The Pennsylvania State University
The Graduate School
Department of Spanish, Italian and Portuguese
SUBJECT EXPRESSION IN MINORCAN SPANISH:
CONSEQUENCES OF CONTACT WITH CATALAN
A Dissertation in
Spanish
by
Ana de Prada Pérez
© 2009 Ana de Prada Pérez
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements
for the Degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
May 2009 The dissertation of Ana de Prada Pérez was reviewed and approved* by the following:
Almeida Jacqueline Toribio Professor of Spanish and Linguistics Dissertation Advisor Chair of Committee
John M. Lipski Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Spanish and Linguistics
Nuria Sagarra Assistant Professor of Spanish Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
Barbara E. Bullock Professor of French and Linguistics
J. Marc Authier Associate Professor of French and Linguistics Special Signatory
Henry J. Gerfen Associate Professor of Spanish and Linguistics Head of the Department of Spanish, Italian and Portuguese
*Signatures are on file in the Graduate School
ii ABSTRACT
This dissertation project examines bilingual speech, specifically subject expression in Catalan-Spanish bilinguals in Minorca, Spain. Antecedent research has mostly focused on bilingual speech in situations where one of the languages enjoys official status and the other is employed in restricted domains or where only one of the languages is spoken by the society at large. Minorca offers a different landscape, one in which Catalan and Spanish are used in public and private milieus. This linguistic situation, it is argued here, enhances the emergence of contact-induced linguistic patterns. Of particular interest are the rates and patterns of subject expression and omission in bilingual varieties of Spanish and Catalan.
Subject expression in Spanish has received much attention from linguists in diverse sub-disciplines, employing diverse theoretical frameworks and methodological tools. This variation has been most convincingly examined by applying variable rule analysis to naturalistic data collected via sociolinguistic interviews. Variationist studies have revealed that the expression and omission of subjects in Spanish is determined by numerous factors, among these information structure, Tense/Mood/Aspect, person, and genre. For instance, overt subjects are favored in contexts of topic shift, with first person, and when there is a lack of continuity. More notably, variation has been attested across varieties of Spanish; in particular, contrasts in rates and patterns of subject expression are reported between Caribbean Spanish and other varieties of Spanish (Otheguy et al. 2007).
Syntactic-theoretical treatments of subject expression abound, most concerned with the formal features that license null subjects. Thus, cross-linguistic differences between null subject languages and non-null subject languages have been attributed to the features of functional projections such as Agr and Tns. While null subjects are licensed by properties of the ‘core’ or narrow syntax of null subject languages, the appearance of overt subjects in such languages is constrained by the informational context. Thus, in contrast to null subjects, the expression of overt subjects in null subject languages is regulated by properties of the ‘peripheral’ grammar, specifically, the area where the syntax interfaces with the discourse/ pragmatics. This generalization has been widely exploited in the literature on child bilingualism, adult second language acquisition, and first language attrition, for the most part by reference to data obtained via experimental research designs. The works of Antonella Sorace and her colleagues indicate that while the
iii core syntax remains unchanged in language contact situations, the peripheral grammars (i.e., the syntax interfaces with other modules) are susceptible to inter-lingual effects. For instance, while Spanish-English bilinguals accept null subjects in Spanish (and reject them in English), they demonstrate the emergence of pragmatically-infelicitous overt pronominal subjects in Spanish.
The use of pragmatically-infelicitous overt pronominal subjects in Spanish has been interpreted in two manners: one view identifies this pattern with a simplification process or strategy of cognitive economy attendant to bilingual speech (Sorace 2004); the second view describes it as a convergent outcome, rendering the contact languages more alike (Bullock & Toribio 2004, Toribio 2004). These two approaches make distinct predictions for outcomes in situations of contact between two null subject languages. The simplification approach predicts an increase in overt subjects, as a consequence of a universal process that allows for bilinguals to compensate for the increased processing load of articulating different types of information (syntactic and discursive). In contrast, a convergence account would predict an intermediate rate of overt subjects between the rates observed in the two languages in contact.
This dissertation project expands on previous research by examining Spanish in contact with Catalan in
Minorca. The project examines variation between null subject languages, by reference to data from two very closely related languages, and it explores bilingual outcomes, by comparing monolingual and bilingual
Spanish data. The aim is to examine the role of language-internal and language-external factors in the emergence of contact-induced forms. To that end, naturalistic Spanish language samples were collected from twelve monolingual Spanish speakers, eleven Spanish L1 bilinguals, and twelve Catalan L1 bilinguals, who were recorded in Spanish; in addition, naturalistic Catalan data were gathered from twelve
Catalan-dominant speakers (as there are no monolingual Catalan speakers). All language samples were recorded during an interview in which participants reported on their language history, participated in an ethnolinguistic survey, and responded to questions on language attitudes and ideologies. The recordings ranged from 49.40 minutes (4,369 words) to 99.70 minutes (11,399 words). Data were transcribed and the first 300 relevant tokens produced by each participant were coded and submitted to statistical analysis using
Goldvarb X (Sankoff, Tagliamonte & Smith 2006). Apart from the overall rate of subject expression, eleven language-internal variables were considered in the distribution of null, overt pronominal, and overt lexical
iv subjects: person and number, discourse function, distance from previous mention, focus, co-referentiality, clause type, animacy, semantic and syntactic verb type, tense continuity, and verb form ambiguity. In addition, seven language-external variables were considered: age, gender, place of residence, first language, second language proficiency, and first and second language use.
Results indicate that overall rates of overt pronominal subjects are not significantly different in
Spanish and Catalan (10.6% and 11.9%). The bilinguals rates in overt pronominal subjects are not significantly different from those in monolingual Spanish (12.8% in the Spanish L1 and 12.6% in the
Catalan L1 bilinguals), as predicted by Bullock & Toribio (2004) and Toribio (2004). However, multivariate regressional analyses reveal differences in constraint ranking between Spanish and Catalan.
Interestingly, the bilinguals mostly display intermediate positions, i.e., convergent outcomes. Evidence of a bilingual continuum, where the Catalan L1 bilinguals are closer to the Catalan data than the Spanish L1 bilinguals, is also present in the patterns of subject expression, instantiated in constraint ranking differences. Apart from the effect found for L1, proficiency was also returned as significant. Catalan L1 speakers with higher proficiency in Spanish and Spanish L1 speakers with higher proficiency in Catalan display more monolingual-like patterns than those who exhibit more disparate proficiencies across their two languages.
This project contributes to various fields. The examination of two sister languages, and monolingual and bilingual varieties of the same language, further enlightens our knowledge of linguistic variation in subject expression, and how to better establish systematic comparisons between typologically similar varieties. The analysis of the speech of bilinguals of two null subject languages argues for the emergence of converged outcomes in their speech. The lack of an increase in the overall rate of overt pronominal subjects indicates a convergent outcome, and patterns in between those in Spanish and those in Catalan indicate convergence. Finally, the examination of a linguistic community displaying extensive and established bilingualism furthers our understanding of the effect of social prestige and other external variables that cannot be explored in other communities.
