while it lives side-by-side with the use of tú, or el tuteo in Chile as well as in Antioquia and Valle del Cauca here in Colombia.

Turning the tables on the use of vosotros, vos was originally brought to the continent by the Spaniards. However, the use of this pronoun fell out of use in Spain long ago but has remained unscathed in parts of Latin America. In Spain you can occasionally find examples of a different vos - conjugated like vosotros - historically used as a formal pronoun even more reverential than usted.

El seseo y el ceceo

The seseo is the pronunciation of both the c (before an e or an i) and z as an "s". While this is the norm in Latin America, most Spaniards use the ceceo, which makes a "distinción" between these sounds.

* C + "i" or "e", or Z + "a", "o", "u" = an unvoiced /θ/ sound, made by placing the tongue between or just behind teeth, it's akin to the "th" sound in English, as in the word "think".

* S = the expected "s" sound

* El seseo = /seseo/

* El ceceo = /θeθeo/

Having this distinction certainly makes spelling easier, as the written form simply follows the spoken words. It also helps to distinguish words that in Latin American Spanish are homophones:

* Sierra = mountain range

* Cierra = 3rd person singular of the verb cerrar (to close)

* Casar(se) = to get married

* Cazar = to hunt

So why did this useful bit of pronunciation get lost in the New World?

At the time of the colonisation of the Americas, there were two predominant forms of Castilian spoken in Spain: one in the north of Castile, with a stronghold in Madrid; and another in Seville, the city that would be the main link to the Americas because of its strategic Puerto de Indias.

It happened to be that in Seville, both the Z and C were pronounced in a similar way to the S. Why was that? The historian Peter Boyd-Bowman explained in an interview with BBC World that the /θ/ sound was seen to belong to a lower social class, since it was associated with the Moors living the region at the time.

Thus, it was to be that the Sevillian way of speaking Castilian came to be the predominant form of "Spanish" spoken in Latin America. However, because the court, the king and much of the written Spanish came from Madrid, the spelling never did without the C/Z distinction.

Another factor that may have weighed in would have been the ease of use in the New World. Simplifying the phonemes may have helped the colonisers spread the language and facilitate learning amongst indigenous populations. Indeed, any anglophone who's tried to help a foreigner with English pronunciation will know that /θ/ is a notoriously difficult sound to replicate.

"Aspiration"

Speaking of the letter S, anyone who has taken a recent trip to the coast, or perhaps watched Neruda, set in Chile, may have had a hard time understanding the Spanish spoken by the colourful characters.

La aspiración de la s refers to the omission in pronunciation of the letter S, usually replacing it with a faint sound similar to the English H. ¿Ehtán lihtoh?, en lieu of ¿Están listos?

This pronunciation - one of the hardest for learners to pick up on - is widespread in the Caribbean as well as Chile and parts of the River Plate area.

El yeísmo y el lleísmo

Similarly to the C/Z/S, the Y and the LL originally existed as separate sounds and are still pronounced that way in parts of the Andean region and Spain. However, the predominant form in most modern Spanish dialects is the yeísmo; that is, the practice of pronouncing the LL in the same way as the Y is pronounced; a "y" or 'j' sound in English. Thus, a Spanish speaker from Bogotá would pronounce both haya and halla exactly the same way.

A particular form of the yeísmo is seen in Argentina and Uruguay, where the Y and the LL take on a completely different sound, similar to the French J /ʒ/ or the English SH /ʃ/.

* Ayer = /aʃer/ "asher"

* Yo me llamo = /ʃo me ʃamo/ "sho me shamo"

So, do you have to learn all these variations to communicate with Spanish language speakers abroad? Of course not! Much like a Canadian, a Kiwi and a Scott will understand each other - perhaps with a bit of patience - speaking slowly and clearly, and asking your counterpart to do so as well, will allow you to have meaningful conversations with Spanish language speakers from around the globe.

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A Cuban, an Argentine and a Spaniard walk into a bar... but will they all get the joke? Even assuming that the Spaniard does indeed speak Castilian, these native Spanish language speakers may have a difficult time understanding one another - at least until the drinks are poured!

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Una perspectiva de multiples idiomas del concepto de "code switching"

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Una perspectiva de multiples idiomas del concepto de "code switching"

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El video nos enseña los tipos específicos de “code switching” con ejemplos de más de un idioma. Es interesante observar que hay una manera de clasificar como las personas intercambian palabras específicas. Por ejemplo, si una palabra no es originalmente de ese idioma, es probable que sería intercambiado por una palabra en inglés o que suena fonológicamente similar a la palabra en inglés.

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CODE-SWITCHING: Jumping Between 2 Different Languages

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Hice un enlace para los apuntes de morfología para este clase. Componiendo el código para este sitio de web era un poco dificil pero me ayudó entender la organización de las morfemas y espero que también sea una manera óptima para repasar el material antes del examen de este capítulo. Agregar más información y ejemplos de morfología en español.

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Vocabulary Katakana Alphabet Hiragana Alphabet Particles Sentence Structure

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Diagrama de IPA para entender  los sonidos consonánticos y vocales

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Diagrama de IPA para entender  los sonidos consonánticos y vocales

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Encontré que el IPA diagrama es muy útil para entender la manera en que se articula el multitud de alófonos en cualquier idioma- inglés, español, y también en japonés. Las áreas que son subrayados en un verde claro son dependientes en los consonantes que siguen el alófono. En adición a los consonantes, el enlace contiene el sonido de los vocales dependiendo en la posición de la lengua y de la boca.

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The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is a set of symbols that linguists use to describe the sounds of spoken languages.