Author Archives: BRL

Linguistic Link: Benefits of Bilingualism

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Does knowing a second language and exposing it to your children have non-linguistic benefits…?

In this short video, Sam Wang, a neuroscientist at Princeton University points out the benefits of exposing infants to a second language. These include: the ability to cope with conflict cues better, increasing theory of mind, and delaying dementia among others.

Take a break and watch this short video that will encourage you to learn a second language.

Now you know how to increase brainpower by utilizing the power of language!

UIC TiL: Shane Ebert

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Come join us at our first Talks in Linguistics (TiL) session of 2012! This friday February 17th, Shane Ebert will be leading a presentation entitled “Why Simple Wh phrases are Not So Simple: Evidence from Inversion in Spanish English Code switching”

When: Friday 17th, 2012 at 3pm

Where: UH 1750 (601 S. Morgan Street, Chicago, IL 60607)

Light refreshments will be provided.

Here is a preview of the presentation:

“Why Simple Wh phrases areNot So Simple: Evidence from Inversion in Spanish English Code switching”

There are two particularly salient properties of wh questions in both
Spanish and English: fronting of the wh phrase and inversion of either the
subject and verb (Spanish) or the subject and auxiliary (English).  In the
case of inversion, this is not a unitary phenomenon, as evidenced by the
matrix embedded asymmetry of English and the argument adjunct asymmetry of
Spanish, and the ultimate motivation for the inversion is not clear.  The
question is why it is possible in those contexts and not in any others.
For example, what makes the process of inversion in Spanish sensitive to
the thematic status of the wh phrase?  In fact, this sensitivity can offer
clues about how inversion proceeds in the two languages. In this
presentation, I review several other types of sensitivity beyond those of
the previously mentioned asymmetries and explore their implications for
the underlying mechanisms behind the phenomenon of inversion using
evidence from Spanish-English code-switching.

For more information, contact: Daniel Vergara (dverga3@uic.edu), Sergio
Ramos (sramos@uic.edu) or Bernie Issa (issa2@uic.edu).

 

 

 

UIC TiL: Spring 2012 Schedule

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The graduate students of Hispanic Linguistics at the University of Illinois at Chicago are proud to announce the Spring 2012 schedule of talks.

UIC Talks in Linguistics (TiL) offers students, faculty, and invited-guests the opportunity to present ongoing work and get comments and ideas as well as the chance for critical and constructive discussion of their work.

The talks on the program for this spring:

17 February: Shane Ebert and Bernard Issa-UIC

30 March: Ji Young Shim-CUNY

13 April: Brady Clark-Northwestern

23 April: Marcel den Dikken-CUNY

For more information, contact: Daniel Vergara (dverga3@uic.edu), Sergio
Ramos (sramos@uic.edu) or Bernie Issa (issa2@uic.edu).

Feel free to keep up with past and present talks via the UIC TiL web site:
http://hispanic.las.uic.edu/UIC_TiL/UIC_TiL.shtml

Video: Make sure to tune in!

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We’re excited about this new series on Link TV about endangered languages.

Of the 6500 languages spoken in the world today, only half will make it
to the next century,” says poet Bob Holman, one of the founders of the
Endangered Language Alliance and host of a new travel series
spotlighting the cultures of endangered languages, premiering
February 1, 2012, on LINK TV. “While endangered plants and animals
are protected by law, who is looking out for the cultures and ways of
life held in these words? That is the heart and mission of this series.”
Encounter the distinct cultures and peoples of West Africa, Asia and
the Middle East in the three-part documentary On the Road with Bob
Holman and discover ancient languages on the brink of extinction.
Each of the half-hour shows, produced by Rattapallax in association
with Bowery Arts and Science, will air on Link TV, which is available on
local cable channels, DVD, online, and on DirectTV channel 375 and
Dish Network channel 9410.