Keywords: Subject expression, variation, microvariation, bilingualism, convergence, simplification,
Spanish, Catalan, Minorca
v Table of Contents List of Tables...... xv Acknowledgments...... xviii Chapter 1 Introduction: Bilingualism and language contact...... 1
1. Justification, goals, and contributions of the research project...... 1
1.1. Sociolinguistics and bilingualism in Minorca...... 2
1.2. Contact linguistics and bilingualism in Minorca...... 3
1.3. Language variation and bilingualism in Minorca...... 4
2. Organization...... 5 Chapter 2 The Sociolinguistic Background: External Factors in the Creation of a Bilingual Community...... 9
1. External factors in bilingual research...... 9
1.1. Social factors in bilingual research...... 9
1.2. Individual factors in bilingual research...... 12
2. Minorca: A historical overview...... 16
3. Minorca’s present day linguistic situation: sociolinguistic data...... 18
3.1. Immigration rates: Changes in population due to mobility...... 18
3.2. Languages...... 18
3.2.1.The effect of language policy and education...... 19
3.2.2.Knowledge of Catalan...... 19
3.2.3.Language use and context...... 21
3.2.3.1.First language, ‘own’ language and ‘habitual’ language...... 21
3.2.3.2.Language in familial contexts...... 23
3.2.3.3.Language in other contexts...... 24
3.2.4.Language attitudes...... 27
3.3. Summary...... 30
vi 4. Valladolid...... 30
5. Research questions: The effect of external variables on bilingual speech...... 31
5.1. Bilingualism and Convergence...... 31
5.2. External Factors and Bilingualism...... 32 Chapter 3 Subject expression in Spanish and Catalan...... 33
1. Introduction...... 33
2. Variables involved in subject expression in monolingual Spanish and Catalan...... 35
2.1. Discourse-related variables...... 36
2.2. Lexico-semantic and morphology-related variables...... 42
2.3. External factors...... 45
3. Bilingual subject expression...... 49
3.1. Contact between a null and a non-null subject language...... 49
3.2. Contact between two null subject languages...... 55
4. Simplification in subject expression...... 56
5. Summary...... 57
6. Contact subject expression between two null subject languages: Spanish in contact with Catalan in Minorca...... 58 Chapter 4 The Present Study: Method. Examining a Bilingual Community...... 60
1. Research questions and hypotheses...... 60
1.1. Internal factors: Variation in subject expression...... 61
1.2. External factors...... 62
1.3. Contact outcomes...... 65
2. Participants...... 67
3. Materials...... 77
4. Procedure...... 80
5. Coding...... 82
vii 6. Summary...... 89 Chapter 5 Results: Microvariation and Contact Effects in Subject Expression...... 90
1. Spanish monolingual speakers...... 90
1.1. Spanish monolingual speakers: Overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects. 91
1.1.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in the overt (lexical and pronominal) vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 93
1.1.2.Variable ranking in the overt (lexical and pronominal) vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 93
1.1.3.Constraint ranking in the overt (lexical and pronominal) vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 94
1.2. Spanish monolingual speakers: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects...... 96
1.2.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in the overt pronominal vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 98
1.2.2.Variable ranking in the overt pronominal vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 98
1.2.3.Constraint ranking in the overt pronominal vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 98
1.3. Spanish monolingual speakers: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects...... 100
1.3.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in the overt lexical vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 102
1.3.2.Variable ranking in the overt lexical vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 102
1.3.3.Constraint ranking in the overt lexical vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 102
1.4. Spanish monolingual speakers: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects...... 104
1.4.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in the overt lexical vs. overt pronominal subject distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 106
1.4.2.Variable ranking in the overt lexical vs. overt pronominal subject distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 107
1.4.3.Constraint ranking in the overt lexical vs. overt pronominal subject distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers...... 107
1.5. Spanish monolingual speakers: Summary...... 108
viii 2. Catalan data...... 109
2.1. Catalan data: Overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects...... 109
2.1.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data...... 111
2.1.2.Variable ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data...... 112
2.1.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data...... 112
2.2. Catalan data: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects...... 113
2.2.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data...... 115
2.2.2.Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data ...... 116
2.2.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data ...... 116
2.3. Catalan data: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects...... 117
2.3.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data...... 119
2.3.2.Variable ranking in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data...... 120
2.3.3.Constraint ranking in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data...... 120
2.4. Catalan data: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects...... 121
2.4.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in the Catalan data...... 123
2.4.2.Variable ranking in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in the Catalan data...... 123
2.4.3.Constraint ranking in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in the Catalan data...... 123
2.5. Catalan data: Summary...... 124
3. Microvariation: comparison between Spanish and Catalan...... 124
4. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 126
4.1. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects...... 126
ix 4.1.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in subject expression in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 129
4.1.2.Variable ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 130
4.1.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 130
4.2. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects...... 131
4.2.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 134
4.2.2.Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 134
4.2.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 135
4.3. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects...... 135
4.3.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 138
4.3.2.Variable ranking in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 138
4.3.3.Constraint ranking in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 139
4.4. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects...... 140
4.4.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 142
4.4.2.Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 142
4.4.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers...... 143
4.5. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Summary...... 144
5. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 144
5.1. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects...... 145
5.1.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 147
5.1.2.Variable ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 148
x 5.1.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 148
5.2. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects...... 149
5.2.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 152
5.2.2.Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 152
5.2.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 152
5.3. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects...... 153
5.3.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 156
5.3.2.Variable ranking in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 157
5.3.3.Constraint ranking in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 157
5.4. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects...... 157
5.4.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 160
5.4.2.Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 160
5.4.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers...... 160
5.5. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Summary...... 161
6. Contact effects: monolingual vs. bilingual speakers...... 161
6.1. Group differences in subject expression: Bilingual vs. monolingual speech...... 163
6.2. Variables and constraints: Evidence of contact effects and a bilingual continuum...... 166
6.2.1.Variables implicated in subject expression and their ranking...... 168
6.2.2.Constraint ranking...... 170
7. Summary...... 174 Chapter 6 Discussion: Internal and External Factors in Subject Expression in Minorcan Spanish...... 175
xi 1. Language-internal factors: Variation in subject expression...... 175
1.1. Variables implicated in subject expression...... 176
1.2. Variable hierarchies implicated in subject expression...... 176
1.3. Constraint hierarchies in subject expression...... 176
2. Language-external factors: Variation in subject expression...... 178
2.1. Place of birth...... 178
2.2. Age...... 179
2.3. Native language...... 179
2.4. Proficiency...... 180
2.5. Language usage...... 181
3. Contact outcomes...... 182
3.1. Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence...... 183
3.2. Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence in subject expression variables...... 184
3.3. Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence in subject expression variables hierarchies...... 185
3.4. Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence in subject expression constraint hierarchies...... 185
4. Summary and conclusions...... 186
4.1. Minorcan Spanish is different from Valladolid monolingual Spanish...... 187
4.2. Dominant language, language use, and dominance patterns as central to the emergence of contact-induced patterns...... 187
4.3. Contact outcomes as simplification and convergence...... 188
5. Summary...... 190 Chapter 7 Conclusion: The fields of language variation, bilingualism, and sociolinguistics: Contributions and directions for future research...... 192
1. Language variation: Micro- and dialectal variation in subject expression in null subject languages...... 192
2. Bilingualism: Pulling forces in language outcomes...... 194
3. Sociolinguistics: Minorca, extensive and established bilingualism...... 197
xii Appendix A Immigration by Autonomous Communities from 2000 to 2006 Source: INE...... 200 Appendix B Foreign population in the Balearic Islands in 2000 and 2006 ...... 201 Appendix C Language of Instruction in the academic year 2003-2004. 202 Appendix D Percentage of knowledge of Catalan Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey...... 203 Appendix E Percentages of L1, native language and habitual language Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey...... 204 Appendix F Percentages of language use in familial contexts Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey...... 206 Appendix G Percentages of language use in other contexts Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey...... 212 Appendix H Percentages of reactions to someone replying in a language other than the one they use (Minorca) Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey ...... 215 Appendix I Percentages of use of Catalan rate Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey...... 216 Appendix J Percentages of opinions of the presence of the languages compulsory education Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey...... 217 Appendix K Percentages of agreement with the statement: “In the Balearic Islands, everyone should know Catalan/Spanish” Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey...... 218 Appendix L Percentages of agreement with the statement: “Only those that can speak the language of the Balearic Islands are fully from Majorca, Minorca, Ibiza and Formentera” Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey ...... 220 Appendix M Percentages of opinions about the need to extend the use of Catalan or Spanish Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey...... 221
xiii Appendix N Peninsular Immigration to Minorca during 2007 Source: Institut Balear d’Estadística...... 222 Appendix O Part I of the interview: Language history...... 223 Appendix P Part II of the interview: Ethnolinguistic Interview...... 226 Appendix Q Part III of the interview: Survey of language attitudes and ideologies...... 228 References...... 233
xiv List of Tables Table 3.1: Discourse-related Variables and Associated Constraints ...... 37
Table 3.2: Lexico-semantic and morphology-related Variables and Associated Constraints ...... 42
Table 3.3: External Variables and Associated Constraints ...... 46
Table 3.4: Dialectal variation in overall rates of pronominal subject expression ...... 47
Table 3.5: Variable Ranking in New York Spanish ...... 53
Table 3.6: Constraint ranking in New York Spanish ...... 54
Table 4.1: Participants ...... 68
Table 4.2: Selected participants ...... 69
Table 4.3: Catalan L1 bilinguals’ language dominance and L2 proficiency ...... 70
Table 4.4: Spanish L1 bilinguals’ language dominance and L2 proficiency ...... 71
Table 4.5: Language use patterns ...... 72
Table 4.6: Importance of L1 and L2...... 73
Table 4.7: Language, culture and identity...... 75
Table 4.8: Dialectal variation and prestige...... 76
Table 4.9: Bilinguals’ Spanish Recordings...... 81
Table 4.10: Monolinguals’ Recordings...... 82
Table 4.11: Variables and Associated Constraints...... 88
Table 5.1: Results: Overt subjects vs. null subjects. Monolingual group...... 91
Table 5.2: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects. Monolingual group...... 96
Table 5.3: Results: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects. Monolingual group...... 100
Table 5.4: Results: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects. Monolingual group...... 105
xv Table 5.5: Results: Overt subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan data...... 110
Table 5.6: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan data...... 114
Table 5.7: Results: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan data...... 118
Table 5.8: Results: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects. Catalan data...... 121
Table 5.9: Results from Catalan and Spanish data combined...... 124
Table 5.10: Differences in constraint patterning between Spanish and Catalan...... 125
Table 5.11: Results: Overt vs. null subjects. Spanish L1 bilinguals...... 127
Table 5.12: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects. Spanish L1 bilinguals...... 132
Table 5.13: Results: Overt lexical subject vs. null subjects. Spanish L1 bilinguals...... 136
Table 5.14: Results: Overt pronominal vs. overt lexical subjects. Spanish L1 bilinguals...... 140
Table 5.15: Results: Overt vs. null subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals...... 145
Table 5.16: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals...... 150
Table 5.17: Results: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals...... 154
Table 5.18: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals.
...... 158
Table 5.19: Bilingual vs. monolingual Spanish subject expression...... 163
Table 5.20: Overt subject expression across the groups...... 164
Table 5.21: Overt pronominal subject expression across the groups...... 164
Table 5.22: Overt lexical subject expression across the groups...... 165
Table 5.23: The distribution of overt pronominal and lexical subjects across the groups...... 165
Table 5.24 Monolingual Spanish vs. Spanish L1 bilinguals...... 166
Table 5.25 Monolingual Spanish vs. Catalan L1 bilinguals...... 167
xvi Table 5.26 Spanish L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan L1 bilinguals...... 167
Table 5.27 Spanish L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan data...... 167
Table 5.28 Catalan L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan data...... 168
Table 5.29: Comparison of significant variables and their rankings across groups...... 169
Table 5.30: Comparison of patterns, as instantiated in constraints) across groups...... 171
xvii Acknowledgments This project has benefitted from the generous help of many people. Without their help, this dissertation would have been very different. First, I am extremely indebted to my committee members: Almeida
Jacqueline Toribio, Barbara Bullock, John Lipski, Nuria Sagarra and Marc Authier, for their useful comments and for always having an open door for me. Jacqueline and Barbara taught two seminars on language contact where I found inspiration for this dissertation. I cannot thank Jacqueline enough for the professional model she provides, her many comments on the many versions of this and other projects, and especially her collegiality and friendship. She is the best advisor, friend, and adoptive mom one could have.
