Abstract
Previous work has shown that both native and nonnative listeners’ production and perception of regional variation changes with an individual’s residential history, social ties, and exposure to different dialects. The present study investigates the relationship between L2 learners’ dialect familiarity and their ability to understand and identify regional varieties in the read speech of native speakers from six different regions. The source and depth of participants’ past dialect exposure, as well as a measure of their proficiency in Spanish, were also accounted for in this investigation of 60 L1 English speakers’ performance on a transcription task and a dialect identification task. Results revealed that familiarity was a significant predictor of learners’ dialect identification regardless of level, and it also predicted the dialect comprehension of more advanced students. Comprehension but not identification was also more accurate when multiple types of exposure were reported and when exposure was through native instructors, study abroad, and media from a specific region. Ultimately, the present findings shed light on second language learners’ comprehension and identification of different regional varieties of Spanish with and without prior exposure to each dialect, including the effects of different sources of exposure on participants’ perception.
Appendix. Comprehension task (presented in random order)
Utterance | Part A | Part B |
---|---|---|
Mientras las abejas zumban por todas partes | Colombia | Mexico |
Todos los tesoros de las islas | Peru | Mexico |
Se consideraba un excelente experto | Spain | Venezuela |
Desde ahora sabe qué hacer en verano y en invierno también | Argentina | Colombia |
En el primer lote había dos cisnes negros | Mexico | Peru |
Yo sé que viajar instruye mucho | Mexico | Spain |
Nunca me lo habría imaginado así | Venezuela | Cuba |
El hombre descubre la clave | Spain | Cuba |
El boxeador extraño se exasperó al tomar el examen | Cuba | Peru |
Una colección de cien publicaciones | Cuba | Argentina |
Veintinueve vacas hambrientas vuelven a comer hierba | Argentina | Spain |
Al llegar a la llanura lluviosa | Peru | Argentina |
Identification task - Excerpt 1
“Yo no veo ningún caballo” le dije a ella al llegar a la llanura lluviosa. Yo sé que viajar instruye mucho pero ayer en la calle de Nueva York, con el billete en el bolsillo, nunca me lo habría imaginado así.
Identification task - Excerpt 2
El cazador de libros se sentía feliz al encontrar en una casa señorial de Zaragoza una colección de cien publicaciones científicas insólitas.
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© 2018 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Research Articles
- Grammatical change in borderlands Spanish: A variationist analysis of copula variation and progressive expansion in a South Texas bilingual enclave community
- Measuring /s/ variation among younger generations in a migrant settlement in Lima, Peru
- Context of learning and second language development of Spanish vowels
- El castellano del Caribe colombiano en la ciudad de Nueva York: El uso variable de sujetos pronominales
- Microvariación sintáctico-semántica-pragmática: El infinitivo frente al subjuntivo en el español (caribeño y mexicano)
- The intonation of Chota Valley Spanish: Contact-induced phenomena at the discourse-phonology interface
- Dialect comprehension and identification in L2 Spanish: Familiarity and type of exposure
- Rhotics of Taos, New Mexico Spanish: Variation and Change
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Research Articles
- Grammatical change in borderlands Spanish: A variationist analysis of copula variation and progressive expansion in a South Texas bilingual enclave community
- Measuring /s/ variation among younger generations in a migrant settlement in Lima, Peru
- Context of learning and second language development of Spanish vowels
- El castellano del Caribe colombiano en la ciudad de Nueva York: El uso variable de sujetos pronominales
- Microvariación sintáctico-semántica-pragmática: El infinitivo frente al subjuntivo en el español (caribeño y mexicano)
- The intonation of Chota Valley Spanish: Contact-induced phenomena at the discourse-phonology interface
- Dialect comprehension and identification in L2 Spanish: Familiarity and type of exposure
- Rhotics of Taos, New Mexico Spanish: Variation and Change