Doctoral Dissertation Research: Minorcan Spanish: The Structural Consequences of Contact with Catalan

当两种语言经常接触时会发生什么？语法的哪些方面最容易发生变化，哪些方面不受外部影响？接触语言学领域中的大部分研究都是在不同语系的语言背景下进行的；接触对具有许多结构属性的语法的影响在很大程度上没有得到检验。本项目探索西班牙语与一种密切相关的语言--加泰罗尼亚语的联系，在这两种语言都被广泛使用的背景下：西班牙米诺卡岛。研究人员将考察外部因素(如习得年龄、居住年限、第二语言水平和使用)以及语言内部因素(如语法的不同领域和性质)如何促进西班牙语接触语法的发展，区别于单语说话者的语法。本研究的结果将有助于在有利于语际影响的背景下理解和模拟双语的语法结果。因此，它有可能对不同的文献做出贡献，包括句法理论、双语和社会语言学。此外，该项目的重点是代表许多当代社会的参与者群体，在这些社会中，双语比单一语言更频繁，说话者在其语言方面表现出不同的熟练程度。这项研究的结果可能会为双语个体评估工具的开发提供参考。更具体地说，我们对双语的结果的了解可以促进一种观点，即不确定形式和趋同形式是持续双语社区语法发展和变化的正常过程。与其他双语社会一样，米诺卡州的许多公民在成年后学会了第二种语言，但他们的表现却像当地人一样。探索这些说话者达到母语水平的条件可以为第二语言教学提供参考。最后，作为对在公共机构接受教育的双语者的语言成果的研究，该项目将引起非专业人士、政府机构、教育工作者和学者的注意。

What happens when two languages are in regular contact? Which areas of a grammar are most susceptible to change, and which areas are impervious to external influence? Most of the research within the field of contact linguistics has been carried out in the context of languages from different families; the consequences of contact on grammars that share many structural properties have gone largely unexamined. The present project explores Spanish in contact with a closely related language, Catalan, in a context where both are extensively used: the island of Minorca, Spain. The researcher will examine how external factors (e.g., age of acquisition, length of residence, second language proficiency and use) as well as language-internal factors (e.g., different areas and properties of the grammar) contribute to the development of a grammar of contact Spanish, as differentiated from the grammar of a monolingual speaker.The results of this research will contribute to understanding and modeling the grammatical outcomes of bilingualism in a context that favors interlingual influence. As such, it has the potential to contribute to diverse literatures, including syntactic theory, bilingualism, and sociolinguistics. Additionally, this project focuses on a participant population that is representative of many contemporary societies, where bilingualism is more frequent than monolingualism, and in which speakers demonstrate disparate proficiencies in their languages. The results of this study may inform the development of assessment instruments for bilingual individuals. More specifically, our knowledge of the outcomes of bilingualism can promote a view of indeterminate and converged forms as a normal course of grammatical development and change in communities of sustained bilingualism. As in other bilingual societies, many citizens of Minorca acquire a second language in adulthood, and yet their performance is native-like. An exploration of the conditions under which such speakers achieve a native-like proficiency can inform second language teaching. Finally, as a study of the language outcomes of bilinguals who have been educated in public institutions, the project will garner the attention of laypersons, government agencies, educators, and scholars alike.