I am grateful to Barbara for numerous reasons. Her comments, advice, friendship, and support are invaluable. She is one of the most intelligent people I know. Her cat, Emma, also deserves a thank you, for her help coding the data. John Lipski has been very helpful throughout my years at Penn State. I wished I had visited his office more often during my first years. I believe I have taken all the classes he offered during my years at Penn State, even during my last semester on campus. Nuria helped me with SPSS and had great comments that I would have never come up with myself. It’s great to have someone that has a different perspective. Marc Authier has been very supportive, even when I decided not to work on syntax. I am so thankful to Verónica González López and Gabriela Zapata for their numerous and right-on comments on the manuscript. I am also indebted to Phil Baldi for his excellent classes and unbeatable sense of humor.
Jim Flege, Marta Ortega-Llebaría, Ricardo Otheguy, Liliana Sánchez, and Antonella Sorace visited Penn
State and inspired me greatly. There are some professors and teachers during my previous education who also deserve thanks: Don Ángel and Don Julio (C. P. San Fernando), Juan Luis González Robledo and
Javier Pascual (I.E.S. Núñez de Arce), and Raquel Fernández Fuertes, Teresa Solías, and José Zamora
Salamanca (Universidad de Valladolid).
This project would have been impossible without the generous NSF Dissertation Research
Improvement Grant # 0746748. Apart from making the fieldwork possible, it allowed me to attend a number of professional conferences. I am grateful to the audiences in the Hispanic Linguistic Symposium, the Linguistic Symposium of Romance Languages, the Boston University Conference on Language
Development, and the Western Conference on Linguistics for useful comments on presentations of segments of this dissertation project.
xviii Doing fieldwork implies getting so many people involved. I decided to work in Minorca after spending many summer vacations there speaking to my good friends Santi, Maria Elena, and Ioli. They inspired me to work on their variety of Spanish. Santi has offered many grammaticality judgements over email during the last four years. ¡Gracias! When I decided to do fieldwork in Minorca I was assisted by the offices of l’Institut Menorquí d’Estudis and Consell Insular de Menorca. Special thanks are due to Eva Florit Pons, at the Servei d’Asssessorament Lingüístic (Linguistic Advice Service), and Manuel Monerris and Joan Coll
Pons, delegados territoriales de educación en Menorca (territorial officers of education in Minorca). Maria
Antonia García helped me find demographic data on Minorca and gave me multiple references to works on
Minorca. She is a great friend. César Giraldó and Araceli de Prada Espinel contacted participants and took me to each and every house where I recorded my participants. The interviews in Catalan were carried out by Eva Florit Pons. Moltes gràcias per la teva ajuda i la teva amistat! In Valladolid, I have to thank my family and friends for helping me contact participants. My participants are the ones who made this project possible. Unfortunately I have to thank you anonymously. Once I had all these data, several research assistants helped me process it: Analia Alcolea, Pepe Álvarez, Mark Amengual, Ernesto Carriazo-Osorio,
Carmen Castro, Lorena Cuya Gavilano, Natalia Guzmán, Bonnie Holmes, Elizabeth Finanger, and Arthur
Wendorf. Britton Smith helped me with my technology battles and serious data entry. Thanks so much!
Finally, I would like to thank all the people who have made these busy years so much fun: my students
(most of them at least!), my friends in Spain, especially, Álvaro, Ana, Dani, Elsa, Emilio, Irene, Lidi, María and Marta, and those here, Álvaro, Eva, Hilary, Ryan and Vero, in particular. Vero may know my own data better than I do. She is a great friend and colleague. Ryan was always there whenever I needed him. Thank you for everything, including conversation, coffee, hot chocolate, lots of food (best cakes ever!) and many car rides! My family has been very supportive. Mi familia lejana en realidad son familia cercana para mi.
¡Gracias Carlos, Carlitos, Mari Tere, Seve, Mari Paz, David, Marta, Javi, Cristina y Davicín! Les debo tanto a mi familia cercana; mis padres son los mejores padres del mundo, me han apoyado en todas mis decisiones, incluso en la de venirme tan lejos y me han dado todo lo necesario para completar mis estudios
(¡incluídas nuestras conversaciones diarias de más de una hora!), mi hermana, Paz, probablemente es la que me da más guerra por haberme ido, y ¡eso también es de agradecer! Y Mari, ¡muchas gracias! Me siento tan afortunada de tener a mis cuatro abuelos (Mariano y Carmen, y Aquilino y Araceli), mis seis primos (Patri,
xix Harry, Luis, Javi, Henar y Elena) y mis cuatro tíos (Araceli y César, Luis y Pilar) tan cerca aunque físicamente estén tan lejos. Lastly, I would like to thank Britton for his love. These years with you have been wonderful. My ‘in-laws’ have definitively contributed to my happiness greatly. Thanks, Jane, Larry, and Breland!
xx Chapter 1
Introduction:
Bilingualism and language contact
This project examines the possible contributions of both external and internal factors in the production of bilingual speech forms. More specifically, it considers a contact situation between two closely-related languages —Spanish and Catalan— in an area of the grammar where inter-lingual influence has been reported for other language contact situations—i.e. subject expression—in a context of extensive bilingualism, Minorca. Three broad questions are posed in this project: Is Minorcan bilingual Spanish different from Valladolid monolingual Spanish1 with respect to rates and patterns of subject expression? If so, what factors are implicated in the emergence of contact-induced patterns of subject expression in
Minorcan Spanish? And how are such patterns to be interpreted?
This chapter embeds the study within the fields of sociolinguistics and language contact, relating it to antecedent literature, explaining the goals, and articulating the applications of the present project to these fields. The chapter concludes with a presentation of the organization of the dissertation.
1. Justification, goals, and contributions of the research project
Bilingualism constitutes a topic in linguistics that has been researched from different points of view or subfields. Some researchers attend to individual bilingualism, others to bilingualism as a social phenomenon. Psycholinguists and neurolinguists, for instance, are concerned with the the acquisition of two languages throughout the lifespan and the localization and alterations in the organization of languages in the brain. In turn, social psychologists and sociolinguists focus on the attitudes and attributes that are implicated in language usage and language maintenance vs. shift among bilinguals. Still others, e.g., language planners, consider bilingualism in view of specific language policies and social initiatives. A
1 The reasons why the Spanish monolingual group is from Valladolid is further explained in Chapter 2, §6. In a nutshell, there are no monolingual Spanish speakers in Minorca so speakers were selected from the Peninsula. Among the four communities with the smallest immigration rates, Castilla y León and Cantabria are the only two with monolingual speakers. Since both have similar immigration rates, Valladolid (in Castilla y León) was selected for convenience. distinct approach is offered by scholars in contact linguistics, whose concerns center on the consequences of bilingualism on the contributing language systems. The interdisciplinary nature of the study of bilingual speech is exemplified by researchers with interests in language variation, who describe and formalize patterns of variation with sociolinguistic and morpho-syntactic tools and frameworks.
This project undertakes the study of bilingualism from the perspective of sociolinguistics, contact linguistics, and language variation.
1.1. Sociolinguistics and bilingualism in Minorca
Much research on bilingualism has focused on the speech of immigrant groups. In many such efforts, the language of the larger society and that of the immigrant community correspond to distinct language families, and the immigrant language is restricted to the local community (see the influential works of
Winford, Muysken, Myers-Scotton, and Thomason & Kaufman, among numerous others). Such is the case, for instance, of Spanish in the U.S. or Turkish in Germany and the Netherlands. However, more intense bilingualism, where the languages share more common traits than differences and where both can be used in all contexts, can promote more profound impacts of each language on the other. This project explores the structural outcomes of bilingualism in such a situation: Spanish in contact with Catalan in Minorca, Spain.
Minorca presents a laboratory-like controlled context for the study of Spanish in contact with Catalan, for numerous and diverse reasons. It is a Catalan Country that witnessed the rapid introduction of Spanish during the Franco dictatorship. More recently, it has enjoyed the introduction of laws protecting Catalan.
The present-day population is relatively stable, with little tourism and immigration until recent years, and the society is markedly bilingual, with both Catalan and Spanish extensively present in private realms and public forums, including the media and education. Although Catalan is preferred by the majority of the population in social situations, speakers demonstrate native-like proficiency in Spanish in most cases, with the exception of some sectors of the elderly population, characterized by later access to Spanish, limited
Spanish-language education, and reduced Spanish-language usage. The population targeted by the present study has lived in Minorca for at least 10 years, ensuring contact with Catalan over a large period of time.
Several language-external variables related to the bilingual individual and the bilingual society are considered in the grouping of the participants: place of birth, age, language dominance, native language,
2 receptive and productive proficiencies, and language usage. One innovation of this dissertation project lies in examining bilingual outcomes by reference to these external factors, as well as the traditional language- internal factors (e.g., dicourse-pragmatic, lexico-semantic, and morphology-related variables).
1.2. Contact linguistics and bilingualism in Minorca
As described, Minorca, where Catalan and Spanish are extensively used, and whose population is highly proficient in both languages, provides the ideal venue to explore the roles of social prestige and extensive use of the language in the emergence of novel structures. The changes or innovations that emerge in bilingual speech, and the restrictions and principles that constrain these, have been the concern of contact linguistics. Numerous bilingual situations have been explored, from pairings of typologically very different languages to pairings of dialects of the same language. These studies provide useful information to determine limitations on admissible forms in natural grammars. Although some researchers have posited no restrictions (see the extensive cross-linguistic studies of Thomason & Kaufman 1988), subsequent studies have recognized some constraints. In addition, researchers differ on the characterization of potential structural innovations. For instance, while Thomason (2001) proposes a borrowing scale from casual contact to intense contact based on length and intensity of contact, generative/minimalist approaches delimit domains of potential influence. This latter approach contrasts the core or narrow syntax with the peripheral syntax, where the syntax interfaces with other modules such as the discourse/pragmatics.
