The aim of this paper is to reflect on bilingual performance and specifically language alternation in informal contexts. In this reflection I have focused on the language choice of bilingual speakers when they are not restricted by the social factors of formal settings to adopt one code or the other. I have adopted Poplack's framework in…

A study investigated the general occurrence of English lexical elements in the recorded speech of 285 Dutch pre-World War I immigrants and their descendants in Massachusetts, Iowa, and Wisconsin. The problems encountered in analyzing a massive data corpus and the methods used to resolve these problems are the focus of the paper. The difficulties…

While early research suggests that bilingualism creates a language handicap in individuals, more recent and methodologically better research clearly supports the advantages of bilingualism in promoting overall cognitive development. Three major explanations for this improved development are proposed: that (1) the bilingual-bicultural child…

Five papers on bilingualism are presented. "Giving Transfer a Boost--Describing Transfer Variation in Learners' Interlanguage Performance" by Claus Faerch suggests, outlines, and illustrates a heuristic principle for describing the result of positive transfer from one language to another, based on the assumption that learners maximize…

The linguistic interactions in the speech of bilingual children is systematically examined to determine their ability to differentiate between their two language systems. The speech samples of eighteen bilingual (Spanish-English) children aged two to six were examined for instances of deviation from the norms of the language of utterance due to…

A study of second language acquisition in two Japanese children, and corresponding examination of research literature, led to this effort to clarify terminology related to cross-linguistic influence in language contact situations. Terms include: bilingualism, code-switching, language mixing, language transfer, and borrowing. Two forms of transfer…

Examines, through a matched-guise technique, the conflict in attitudes and behavior toward the use of a mixture of Cantonese and English (MIX) among English-Cantonese bilingual students in Hong Kong. Results indicate hostility toward MIX but produce evidence that it is a useful, culturally neutral choice and that it may have covert status in the…

Examines a code mixed variety of English and Hindi called Filmi English, which reflects the linguistic influence of the Indian film industry. A corpus of more than 2,000 intrasentential code-mixed sentences drawn from a film magazine, "Stardust," is analyzed. (Author/OD)

Examines code mixing and borrowing across two generations of New York Puerto Ricans, and explores the possibility of existence of a lifecycle of language use in the community. (26 references) (Author/OD)

Suggests that sociolinguistic knowledge is realized from the beginning of language use. The roles of formulaic language and of interactional consequences are described as explanations for the acquisition of style-switching. (30 references) (Author/JL)

Papers in this issue include the following: "Code-Mixing in Hongkong Cantonese-English Bilinguals: Constraints and Processes" (Brian Chan Hok-shing); "Information on Quantifiers and Argument Structure in English Learner's Dictionaries" (Thomas Hun-tak Lee); "Systematic Variability: In Search of a Linguistic…

This paper attempts to integrate the results of the ethnographic and attitudinal components of a broader study into a specifically sociolinguistic analysis. While a variety of opinions can be found in the literature on code-switching, the contention here is that code-switching is a norm in specific speech situations that exist in stable bilingual…

Data delimited by the phonology-to-semantics framework of mainstream linguistics are inadequate to account for the subtle influences of first language (L1) upon second language (L2). Unique errors for which there is no L1 correlate are found in samples of written English produced by Japanese and Chinese second language learners. This is due to a…

A study was conducted of the language development of a hearing child whose mother was deaf and communicated only in sign and whose father was hearing and communicated in both sign and oral language. Results showed similarities in development between the two modalities as well as similarity between development in two separate modalities and two…

This article concludes that language mixes do not constitute a major interference in the acquisition of bilingualism since children appear to be able to differentiate their two linguistic systems from an early age. (Author/NCR)