Travel the road not taken, with Bob Holman, in On the Road with Bob
Holman, beginning February 1, 2012, on LINK TV. More info at
www.rattapallax.com

Video: Pinker on Language, Violence and Human Nature

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Check out this interview with Steven Pinker in which he discusses human nature and the role of language in shaping it, among other things.  The New York Times interview coincides with the release of his new book, The Better Angels of our Nature.  Here’s a short abstract:

We’ve all had the experience of reading about a bloody war or shocking crime and asking, “What is the world coming to?” But we seldom ask, “How bad was the world in the past?” In this startling new book, the bestselling cognitive scientist Steven Pinker shows that the world of the past was much worse. With the help of more than a hundred graphs and maps, Pinker presents some astonishing numbers. Tribal warfare was nine times as deadly as war and genocide in the 20th century. The murder rate of Medieval Europe was more than thirty times what it is today. Slavery, sadistic punishments, and frivolous executions were unexceptionable features of life for millennia, then suddenly were targeted for abolition. Wars between developed countries have vanished, and even in the developing world, wars kill a fraction of the people they did a few decades ago. Rape, battering, hate crimes, deadly riots, child abuse, cruelty to animals—all substantially down.

How could this have happened, if human nature has not changed? What led people to stop sacrificing children, stabbing each other at the dinner table, or burning cats and disemboweling criminals as forms of popular entertainment? The key to explaining the decline of violence, Pinker argues, is to understand the inner demons that incline us toward violence (such as revenge, sadism, and tribalism) and the better angels that steer us away. Thanks to the spread of government, literacy, trade, and cosmopolitanism, we increasingly control our impulses, empathize with others, bargain rather than plunder, debunk toxic ideologies, and deploy our powers of reason to reduce the temptations of violence.

With the panache and intellectual zeal that have made his earlier books international bestsellers and literary classics, Pinker will force you to rethink your deepest beliefs about progress, modernity, and human nature. This gripping book is sure to be among the most debated of the century so far.

Linguistic Link: Tonight’s Code-switching is brought to you by…Telemundo!

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The New York Times reports that Telemundo is trying a new approach in their effort to stay competitive with Univisión: running shows in Spanglish and English subtitles.

…The programs will feature a sprinkling of English and be available with English subtitles — something not as readily found on the competing Univision…

“If you think about Telemundo as a narrower broadcast network, you quickly get to the place where, like all broadcast networks, your mandate must be to go for the widest possible audience,” said Lauren Zalaznick, the chairwoman of entertainment and digital networks and integrated media for Telemundo’s parent company, NBCUniversal.

Bilingual Hispanics, defined as speaking English more than Spanish or Spanish and English equally, are 82 percent of the United States Hispanic population, according to a report released this year by Scarborough Research, a consumer research firm.

This group has more disposable income than the more Spanish-speaking recent immigrants, with 12 percent of acculturated Hispanic families earning $75,000 to $100,000 a year, the study said.

Advertisers also may be attracted by the fact that Hispanics watch more TV as a family, with Spanish-speaking grandparents often gathered around the TV with their predominantly English-speaking grandchildren, according to the Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies. Shows that incorporate both languages and cultures can hook multiple generations.

“You may have a home full of generations with different perspectives,” said Roberto Orci, chief executive of Acento, a Los Angeles-based advertising agency aimed at Hispanics.

Very interesting, ¿no les parece?

Linguistic Link: “I speak Spanglish … I say ‘Necesito ayuda con my homework.'”

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NPR shines a spot on one of the first bilingual schools in the U.S., Coral Way Elementary School in Miami-Dade County.  In 1963 the school opened its doors to the children of political refugees from Cuba.  The goal was not only to teach them English, but to maintain their Spanish as well.  The school has been a model of bilingual immersion programs ever since.

NPR’s reports that

Teachers at Coral Way cringe when they hear Spanglish. They demand proper English and proper Spanish. This kind of rigor and rich immersion in the two languages is very different than what most Latino school students experience.

Although we here at the Bilingualism Research Laboratory can appreciate the need to maintain a high level of Spanish input and output to ensure fluency, it’s important to understand that statements such as these only serve to further stigmatize code-switching.  Remember — code-switching, especially intra-sentential code-switching, requires a high level of proficiency in both languages! (Poplack 1980)

Video: Is vowel harmony innate?