Consider Spanish, a null subject language: A change in a core property (pertaining to the formal features of
Agr and Tns) would result in obligatorily expressed subject pronouns, while a change in a peripheral property (loss of constraints on discursive licensing) could return more frequent and infelicitous
(pragmatically odd) use of overt pronouns.
The predominant question that guides research on bilingualism and contact linguistics is whether the innovations present in bilingual, as compared to monolingual speech, reflect an acceleration of an internal change in progress, a universal process of simplification, or convergence with the cohort language, the latter two of interest here. Consider again subject expression in Spanish. The alternation between the null and the overt pronominal subjects is regulated by discursive-pragmatic factors, e.g., null subjects are favored by discourse continuity, and overt subjects are preferred in contexts of focus/emphasis and
3 disambiguation. In addition, the distribution is subject to variation, e.g., overt forms are more frequent with first person singular pronouns than with others and they are favored by estimative predicates over other types of verbs. In Spanish in contact with English, the variable distribution of overt subjects has been reported to differ from that manifested in monolingual varieties of Spanish, both in the overall rate of overt subjects and in the use of pragmatically-illicit subjects (Lapidus & Otheguy 2005a, b, Lipski 1996, Montrul
2004, Otheguy & Zentella 2007, Otheguy et al. 2007, Silva-Corvalán 1994):
(1) ¿Por qué se fue Pepe? ‘Why did Pepe leave?’
Monolingual norm: Porque Ø tenía que estudiar. ‘Because he had to study.’
Bilingual Spanish: Porque él tenía que estudiar.
This outcome can be explained as a universal simplification process, in that the processing of the pragmatic content of the overt pronoun is suspended, a strategy of cognitive economy (Sorace 2004). An alternative explanation of the infelicitous presence of the pronominal form in the bilingual Spanish utterance holds that Spanish becomes more similar to or convergent with English by presenting more overt subjects (Bullock & Toribio 2004, Toribio 2004). As should be evident, innovative speech patterns that emerge in situations of contact between typologically different languages cannot provide the testing ground for these hypothesis because both predict an increase in the rate of overt pronominal subjects. Contact between two null subject languages with similar rates of overt pronominal subjects, on the other hand, can tease apart simplification from convergence. A universal process like simplification would take place irrespective of the language pairing, predicting an increase in the rate and infelicitous patterns of overt pronominal subjects in Spanish in contact with another null subject language. The alternative approach predicts no increase in the overall rate since the languages converge on subject expression. In addition, they may as well converge in patterns. Thus, the present study can illuminate the mechanism underlying language contact outcomes by examining variation in subject expression in two null subject languages in contact: Spanish and Catalan.
1.3. Language variation and bilingualism in Minorca
Subject expression in Spanish has received significant attention from researchers with interests in language variation. Of relevance here are those studies that employ a variable rule analysis (Bayley &
4 Pease-Álvarez 1996, 1997, Cameron 1996, Flores-Ferrán 2004, Lapidus & Otheguy 2005, Otheguy &
Zentella 2007, Otheguy et al. 2007, Travis 2005, 2007), where the contribution of language-internal and language-external variables is analyzed in naturalistic data. Employing this methodology, Otheguy et al.
(2007) report significant differences with respect to rates and patterns of pronoun expression in Mainland and Caribbean Spanish varieties in contact with English in New York City. This dissertation project extends that work through its attention to subject expression in Minorcan Spanish, of importance in that little is known of Minorcan Spanish and of the outcomes of contact between two null subject languages. More generally, the project expands on previous research by applying variationist methods in responding to broad questions posed in the bilingualism and language contact literatures and in confronting current theories on microvariation with novel data.
To summarize, this dissertation project on Minorcan bilingual Spanish contributes to sociolinguistics, by examining the role of language prestige and other external variables in the production of bilingual speech forms; it contributes to contact linguistics, by determining whether language contact outcomes are better explained by simplification or convergence; and it contributes to the study of language variation, by examining the variable and constraint hierarchies in bilingual Catalan vs. bilingual Spanish vs. monolingual
Spanish.
2. Organization
This dissertation project examines subject expression in Spanish in contact with Catalan in Minorca.
The social context, the language pairing, and the double nature of subject expression in Spanish, i.e. regulated by core and peripheral properties, provide the ideal terrain for examining claims about the role of language prestige and external factors, the role of language similarity, and the role of restrictions and processes underlying language contact. These ideas are developed in the following chapters.
Chapter 2 introduces the language-external factors explored in bilingualism research and outlines the bilingual society of Minorca, describing the socio-historical events that have led to the present-day situation of extensive bilingualism. Discussion of the effects of Franco’s regime, migratory waves, especially that of the 60s, and the legal protection attempts is followed by an examination of the data collected in a sociolinguistic study carried out in 2003 by the Department of Linguistic Policies (Direcció General de
5 Política Lingüística) in the Education and Cultural Ministry (Coselleria d’Educació i Cultura). This study attends to important factors such as knowledge and use of Catalan, as well as attitudes towards Catalan, and reveals notable interactions between these factors and external factors such as age, gender, place of birth, place of residence, first language (L1), and language dominance. At the end of the chapter, a brief introduction to the research questions related to the socio-historical context of the project is presented.
Chapter 3 discusses the existing literature on subject expression in Spanish. It begins by presenting the variables (factor groups) that have been shown to play a role in the distribution of null and overt subjects in
Spanish. These variables are language-internal (discourse-related, lexico-semantic, and morphology- related) and language-external (individual and societal). As will become aparent, there is no consensus in the literature on the significance of some of the variables; however, methodological differences may account for these inconsistencies. The second part of the chapter focuses on bilingual subject expression, reviewing studies of Spanish in contact with English, and, then, research on Spanish in contact with other null subject languages. The former studies generally agree on some degree of influence of English on
Spanish subject expression, although some dissenting findings are discussed. The literature on Spanish in contact with null subject languages, however, presents conflicting results. This dissertation project expands on this literature and readdresses some of the shortcomings of the preceding studies. To conclude the chapter, a succinct discussion of the research questions that emerge from the literature presented in this chapter is offered.
Chapter 4 describes the methodology of this project. The first section articulates the research questions outlined in the preceding two chapters, questions pertaining to the language-internal (dicourse-pragmatic, lexico-semantic, and morphology- related) factors, the language-external (individual and societal) factors implicated in subject expression in monolingual and bilingual Spanish, as well as questions relevant to discussions of the structural outcomes of contact in contexts of societal bilingualism. The chapter subsequently describes the participants, drawing on their responses to an orally administered personal history and language attitudes questionnaires. Following this, the elicitation materials and the procedure are detailed. Lastly, the coding procedure is explained and exemplified.
6 Chapter 5 presents the results of the study. This chapter examines microvariation through a variationist analysis, comparing subject expression use in Spanish and Catalan, and contact effects, by comparing subject expression in monolingual and bilingual Spanish. Four groups of results are presented, one per group of data: Spanish monolingual speakers, Spanish L1 bilingual speakers, Catalan L1 bilingual speakers, and Catalan data from Catalan L1 bilingual speakers. In each of these sections the variables that are significant, their ranking and the ranking of constraints are presented. First, the results for Spanish and
Catalan are presented, with a comparison between these two groups. Subsequently, the results for the two bilingual groups are revealed, followed by comparisons between monolingual and bilingual Spanish.
Chapter 6 discusses the results in light of the research questions set forth in Chapter 4. First, a comparison between subject expression use, instantiated in variable and constraint ranking, across the groups is offered. These comparisons have crucial implications for language variation. Importantly, comparisons across groups are better accounted for by comparing constraint hierarchies (as opposed to variable hierarchies). Second, the language-external factors are discussed for the bilingual groups, determining which external factors are implicated in the emergence of contact-induced forms. Notably, equal dominance in both languages seems to correlate with more monolingual-like behavior, and the speaker’s first language is permeable to inter-language interference. Lastly, the processes underlying subject expression contact outcomes (i.e., simplification and convergence) in Minorcan Spanish are discussed in light of the results obtained.
Lastly, Chapter 7 presents the conclusions and contributions of the present project as well as directions for future research. It connects the findings of the study with the preceding literature explaining the goals achieved, offers applications to the fields of sociolinguistics, contact linguistics and language variation, and presents unresolved issues left for future research. The first section adresses issues of variation in subject expression incorporating the results from monolingual Valladolid Spanish, bilingual Minorcan Spanish and
Minorcan Catalan to previous research. It proposes implementing experimental research methods to facilitate the comparisons across groups. The second section places the present study within current research on bilingualism and, more specifically, with research establishing restrictions on bilingual outcomes and determining the roles of internal and external factors in language contact outcomes. It
7 proposes extending the examination of bilingualism between typologically similar languages to other structures apart from subject expression. In addition, it suggests examining the nature of cognitive load, central to simplification hypotheses. The final section explores the social context of bilingualism in
Minorca. It proposes further study of Spanish L1 speakers with different proficiencies in Catalan.
8 Chapter 2
The Sociolinguistic Background:
External Factors in the Creation of a Bilingual Community
This project considers the potential contribution of the social context of Minorca to the enhancement of contact-induced features in the Spanish of its Spanish-Catalan bilingual residents. For this reason, in this chapter the society of Minorca goes under scrutiny, so as to allow for a better understanding of the language situation of the population under study here. In highlighting some of the historical events and modern-day movements that have shaped the bilingual language situation of Minorca, the location of the study is also justified. Section 1 introduces the role of social and individual factors in bilingual speech. Section 2 and
Section 3 offer relevant background information on Minorca and its history. Subsequently, Section 4 presents a detailed discussion of data from the Sociolinguistic Survey collected by Conselleria d’Educació i
Cultura in Govern de les Illes Balears in 2003. Lastly, Section 5 offers a summary of the preceding discussion. Section 6 presents the site for the collection of monolingual Spanish control data: Valladolid.
Finally, Section 7 introduces the research questions that emerge from the consideration of the sociolinguistic situation in Minorca.
