Effects of Spanish use on the production of Catalan vowels by early Spanish-Catalan bilinguals
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Joan Carles Mora
Abstract
This study examined the production of Catalan vowels by 82 adults who had begun using both Spanish (S) and Catalan (C) at school age but differed in their self-reported percentage of Catalan use (11%=MostlyS, 40%=S/C, 63%=C/S, 86%=MostlyC). Bark-normalized Euclidean distances between the vowels /i/-/e/, /u/-/o/, /e/-/ε/ and /o/-/ɔ/ were computed to estimate the magnitude of between-vowel production differences. The results revealed an effect of Catalan use: the more frequently Catalan was used, the more open and less fronted — and thus the less Spanish-like — were productions of Catalan /ε/ and /ɔ/. Euclidean distances between /e/-/ε/ were greater for the MostlyC group than for the MostlyS and S/C groups, also indicating an effect of Catalan use. These findings suggest that Catalan /e/ and /ε/ are produced less successfully by early learners of Catalan who continue using Spanish often despite the fact that the second language (either Catalan or Spanish) was acquired in early childhood.
Abstract
This study examined the production of Catalan vowels by 82 adults who had begun using both Spanish (S) and Catalan (C) at school age but differed in their self-reported percentage of Catalan use (11%=MostlyS, 40%=S/C, 63%=C/S, 86%=MostlyC). Bark-normalized Euclidean distances between the vowels /i/-/e/, /u/-/o/, /e/-/ε/ and /o/-/ɔ/ were computed to estimate the magnitude of between-vowel production differences. The results revealed an effect of Catalan use: the more frequently Catalan was used, the more open and less fronted — and thus the less Spanish-like — were productions of Catalan /ε/ and /ɔ/. Euclidean distances between /e/-/ε/ were greater for the MostlyC group than for the MostlyS and S/C groups, also indicating an effect of Catalan use. These findings suggest that Catalan /e/ and /ε/ are produced less successfully by early learners of Catalan who continue using Spanish often despite the fact that the second language (either Catalan or Spanish) was acquired in early childhood.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword & acknowledgments vii
- Editors’ introduction ix
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Part I First and second language acquisition
- Devil or angel in the details? 3
- Effects of Spanish use on the production of Catalan vowels by early Spanish-Catalan bilinguals 33
- Cues to dialectal discrimination in early infancy 55
- Phonology versus phonetics in loanword adaptations 71
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Part II Prosody
- A preliminary study of penultimate accentuation in French 93
- Sentence modality and tempo in Neapolitan Italian 109
- Glottalization at phrase boundaries in Tuscan and Roman Italian 125
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Part III Segments
- Acoustic analysis of syllable-final /k/ in Northern Peninsular Spanish 151
- The phonetic basis of a phonological pattern 171
- The production of rhotics in onset clusters by Spanish monolinguals and Spanish-Basque bilinguals 193
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Part IV Methodology
- Secondary correlates of question signaling in Manchego Spanish 211
- Modeling prosody and rhythmic distributions in Spanish speech groups 239
- Categories and gradience in intonation 259
- Subject Index 285
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword & acknowledgments vii
- Editors’ introduction ix
-
Part I First and second language acquisition
- Devil or angel in the details? 3
- Effects of Spanish use on the production of Catalan vowels by early Spanish-Catalan bilinguals 33
- Cues to dialectal discrimination in early infancy 55
- Phonology versus phonetics in loanword adaptations 71
-
Part II Prosody
- A preliminary study of penultimate accentuation in French 93
- Sentence modality and tempo in Neapolitan Italian 109
- Glottalization at phrase boundaries in Tuscan and Roman Italian 125
-
Part III Segments
- Acoustic analysis of syllable-final /k/ in Northern Peninsular Spanish 151
- The phonetic basis of a phonological pattern 171
- The production of rhotics in onset clusters by Spanish monolinguals and Spanish-Basque bilinguals 193
-
Part IV Methodology
- Secondary correlates of question signaling in Manchego Spanish 211
- Modeling prosody and rhythmic distributions in Spanish speech groups 239
- Categories and gradience in intonation 259
- Subject Index 285