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Check out this video highlighting child language acquisition research conducted by Toby Mintz, Associate Professor of Psychology and Linguistics at the USC College of Letters, Arts & Sciences, and USC College undergraduate Ashlee Welday.

Their study investigates how infants are able to identify individual words in their language, as opposed to hearing speech as a continuous string of sound with no internal word boundaries.  The researchers use an artificial language with vowel harmony to discover if infants, even those exposed to a language devoid of vowel harmony as is the case with English, are innately equipped to pick up on vowel harmony as a cue for word boundaries.

They find that infants do use vowel harmony as a cue to help decipher word boundaries, in the way we would predict if babies were innately equipped to perceive vowel harmony.

 

 

 

 

 

Publications: There’s a new journal in town…

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Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism is a new journal dedicated to original research assuming any cognitive science approach to understanding the mental representation of bilingual language competence and performance, including cognitive linguistics, emergentism/connectionism, generative theories, psycholinguistic and processing accounts, and covering typical and atypical populations.  The journal is on it fourth issue, and volume 1:1 is available online as a free sample.

Four types of articles appear in LAB:

General Research articles: 8,000-10,000 word articles that present original empirical research pertinent to the study of cognitive-linguistic bilingualism.

Squibs and Research Reports: These small articles should not exceed 5,000 words and should present research on ongoing theoretical projects or subsets of data sets making significant contributions that are time sensitive. Accelerated review will be conducted.

Epistemological Topics: these articles on topics of general epistemological interest in the sub-disciplines that contribute research to the journal will be between 8,000 and 12,000 words and will be by invitation only.

Spotlight issue: Annually, one Spotlight issue will be published focusing on research of one particular language, language family or a cohort of articles addressing the same theoretical questions within the remit of the journal. Proposals for guest editing this issue should be sent to the editors and not exceed 3 pages.

The editors of the journal include:

Editors
Jason Rothman, University of Florida
Roumyana Slabakova, University of Iowa
Associate Editors
Holger Hopp, Universität Mannheim
Theodoros Marinis, University of Reading
Silvina A. Montrul, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Ludovica Serratrice, University of Manchester
Sharon Unsworth, Utrecht University
All inquiries as well as all submissions should be sent to: LABjournaluiowa.edu

Talk: When “foreign” languages aren’t foreign – Heritage speakers in the United States

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The Latin American and Latino Studies Program and the Department of Hispanic and Italian Studies present:

When “foreign” languages aren’t foreign: Heritage speakers in the United States

Presented by: 
Kim Potowski
Associate professor of Hispanic Linguistics at UIC
 
October 12, 2011,  12:00 p.m.
Rafael Cintrón-Ortiz Latino Cultural Center
Lecture Center B2, University of Illinois at Chicago, East Campus
“You’re in America Speak English.”
“Multilingualism threatens our national unity.”
“Today’s immigrants are not learning English as quickly as those of the past.”
These myths regarding language are fairly prevalent in the U.S. at the beginning of the 21st century.  Approximately 20% of the U.S. population speaks a language other than English at home, yet several mainstream currents portray this linguistic diversity as a problem – with repressive and sometimes illegal  results. But there have been growing countercurrents of awareness that heritage languages are in fact both a right for the communities that speak them and a resource for the nation generally, along with the understanding that there are good ways (and not so good ways) of promoting English language learning.   Several cities have enacted initiatives to protect people’s right to maintain their heritage language without being accused of rejecting mainstream U.S. society, and several K-8 educational models teach other languages to our nation’s English monolingual children. This talk explores these issues making frequent reference to Spanish in the U.S. and to Chicago more specifically.
Kim Potowski is Associate Professor of Hispanic linguistics at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she directs the Spanish for Heritage Speakers Program. Her research focuses on Spanish in the United States, and her book Language Diversity in the U.S. (Cambridge University Press 2010) profiles the 12 most commonly spoken heritage languages in the nation.  She is currently completing a book about “MexiRicans” in Chicago.
Bring your brown bag lunch and refreshments will be provided  –   this event is free and open to the general public.   For more information call LALS office at 312. 996.2445.