1. External factors in bilingual research
Research on the speech of bilinguals, second language learners, and first language attriters addresses social as well as individual factors that can have an impact on the emergence of contact-induced speech forms. In this section, some of the more relevant external factors are discussed.
1.1. Social factors in bilingual research
In the extant literature on bilingual communities, the focus of study has rested largely on factors affecting language maintenance or effecting language shift and death. The communities can be characterized by whether the two languages in the community are spoken by all the speakers (bilingualism) or not (two monolingual groups within the community). In addition, the functional distribution of the languages characterizes communities as diglossic, if the languages have different domains of usage (e.g.,
9 one language for the domains of family and friendships, and another for the domains of religion, education, and employment), or non-diglossic, if they do not. This distinction was first proposed by Ferguson (1972) to refer to two varieties of the same language. Addressing bilingualism and diglossia, Fishman (1980) proposes four types of communities: neither bilingualism nor diglossia, bilingualism without diglossia, bilingualism with diglossia, and diglossia without bilingualism, each discussed here.
Communities without bilingualism or diglossia are monolingual communities. Diglossia without bilingualism is exemplified by the situation of language minority immigrants; for instance, Chinese in
Spain. Contexts of bilingualism with diglossia are common, and this was the case of Spanish and Catalan in
Minorca during Franco’s regime, when speakers were bilingual, but their languages were functionally distributed: Spanish was the language of the public sphere and Catalan was relegated to private domains.
Bilingualism without diglossia is represented in modern-day Minorca, where both Spanish and Catalan are extensively used and in all contexts. Note, however, that although the society at large is bilingual and non- diglossic, speakers have a preference for one language depending on who they talk to or what they talk about. This configuration (bilingualism without diglossia) is considered very unstable by Fishman (1980) and can lead to language shift.
There are a number of factors that contribute to language maintenance and shift in bilingual situations.
Among these factors are the numerical strength of the group in relation to other minorities and majorities, social class, religious and educational background, settlement patterns, ties with the homeland, degree of similarity between the majority and the minority language, degree of exogamous marriage, attitudes of the majority and the minority, government policy towards language and education of minorities, and patterns of language use (Paulston 1994, Romaine 1995). There is no formula for predicting the outcome of a contact situation, although there are usually factors favoring the maintenance of the language and other factors favoring its loss. In general, large numbers of speakers in the community, middle and upper class speakers, and positive attitudes towards the language from the minority and the majority groups favor the maintenance of the language. But similar situations may give rise to different outcomes. Thus, the weight of each factor may vary from community to community (Baker 2001, Myers-Scotton 2007).
10 Myers-Scotton (2007) proposes grouping these factors in three models: horizontal or vertical multilingualism, social networks, and ethnolinguistic vitality. The model of horizontal or vertical multilingualism is closely-related to Fishman’s (1980) classification of communities. In horizontal multilingualism, there is no bilingualism in the community but in vertical bilingualism there is. Mansour
(1993) describes horizontal bilingualism as a “patchwork quilt”, where the monolingual groups of speakers form the squares. This configuration, where speakers of one of the languages are confined to a rural area or a localized area in an urban setting, and identify with their ethnic group, favors language maintenance. On the other hand, vertical multilingualism, where there are speakers of one language in contact with speakers of other languages, normally in an urban setting and with a common language or a lingua franca, favors language shift.
Social networks, the second model of social factors (Milroy 1980), examines the relationships between speakers. For instance, it analyzes whether a specific language is used with family or with co-workers. The focus can be on an individual or a community. For bilingualism, the focus lies on the community. To examine a community, the network is explored based on the density of the network, that is, whether the community of speakers is tightly-knit or not, and the strength of the ties, that is, the frequency of interaction between speakers as well as the intimacy of their relationship. Groups with strong ties are more likely to maintain a language than groups with weak ties.
The last model for the study of bilingual communities—ethnolinguistic vitality—was introduced by
Giles et al. (1977). It includes sociological variables, such as the status of the language, the number of speakers, and the institutional support, but also subjective ethnolinguistic vitality, i.e., what speakers think about their group (Allard & Landry 1992). By reference to these factors, this model predicts that language maintenance is aided by the high status of the language in a community, a large number of speakers, institutional support, and positive attitudes towards the group.
As will become evident, the insights of Fishman (1980), Myers-Scotton (2007), and other scholars will prove useful in interpreting the role of social variables in the language situation of Minorca. Information regarding the sociological variables is normally obtained through the census or similar surveys. The data presented in Section 4 consist of a detailed sociolinguistic survey conducted by Conselleria d’Educació i
11 Cultura in the Balearic Islands. This survey includes questions on domains of language usage and language attitudes. It also includes items on speakers’ language history and knowledge of Spanish and Catalan, among other individual factors. The following section explains the relevance of individual factors in the study of bilingualism.
1.2. Individual factors in bilingual research
At the level of the individual, researchers have examined a number of factors that have an effect on bilingualism and may be implicated in the emergence of contact-induced forms. Among these individual factors are order and age of acquisition, language proficiency, language dominance, language use, and input.
Bilinguals are classified according to the sequence of acquisition in childhood as (i) simultaneous, 2L1 bilinguals or bilingual L1 acquisition (Genesee 2000, Meisel 2001), when both languages are acquired before the linguistic systems are in place (around age 2 or 3, depending on the author), or (ii) sequential bilinguals, when one of the languages is acquired when the linguistic foundations of the other language are already established. Sequential bilinguals are further divided by age of acquisition into early (or child L2 acquisition) and late bilinguals (or adult L2 acquisition). Montrul (2008) further divides child L2 acquisition into early child L2 acquisition (pre-school acquirers) and late child L2 acquisition (elementary school acquirers). These classifications are based on patterns of bilingual acquisition.
Bilinguals also differ with respect to the quantity and quality of the input samples that they receive. In bilingual acquisition, the quantity of input in one language may be reduced, since the hours when children are exposed to linguistic input are divided between two languages. In fact, Montrul (2008) argues that language deficits in child L2 acquisition are due to reduced input. In addition to the quantity of input, the quality may vary, since the input may be provided by speakers of a converged variety. In Minorca, for instance, children are exposed to Spanish and Catalan, but rarely to monolingual Spanish and never to monolingual Catalan.
In addition, deficits in second language learners can be ascribed to age effects. Multiple studies show that acquiring a language at a later age correlates with a lower proficiency in the language. For instance,
12 Flege and his colleagues report on a correlation between age of acquisition and accentedness ratings
(Aoyama et al. 2008, Flege 1999, Flege & Liu 2001, Flege et al. 2006, Mackay & Flege 2004, Mackay et al. 2006, Piske et al. 2001, Piske et al 2002, Tsukada et al. 2004). Morphosyntactic acquisition studies also report an age effect (Coppieters 1987, Johnson & Newport 1989, 1991, Schachter 1990, Sorace 1993).
These age effects have been explained as a maturational change in the ability to process input. Newport’s
(1988) Less is More Hypothesis, for instance, explains that maturational changes brought about with age do not permit the processing of input into smaller units. The Fundamental Difference Hypothesis (Bley-
Vroman 1988) states that the mechanisms adults and children use to acquire a language are different.
Subsequent maturational theories include Schachter’s (1990) Incompleteness Hypothesis and Sorace’s
(1993) refinement distinguishing two possible non-target-like outcomes in second language acquisition: incomplete and divergent representations. In both cases, second language learners’ representations differ from monolinguals’. In the first case, they use a property probabilistically while in the second they behave consistently differently from monolinguals.
The above theories have to be flexible enough to explain the overbearing evidence of age effects in language acquisition, where there is a decline in ability from ages 6 or 7 to 16 or 17 (Bialystok & Hakuta
1994, Johnson & Newport 1989, 1991) and beyond that age there is a plateau (however, see Flege 1999 for a contrary finding), and the exceptions of native-like proficiency attested in some adult learners (Bongaerts et al. 1995). As a consequence, multiple research projects aim to determine what individual differences can account for those speakers who acquire a language native-like in adulthood. For instance, DeKeyser (2000) examines the correlation between native-like attainment and verbal aptitude (see also Carrol 1981, 1990,
Sasaki 1993, Skehan 1989, Wesche et al. 1982, cited in DeKeyser 2000). Other researchers have examined the role of working memory capacity and success in second language acquisition (L2 comprehension: Abu-
Rabia 2003, Harrington & Sawyer 1992, Geva & Ryan 1993, Leeser 2007, Taguchi 2008, Walter 2004; L2 processing of redundant, low reliable morphology: Sagarra 2007; L2 lexical access: Kroll et al. 2002; language aptitude: Miyake and Friedman 1998; and L2 oral proficiency: Payne & Whitney 2002). All these studies examine the effect of different factors on the speaker’s proficiency.
13 Note that proficiency can be attained in the different components of a language (phonology, morphology, syntax, etc.). Some authors have posited that not all these components develop simultaneously
(e.g., Eubank & Gregg 1999, Long 1990, Schachter 1996, Scovel 1988, Seliger 1978, Walsh & Diller
1981). Therefore, some speakers may demonstrate greater native-like performance in particular components than in others. For instance, Lardiere’s (2006) monograph of the acquisition of English by a
Chinese adult second language learner exemplifies the target-deviant morphological production even when syntax is target-like. Differential ultimate attainment is also reported between the core or narrow syntax and the syntax interfaces with other modules (Sorace 1993, 1999, 2004, Tsimpli et al. 2004), even between the different interfaces (Tsimpli & Sorace 2006).
Language dominance in classroom second language acquisition research largely matches the first or native language. However, in more proficient bilinguals, language dominance can be difficult to determine.
