3. Anglicismos en el léxico disponible de los adolescentes hispanos de Chicago
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Francisco Moreno-Fernández
Abstract
The degree of English present in the available lexicon of adolescent first and second generation Hispanics in Chicago is analyzed. Available lexicon is defined as (1) the sum of words that speakers have in their mental systems and (2) whose use is conditioned by a particular topic. Given the English environment in which these youth live and are educated, we hypothesize that their Spanish would show a notable number of English lexical loans. The author elicited available lexicon by asking the teens to list words by association within 22 different semantic fields. These include, the human body, clothing, parts of the house, food and drink, school, transportation, means of heating and cooling interior spaces, etc. In turn, the frequency of the words was calculated to arrive at a statistical index of availability. Of the 20 words most commonly listed in each of the semantic fields, only 26 (6.5%) were Anglicisms, indicating that the Spanish lexicon of these young U.S. Latinos is sufficiently solid to permit communication about general topics. A greater number of English words were present in more esoteric fields such as “means of heating and cooling interior spaces,” which is to be expected given that this field is not part of the everyday experience of most teenagers. There were no significant differences related to gender or even to generation; it was the participants' level of Spanish, defined by the level of Spanish course in which they were enrolled, that showed the greatest correlation with the presence of English lexical items.
Abstract
The degree of English present in the available lexicon of adolescent first and second generation Hispanics in Chicago is analyzed. Available lexicon is defined as (1) the sum of words that speakers have in their mental systems and (2) whose use is conditioned by a particular topic. Given the English environment in which these youth live and are educated, we hypothesize that their Spanish would show a notable number of English lexical loans. The author elicited available lexicon by asking the teens to list words by association within 22 different semantic fields. These include, the human body, clothing, parts of the house, food and drink, school, transportation, means of heating and cooling interior spaces, etc. In turn, the frequency of the words was calculated to arrive at a statistical index of availability. Of the 20 words most commonly listed in each of the semantic fields, only 26 (6.5%) were Anglicisms, indicating that the Spanish lexicon of these young U.S. Latinos is sufficiently solid to permit communication about general topics. A greater number of English words were present in more esoteric fields such as “means of heating and cooling interior spaces,” which is to be expected given that this field is not part of the everyday experience of most teenagers. There were no significant differences related to gender or even to generation; it was the participants' level of Spanish, defined by the level of Spanish course in which they were enrolled, that showed the greatest correlation with the presence of English lexical items.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction ix
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Part I. Heritage Spanish in the United States
- 1. Subjects in early dual language development 3
- 2. Interpreting mood distinctions in Spanish as a heritage language 23
- 3. Anglicismos en el léxico disponible de los adolescentes hispanos de Chicago 41
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Part II. Education and policy issues
- 4. Teaching Spanish in the U.S. 61
- 5. The politics of English and Spanish aquí y allá 81
- 6. Language attitudes and the lexical de-Castilianization of Valencian 101
- 7. Are Galicians bound to diglossia? 119
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Part III. Pragmatics and contact
- 8. Addressing peers in a Spanish-English bilingual classroom 135
- 9. Style variation in Spanish as a heritage language 153
- 10. “Baby I'm Sorry, te juro, I'm Sorry” 173
- 11. Cross-linguistic influence of the Cuzco Quechua epistemic system on Andean Spanish 191
- 12. La negación en la frontera domínico-haitiana 211
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Part IV. Variation and contact
- 13. On the development of contact varieties 237
- 14. Linguistic and social predictors of copula use in Galician Spanish 253
- 15. Apuntes preliminares sobre el contacto lingüístico y dialectal en el uso pronominal del español en Nueva York 275
- 16. Is the past really the past in narrative discourse? 297
- 17. The impact of linguistic constraints on the expression of futurity in the Spanish of New York Colombians 311
- 18. Quantitative evidence for contact-induced accommodation 329
- 19. Está muy diferente a como era antes 345
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Part V. Bozal Spanish
- 20. Where and how does bozal Spanish survive? 359
- 21. The appearance and use of bozal language in Cuban and Brazilian neo-African literature 377
- Index 395
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction ix
-
Part I. Heritage Spanish in the United States
- 1. Subjects in early dual language development 3
- 2. Interpreting mood distinctions in Spanish as a heritage language 23
- 3. Anglicismos en el léxico disponible de los adolescentes hispanos de Chicago 41
-
Part II. Education and policy issues
- 4. Teaching Spanish in the U.S. 61
- 5. The politics of English and Spanish aquí y allá 81
- 6. Language attitudes and the lexical de-Castilianization of Valencian 101
- 7. Are Galicians bound to diglossia? 119
-
Part III. Pragmatics and contact
- 8. Addressing peers in a Spanish-English bilingual classroom 135
- 9. Style variation in Spanish as a heritage language 153
- 10. “Baby I'm Sorry, te juro, I'm Sorry” 173
- 11. Cross-linguistic influence of the Cuzco Quechua epistemic system on Andean Spanish 191
- 12. La negación en la frontera domínico-haitiana 211
-
Part IV. Variation and contact
- 13. On the development of contact varieties 237
- 14. Linguistic and social predictors of copula use in Galician Spanish 253
- 15. Apuntes preliminares sobre el contacto lingüístico y dialectal en el uso pronominal del español en Nueva York 275
- 16. Is the past really the past in narrative discourse? 297
- 17. The impact of linguistic constraints on the expression of futurity in the Spanish of New York Colombians 311
- 18. Quantitative evidence for contact-induced accommodation 329
- 19. Está muy diferente a como era antes 345
-
Part V. Bozal Spanish
- 20. Where and how does bozal Spanish survive? 359
- 21. The appearance and use of bozal language in Cuban and Brazilian neo-African literature 377
- Index 395
