Toddlers' and preschoolers' knowledge of the phonological forms of words was tested in Spanish-learning, Catalan-learning, and bilingual children. These populations are of particular interest because of differences in the Spanish and Catalan vowel systems: Catalan has two vowels in a phonetic region where Spanish has only one. The proximity of the…

Bearing in mind the relevance of immigration in Spain, we consider the linguistic idiosyncrasy of the autonomous community of Catalonia in the present study to describe and analyse language attitudes to Catalan and Spanish in a sample of 225 students of immigrant origin living in different parts of the region. We focus on language attitudes in so…

Starting from the assumption that interpreting is a norm-governed type of communication and that within this communicative "pas de trois" or "situated activity" (Wadensjo) which is "socially bounded" (Inghilleri), the interpreter's presence appears as a defining feature, this paper tries to identify preliminary and…

Presents study which shows that although these causatives have same surface structure as productive causative constructions they differ in several ways, e.g., unlike other productive causatives their meaning changes when "que" subjunctive is substituted for the infinitive, and they function like lexical causatives which involve agent-patient, not…

Most current models of language production assume that information about gender is selected only in phrasal contexts, and that the phonological form of a noun can be accessed without selecting its syntactic properties. In this paper, we report a series of picture-word interference experiments with Italian-speaking participants where the…

Using a sequential mixed-methods design, this study examined the differences between two native language groups--those with an East Asian language background and those with a Romance language background--in regard to reading subskills as represented in the Michigan English Language Assessment Battery (MELAB) reading test, so as to provide…

This paper is situated in interaction on the Internet and presents an analysis of chat conversations in Romance languages--French, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish--between students from several universities. The Internet is currently a fertile setting for intercultural and plurilingual encounters, and interaction, virtual or real, is seen as a…

In this article we investigate the effects of first language (L1) on second language (L2) neural processing for two grammatical constructions (verbal domain dependency and grammatical gender), focusing on the event-related potential P600 effect, which has been found in both L1 and L2 processing. Native Dutch speakers showed a P600 effect for both…

Background: The profiles of children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI) differ greatly according to the language they speak. The Surface Hypothesis attempts to explain these differences through the theory that children with SLI will incorrectly produce elements in their language with low phonological weights or that are produced in a…

This study reports on the uneasy compromise in language and education policies in the post-Soviet Republic of Moldova since its first moves toward independence in 1989. Taking an approach that posits language policies as needing to be anchored in both international norms and the idiosyncrasies of local conditions, the discussion explores the…

The attitudes and behaviours of majority language speakers have an important impact on minority languages, and it has been claimed that the long-term success of minority language initiatives may only be achievable if some degree of favourable opinion, or "tolerability", of these initiatives is secured among majority language speakers.…

Traces history of Aztec language and culture to show how traces remain in modern Spanish and how they have contributed to other languages. (BK)

Examines linguistic issues involved in designing a computer concordance program for Spanish that automatically retrieves in context all forms of the verb from the infinitive. Results indicate that, although concordances remain popular with researchers in the humanities, their lack of language-specific morphological information is a detraction.…

Considers several difficulties, both empirical and conceptual, that arise from the formulation of the classical Binding Theory that states the following: (1) an anaphor must be locally bound, (2) a pronoun must not be locally bound, and (3) an R-expression must not be bound. Ways of overcoming these difficulties are presented. (39 references) (GLR)

Examines linguistic criteria that have been adduced on the Middle French period and concludes that there is no real discontinuity that serves to define Middle French. Suggests that the value of Middle French may be typological rather than temporal--specifically that it defines a variety of French that broadly conforms to the Romance…