Bilinguals may be dominant in their first or second language or equally dominant in both (balanced bilinguals). Flege et al. (2002) offer a review of different methodologies proposed for determining bilingual dominance. Among these are (i) information reported by the participant: language background questionnaire (Chincotta & Underwood 1999, Hazan & Boulakia 1993) and self-ratings of ability in the four skills in the Ll and L2 (Goggin et al. 1994, Kohnert et al. 1999, Lemmon & Goggin 1989, Magiste
1979, Talamas et aI. 1999), (ii) independent measures: fluency ratings (Tamamaki 1993), vocabulary scores
(Cromdal 1999), and grammaticality judgements in both languages (Lemmon & Goggin 1989), (iii) the researcher’s judgement (Talamas et aI. 1999). Hazan & Boulakia (1993) discuss the relationship between dominant language and age of acquisition. In particular, they argue that for second language learners who acquire their L2 in the context of immigration to an L2-speaking country, age of L2 acquisition may correlate with the shift to dominance in the L2; early bilinguals in this context may be dominant in the L2.
Grosjean (1982) points out that dominance is affected by a number of factors, not just age, but also psychological factors affecting language acquisition, e.g. frequency of use or domain.
In fact, MacKay et al. (2001) and Piske et al. (2002) report on the effect of L1 use, irrespective of age of L2 acquisition. With these studies in mind, Flege et al. (2002) examine the L1 and L2 performance of
Italian-English bilinguals in Canada as a function of age of arrival, length of residence, and use of L1 with
14 two measures of dominance, a self-rated ratio and a sentence duration ratio. They find that early arrivals self rate their L2 better than their L1, while the opposite trend is observed in late arrivals. No correlation was found for use of L1 and self-rated ratios in general. However, separation of self-rated ratios into written and oral reveals a correlation between use of L1 and dominance. The objective measure of dominance (the sentence duration ratio) correlated with the self-rated ratios, use of L1, and age of arrival. In general, the later in life participants had migrated and the shorter they had resided in Canada, the more the used Italian and the more dominant they were in Italian (both in the self-report and sentence duration). With respect to the overall accentedness ratings, the researchers found that dominance in Italian (as per self reports and sentence duration rations) correlated with strong foreign accents in English. Age of arrival, length of residence, and use of L1 also correlated with foreign accentedness ratios. Actually, these external factors related to the bilingual experience accounted for foreign accentedness ratios more than dominance. Lastly,
Flege et al. (2002) examine these factors and performance in the L1 (translation task), and a correlation was found between age of arrival and L1 performance, while no effect was reported for use of L1. In addition, dominance also had a smaller predictive power than age of arrival, in fact, smaller than in L2 performance.
Based on these results, Flege and his colleagues conclude that while dominance and bilingual experience are related, they are not fully equivalent.
The relation between language dominance and cross-linguistic influence has also been examined.
Müller & Hulk (2001) and Serratrice et al. (2004) argue that the direction of cross-linguistic influence is determined by language-internal factors, specifically, whether the property under study is a core or a peripheral property of the language. Argyri & Sorace (2007) revisit this idea exploring subject expression and position, peripheral properties in Greek, and subject position in what-embedded interrogatives and object pronouns in declaratives, core-properties, in Greek-dominant and English-dominant bilinguals. They report that language dominance is a predictor of cross-linguistic influence as it only manifests in the
English-dominant bilinguals in their data. In sum, authors generally assume a trade-off where proficiency in one of the languages comes at the expense of proficiency in the other language, explaining the rarity of balanced bilinguals (Cook 2003, Flege 1999, Grosjean 1998, Montrul 2008). They are, however, unclear about the position of balanced bilinguals, who may behave monolingual-like in each of their languages or
15 may exhibit cross-linguistic influence. Lambert (1990) proposes that they exhibit no cross-linguistic influence, which is confirmed by Flege et al. (2002) and Argyri & Sorace (2007).
This section has succinctly presented some of the individual factors considered in research on bilingualism. The following sections presents social and individual factors in the bilingual society examined here, Minorca.
2. Minorca: A historical overview
Catalan has 9,118,882 speakers in the world.2 It is the official language of Andorra, and co-official
(with Spanish) in Catalonia, the Valencian Community, and the Balearic Islands. It is also present in the region of Alguero in Sardinia, Italy. The linguistic area, depicted in the following map, created by Marc
Belzunces for Wikipedia3, is commonly referred to as the Catalan Countries.
2 Data from Estadística de usos lingüísticos de Cataluña (2003), encuestas de usos lingüísticos de las Islas Baleares, Cataluña Norte (Francia), Andorra, Alguer (Italia) and Franja de Ponent (western area of Aragón) (2004), and data from la Generalitat Valenciana (2004).
3 http://blocs.mesvilaweb.cat/user/view/id/5830
16 Minorca is the eastern-most island in the Balearic Islands. This physical distance from the Peninsula is further accentuated by its divergent history in the 18th century, when it fell under British rule. Despite differences, efforts to declare independence from the Catalan Countries are almost absent in Minorca, unlike in Majorca. Thus, we are exploring a society that recognizes its uniqueness while remaining loyal to the Catalan linguistic area. Its value to this investigation stems from its social composition, boasting the highest rate of use of Catalan and the minimum rate of immigration.
Minorca’s linguistic history can be traced back to the Roman Empire. The long period under Roman rule promoted the expansion of Latin and the disappearance of any traces of previous languages.4 This period was followed by the invasion of Vandals, Normans, and Arabs. During the latter period, Mozarabic, a Romance variety influenced by Arabic, was the language most commonly used in Minorca (Gargallo Gil
1994). With the Reconquest led by James I in 1232 and the repopulation of Minorca by Catalan speakers from Catalonia and Majorca, Catalan was introduced in Minorca. However, after 1474, Catalan, suffers a decline, at least in the public realm, in favor of Spanish, when the Aragon and Castilian Crowns merge.
This event signals the beginning of contact between the languages although contact is not as intense as in the last three centuries (Strubell 1999).
Further decline of Catalan followed in 1708, when Minorca was invaded by the Anglo-Dutch troops.5
In 1756, it was annexed to the French crown, although it was soon recovered by the English in 1763. In
1802, Spain regained Minorca through the Treaty of Amiens. During English and the French rulings, the predominant language spoken in Minorca was Catalan. Afterwards, Spanish and Catalan co-existed even when the latter was banned during Franco’s regime (1939-1975). This period, and migratory waves from monolingual Spanish-speaking regions that started in the 1960s, assured the extension of the use of Spanish and it was not until 1975 when they co-existed in all spheres.
4 Evidence of very early Prehistoric inhabitants is found in Minorca’s megalithic stone monuments. This period was followed by the establishments of Phoenicians, Greeks, and Carthaginians. The early Roman period is characterised by the co-existence of Romanism and Indigenousness (Casanovas Camps 2005). However, the introduction of Roman settlers assured the progressive Romanization of the indigenous population.
5 Evidence of the English influence on Catalan is found in a few borrowings: xoc < chalk, mèrvol < marble, boínder < bow-window, ull blec < black (eye) 5 Source: Direcció General d´Economia, Institut Balear d´Estadística, posted on http://www.caib.es/ibae/ demo/estrangers/I02.htm.
17 3. Minorca’s present day linguistic situation: sociolinguistic data
The historical events described above led to a bilingual situation where both Spanish and Catalan are widely used. The ensuing paragraphs discuss the demographics of Minorca, highlighting the characteristics of this bilingual society that are most pertinent to the study of language contact.
3.1. Immigration rates: Changes in population due to mobility
Recent changes in immigration rates affect the totality of Spain. The 2006 Census collected by the
Instituto Nacional de Estadística (INE) indicates that 9.27% of the Spanish population is foreign. However, immigration rates differ across municipalities (see Appendix A).6 The Balearic Islands, Catalonia, and the
Valencian Community had among the highest immigration rates in 2006. It merits pointing out, however, that the foreign population in the Balearic Islands includes high numbers of foreigners that retire in there.
In 2000, Minorca and Majorca had the lowest percentages of foreigners in the the Balearic Islands, likely owing to the fact that these islands have not been subject to intense touristic exploitation. The difference is diminishing, however, as attested in the 2006 data, where the increase witnessed in the country in general is also evident in Minorca (from 4.22% to 13.76%). Nevertheless, Minorca reports the lowest number of foreign-born among its population (see Appendix B).
Blas Arroyo (2007) reports that immigration rates correlate with knowledge of Catalan, i.e. places with more immigrants have lower numbers of Catalan speakers. As compared to other Catalan-speaking areas,
Minorca exhibits a relatively homogeneous population with little immigration and little contact with tourists. As will be discussed, it also exhibits extensive Spanish-Catalan bilingualism, making it the ideal location for this study.
3.2. Languages
Of the Balearic Islands, Minorca presents the broadest use of Catalan, promoted in part by language policies and education. The policies and ensuing positive effects on knowledge of Catalan are discussed next.
6 In Majorca, Palma de Majorca is touristically exploited. The rest of the island, however, exhibits similar rates as Minorca.
18 3.2.1. The effect of language policy and education
Minorca’s extensive Spanish-Catalan bilingualism is assured by an educational policy that protects the use of Catalan in schools. The protection of the language was initiated in 1975 with a policy permitting the optional teaching of Catalan. Subsequently, in 1979, Catalan was enforced as a subject of study through the
Bilingualism Decree (Decret de bilingüisme). It was not until 1986, however, that the Linguistic
Normalization law (Law 3/1986: Llei de normalització lingüística) expanded its use to that of language of instruction. In 1997, the number of hours taught in each language was regulated so that instruction was imparted 50% in each language (Decree 92/1997, article 10: Decret “de mínims”). The main aim of this law was to assure that all students could use both languages by the end of their compulsory education.7 In the academic year 2003-2004, all students in the Balearic Islands had either bilingual instruction (49.3%) or instruction in Catalan with Spanish as a course (50.7%). Private institutions favor bilingual education
(70.1%), whereas public schools favor Catalan as the medium of instruction (64.2%) (see Appendix C).8
The role of education had an immense impact on literacy in Catalan. Less obvious is its role in the expansion of the language. Comparing the generation preceding these laws to the one following them can further clarify this role. Persons of the generation that had education in Spanish only, i.e. those who attended school during Franco’s regime, exhibit a decline in the use of Catalan. The next generation displays a recovery that stems from the above-mentioned protective laws. After all, Catalan was always spoken at home. Franco’s regime raised the status of Spanish so that it was perceived as the language of culture and power; therefore, some sectors of the population preferred using Spanish because of its social and cultural implications. Once laws protecting Catalan were passed, and it was introduced in schools, it regained prestige (Blas Arroyo 2007:81).
3.2.2. Knowledge of Catalan
Much is known about knowledge of Catalan in the Balearic Islands because of the Sociolinguistic
Study that was carried out in 2003 by the Department of Linguistic Policies (Direcció General de Política
7 Schools have interpreted this law to mean that they have to create their own “linguistic project”, which is ultimately approved by the school council (Blas Arroyo 2007).
8 Source: http://www.caib.es/ibae/dades/catala/educaciom.htm
19 Lingüística) in the Education and Cultural Ministry (Coselleria d’Educació i Cultura).9 This knowledge is represented by self-rated abilities in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Participants were classified according to their place of birth, place of residence, age, and gender. Among these factors, gender is the least informative since no noticeable differences in knowledge of Catalan were found between the groups.
The following discussion addresses differences that emerged from the other divisions. See Appendix D for the complete results of the survey.
With reference to place of birth, the participants were divided according to whether or not they were born in the linguistic area, i.e. in a Catalan-speaking territory. This factor clearly correlates with knowledge of Catalan: 99.6% of those born in the linguistic area understand the language (as compared to 83.4% of those born elsewhere), 96.8% speak it (only 41.6% of those born elsewhere), 91.8% read it (as opposed to
61.4% of those born elsewhere), and 64.5% write it (vs. 20.7% in those born elsewhere). Those born outside the Catalan Countries display only a passive knowledge of Catalan. In addition, residents of
Minorca register the highest overall rates of knowledge of Catalan (97.1% understand it vs. 91.3% in la
Badía de Palma, 94.8% in the rest of Palma, and 92.4% in Ibiza/Formentera10).
Regarding age, there is a notable distinction between oral and written abilities in the age group 65 and over. While these speakers report high rates of passive knowledge (91.4% listening, 80.2% reading), they report diminished rates of the active skills of speaking (78.8%) and significantly low rates of writing
(24.1%). This disparity disappears in the 15 to 29 age group, which registers high Catalan literacy rates
(89.8% can read and 77.4% can write in Catalan). Noteworthy is the decline in speaking ability in the group of 45 to 64 year olds, which grew up during Franco’s regime (69.1%, vs. 78.8% in those 65 and over,
72.3% in those 30-44 and 80.1% in the youngest group). Those in the 30 to 44 age group do not differ much from the previous generation in speaking ability although an improvement in all the other skills is evidenced (speaking: 92% to 94.8%, reading: 73.7% to 82.9%, and writing: 27.3% to 49.5%). We can conclude from these data that the prohibition of Catalan during Franco’s regime affected the speaking
9 Source: Of the population of 804, 816, 3,671 were interviewed in the Balearic Islands. In Minorca, 68,311 people were registered in 2003 and 630 participated in this study.
10 The survey conflates the data from two islands, Ibiza and Formentera, thus, it is presented here as Ibiza/ Formentera.
20 ability of Catalan speakers and that the effect of education reform is evident in increased rates of Catalan literacy.
3.2.3. Language use and context
Apart from inquiring about the knowledge of the language, the Sociolinguistic Survey interviews explored the contexts in which Spanish and Catalan are used.
3.2.3.1. First language, ‘own’ language and ‘habitual’ language
The participants in the 2003 survey answered questions regarding their first language, their ‘own’ language, and their ‘habitual’ language. These were defined to participants as follows: their first language
(L1) is the language to which they were exposed at home during childhood; their ‘own’ language is the language with which they identify; and the ‘habitual’ language is the language they most use across contexts. Participants were invited to select Spanish, Catalan, or both Spanish and Catalan for each classification. The full findings are shown in Appendix E and patterns of special interest are commented on below.
Patterns of language dominance are reflected in the fact that few participants consider both Spanish and Catalan their L1s (1.8%), their own languages (3.9%), or their habitual languages (5.3%). Catalan and
Spanish have very similar ratios in the Islands: 42.6% have Catalan as their L1 and 47.7% have Spanish.
However, Catalan is gaining ground since the number of participants who report it as an L1 (42.6%) is exceeded by those who consider it their ‘own’ language (45.6%).
The division between those born in the linguistic area and those born elsewhere correlates highly with the dominant language; for those born in the linguistic area, Catalan predominates as the L1 (69.8%),
‘own’ language (72.4%), and ‘habitual’ language (70.8%). The same is true for Spanish among those born elsewhere. Interestingly, the association with Spanish by those born in the linguistic area (22.2% consider it their own language) is higher than the association with Catalan by those born elsewhere (5.6% consider
Catalan their own language). Spanish seems to be losing some ground in favor of Catalan, as slightly fewer participants consider Spanish their ‘own’ (79.8%) than participants who were exposed to it in their childhood (80.8%). We can interpret this result as indicating that some participants born to Spanish-
21 speaking parents have shifted to Catalan, at least as a language of identity. This is corroborated by the fact that there are more participants who consider Catalan their ‘own’ language than participants exposed to it at home.
Regarding place of residence, the survey shows that Palma and Ibiza/Formentera have fewer Catalan
L1 speakers, 31.9% and 35.7% respectively, than do Minorca (56.9%) and the rest of Majorca (58.2%), and more speakers of other languages, 8.4% and 9.5% respectively (vs. 6% and 5.1% in the rest of Majorca and
Minorca). In Minorca and the rest of Majorca, Catalan is gaining speakers, as evidenced by the higher number of participants reporting Catalan as their ‘own’ language (65.1% and 59.8%, respectively) than those whose L1 is Catalan (58.2% and 46.9%). In Palma and Ibiza/Formentera, Spanish seems to be gaining speakers or at least it is not losing them. In Palma, 55% of respondents consider Spanish their
‘own’ and it is the L1 for 56.9%; in Ibiza/Formentera, 52.7% consider it their own language and 55.1% report it as their L1. Thus, we can conclude that those with an L1 other than Spanish and Catalan learn
Spanish or both. Indeed, in Ibiza and Formentera, the use of Catalan is lower than Catalan as L1, i.e. some of the Catalan L1 speakers do not register Catalan as their ‘habitual’ language (only 33.6% report Catalan as their habitual language and 35.7% have it as their L1). This may be due to their interaction with the elevated number of immigrants.
Immigration fluxes have an effect that is interrelated with age. Most of those 65 and over, who grew up when little immigration was attested in the Balearic Islands, report Catalan as their L1 (65.1%), their ‘own’ language (64.8%), and ‘habitual’ language (66.5%). Nonetheless, the figures show that in some cases not all who declared Catalan as their L1 consider it their ‘own’ language. These respondents seem to consider both Spanish and Catalan their ‘own’ languages, i.e., the languages they identity with. This could indicate that they are satisfied with their proficiency in Spanish. Or it could indicate that because they lived during the period when Spanish was the prestige language, they want to express their access to and identification with the prestige language. Among those aged 45-64, there is almost the same percentage of L1 Spanish as
L1 Catalan, 47.2%% and 42.2% respectively. These participants grew up when Spanish was the prestige language and, therefore, the use of Spanish was more extended. They also coincided with the migratory movements of the 1960s, when a significant number of residents from Mainland Spain moved to the Islands
22 to work in the touristic sector. The three younger groups display a higher ratio of Spanish L1 speakers
(47.2%, 52.9%, and 55.1% from older to younger) than the older group (27%), probably a reflection of immigration. Nonetheless, some of these informants report that Catalan is their ‘own’ language and their
‘habitual’ language.
With regard to gender, the differences are minimal; however, more women seem to identify with
Catalan than do men (47% vs. 44.1%). Among women, 47% select Catalan as their ‘own’ language, although only 43.3% claim it as their L1 and 45.8% as their ‘habitual’ language. Among men, 44.1% identify Catalan as their ‘own’ language and 44.2% as their ‘habitual’ language, but only 42% as their L1.
3.2.3.2. Language in familial contexts
The participants were asked about the language/s they use with family members: only Catalan or only
Spanish, more of one than the other, the same amount of each, or another language altogether. The results
(see Appendix F) reveal that participants use either Catalan or Spanish with parents, siblings, and other family members, while the dual language and ‘other language’ options are less common. The rates of
Spanish and Catalan use at home are very similar (36.7% and 37.6% respectively), although differences emerge when we consider the participants’ place of birth. Those born in the linguistic area (the Catalan
Countries) speak Catalan more than Spanish in these familial contexts (59.7% vs. 17.7%), while those born elsewhere mostly speak Spanish (65.6% use only Spanish at home while 3.8% use only Catalan at home).
Among those born in the linguistic area who speak only Spanish with their parents, there is a change regarding the language they use with their children. This group comprises the second generation of immigrants. The fact that Catalan predominates in both groups when speaking to children augurs well for the maintenance of the language.
As expected from the preceding discussion, residents of Palma and Ibiza/Formentera display lower percentages of use of Catalan in the home (26% and 25.9% respectively) than Minorca (59.4%) and the rest of Majorca (52.9%). Consistent with this general trend, Catalan is more used with children (67.7%) than with other family members (e.g., 59.8% with their mother). Residents of Ibiza/Formentera, however, pattern differently: 33.8% speak Catalan to their children and 35.2% to their mother. The high number of
23 immigrants, who tend to acquire only Spanish or Spanish and Catalan (as opposed to Catalan only), may explain the recession of Catalan in this milieu.
Regarding age, the data on language usage seem at odds with that discussed in the previous sections.
There is a progressive introduction of Spanish in familial contexts. As a result, the youngest age group uses more Spanish (46.8%) than the other age groups (35.6%, 34.3%, and 20%, as age progresses). This is surprising considering the extension of the use of Catalan with children in general. However, in view of the rise in immigration and the young median age of immigrants, this change is unsurprising.
Gender is not a predictor of the language used in the familial context. More interesting are the data considering the language that participants identify with. As would be expected, those who consider either
Spanish or Catalan their ‘own’ language use that language more in familial contexts; 78.3% of those who identify with Catalan and 73.1% of those that identify with Spanish use it at home. Those who identify both languages as their ‘own’ languages exhibit higher rates of use of both languages to the same extent
(31.7%). Still some use Catalan (28%) or Spanish (15.7%) only, which is probably due to their accommodation to the native language of their family members. In this case, these participants use one of the languages extensively at home and the other elsewhere. 75.9% of the participants who consider their
‘own’ language a language other than Catalan or Spanish customarily use their other language at home and when they do not, they use predominantly Spanish (20.5%) and never Catalan (0%). Importantly, the rare instances when they use Catalan, it is with older generations; 1.7% use it with their father and 1.2% with their mother, while only 0.7% use it with their children.
3.2.3.3. Language in other contexts
Participants in the 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey were also asked what language/s they use when speaking to their classmates, co-workers, doctors, store clerks, and bank tellers. The findings (depicted in
Appendix G) show that Spanish is the primary language of these realms. For instance, in interactions with a doctor, 46% of participants use only Spanish while just 27.6% use only Catalan with their doctor. The same trend is observed with classmates (41.8% for Spanish and 23.1% for Catalan), co-workers (30.7% for
Spanish and 19.7% for Catalan), in stores (38.2% for Spanish and 26.3% for Catalan) and in banks (39% for Spanish and 36.4% for Catalan), although to a lesser degree. This result is consistent with the data
24 regarding place of birth. Even those born in the Catalan Countries, who identify with Catalan (72.4% claim it is their ‘own’ language), use Spanish more in public contexts (23.2% use it with their doctors) than in familiar contexts (17.7% use it at home). This could be due to the language of the worker since a high number of the national immigrants from the 1960s occupy positions in the service sector. 11 In addition, these workers born elsewhere represent the residents with lower knowledge of Catalan (see §4.2.2). For those born elsewhere, as expected, Spanish seems to be the vehicle language in these contexts: 81.6% speak only Spanish with their doctors. Similar trends emerge in other non-familial contexts. 36.5% of those born in the linguistic area speak only Catalan with their classmates while only 3.2% of those born elsewhere do.
31% of those born in the linguistic area speak only Catalan with their co-workers while only 2.8% of those born elsewhere do. In stores, 39.6% of those born in the linguistic area speak only Catalan while only 6.6% of those born elsewhere do. In banks, 55.5% of those born in the linguistic area speak only Catalan while only 8% of those born elsewhere do.
Place of residence, again, follows the same pattern as in the data regarding knowledge and use of the language in familial contexts. Those who reside in Palma and Ibiza/Formentera use Spanish more than
Catalan in public spaces (55.2% and 63.4%, respectively, use Spanish with their doctor) whereas either
Catalan or both languages dominate in Minorca and the rest of Majorca (28.6% and 26.9%, respectively, use Spanish with their doctor). In other no familial contexts, the trend is the same. For instance, Palma use only Spanish 50.2% of the time with classmates, 37.4% of the time with co-workers, 48.3% of the time in stores and 48.3% in banks. Ibiza/Formentera also register high use of only Spanish in these contexts; 47.4% with classmates, 36.9% with co-workers, 48.6% in stores and 63.4% in banks. The rest of Majorca, however, registers a lower use of Spanish; 31.3% with classmates, 21.8% with co-workers, 24.3% in stores and 25.8% in banks. In Minorca, too, Spanish enlists a lower use of Spanish; 26.9% with classmates, 18.9% with co-workers, 20.7% in stores, and 23.7% in banks.
11 Doctors, for instance, take a statewide exam which decides where they will work depending on the availability of positions and the grade obtained. The University of the Balearic Islands does not have a degree in medicine in their campus in Minorca. In the past, pursuing college studies in the Peninsula was restricted to a minority. Thus, it is not surprising that hospitals are the place where more people speak Spanish.
25 Regarding age, Spanish predominates in all groups but for those 65 or above. With their doctors,
56.7% of those between 15 and 29 years old use Spanish and only 20.3% use Catalan, 47.7% of those
30-44 use Spanish and 25% use Catalan, and 44.3% of those 45-64 use Spanish and only 28.4% use
Catalan. Among those 65 or above, in contrast, 31.9% use Spanish with their doctor and 43.1% use Catalan.
Interestingly, with co-workers the use of other languages is noticeable, especially in those 15-29 (22.2%).
People working in the touristic industry, the main sector in the region, are required to speak other languages. The most touristic areas, Ibiza and Palma, have higher uses of other languages in public spaces
(5.9% in both places) than less touristic ones, Minorca and the rest of Majorca (3.3% and 4.9%). Other non familial contexts offer similar tendencies. With classmates, 12.3% of those 15 to 29, 20.4% of those 30 to
44, 26.4% of those 45 to 64 and 40.2% of those 65 and over use only Catalan. With co-workers, 9.6% of those 15 to 29, 18.1% of those 30 to 44, 19% of those 45 to 64 and 31.3% of those 65 and over use only
Catalan. In stores, 19.3% of those 15 to 29, 22.5% of those 30 to 44, 27.9% of those 45 to 64 and 42.1% of those 65 and over use only Catalan. In banks, 25.9% of those 15 to 29, 33.8% of those 30 to 44, 38% of those 45 to 64 and 55.4% of those 65 and over use only Catalan.
As in the case of familiar contexts, the language selected as ‘own’ language determines the language used in other contexts. Those who consider Spanish or Catalan their ‘own’ language prefer to use that language in public, while those who identify with both languages use them extensively. Finally, those who speak a language other than Spanish or Catalan exhibit a preponderance of use of the ‘other’ language, especially with classmates. It is not uncommon for foreign children (especially of European origin) to attend national foreign-language schools, where the language of instruction is other than Spanish and
Catalan. When they cannot use this ‘own’ language in interactions with service personnel in the Balearic
Islands (e.g., in stores, in banks and in medical offices), they use primarily Spanish. In general, surprisingly, the language most used across the board with classmates is Spanish. This seems to contradict the fact that in the year 2003-2004 all classes were imparted in both languages or only in Catalan, with Spanish as a subject class.
26 Overall, context does not dictate the use of Spanish or Catalan; rather it is the language dominance of the interactants.12 For instance, many doctors are born outside the linguistic area, thus, their dominant language is Spanish, and this is reflected in the fact that most speakers in this survey use Spanish with their doctors (46.6% speak only Spanish to their doctor while only 27.6% use only Catalan, 9% use the same amount of both, 8.9% use more Catalan than Spanish and 6.8% use more Spanish than Catalan). While all
Catalan-dominant speakers are highly proficient speakers of Spanish, Spanish-dominant speakers do not usually exhibit high proficiency in Catalan (at least in active skills, see Chapter 2, §4.2.2). Therefore, when a Spanish-dominant and a Catalan-dominant speaker have to communicate, they tend to use Spanish.
In the survey, participants were also asked about their reactions when someone responded in Spanish when asked in Catalan and vice versa (Appendix H). The data show that in such cases, speakers mostly change to their interlocutor’s language; 73.1% change to Spanish when their interlocutor responds in
Spanish after being addressed in Catalan, and 67.7% change to Catalan when their interlocutor responds in
Catalan after being addressed in Spanish. This is true in cases where interlocutors speak both languages.
For those with only passive knowledge of Catalan, this is impossible. Thus, a conversation between a person born in the linguistic area with someone born elsewhere happens largely in Spanish.
Overall, almost 50% of the population uses Catalan above 76% of the time (Appendix I). Note that, among those who consider Spanish their language, 40.8% never use Catalan. However, if they know
Catalan, this percentage goes down to 15.4%. Regarding Spanish, only 9.9% of the population of Minorca use it exclusively. In fact, over 50% of the population use Spanish 25% of the time or less.
3.2.4. Language attitudes
In previous sections, the focus has been on language knowledge and use. Some of the patterns observed can be further elucidated by exploring the language attitudes reported in the 2003 Sociolinguistic
Survey. After all the protective laws, Catalan can be expected to have gained value and prestige in the
Catalan Countries society. This survey asks the participants for their opinion on languages in instruction:
12 An exception is the media (TV, radio, and newspapers), where Spanish dominates. Pieras-Guasp (2002) carried out a matched guise experiment in Majorca and he showed that the reality is different from the answers provided in these surveys. Spanish is still related to power, economical status, and prestige.
27 should the language of instruction be only Spanish, mostly Spanish, both Spanish and Catalan, mostly
Catalan, or only Catalan? As shown in Appendix J, participants are uniform in expressing a preference for bilingual education (51.2%). Some minimal differences across the groups are attested. For instance, those born in the linguistic area and those who consider Catalan their ‘own’ language register the highest preference for instruction in Catalan only (12.2% and 14.9%, respectively, while only 3% of those born elsewhere and 3.5% of those whose ‘own’ language is Spanish prefer instruction in Catalan only). Those who speak other languages show the highest preference for the use of Spanish in schools; 37.3% prefer the use of mostly Spanish and 17.1% prefer the exclusive use of Spanish.
A related survey item addressed respondents’ opinions on the need to know Spanish and Catalan in the
Balearic Islands (Appendix K). The respondents converged in the value of both languages: 83.4% agree
(completely/mostly) that residents of the islands should know Catalan, and 89% agree that residents of the islands should know Spanish. Those born in the linguistic area acknowledge the need for both languages and there are no noticeable differences between the two languages (89.5% agree on the need to speak
Catalan and 89% in the case of Spanish). Those born elsewhere, however, agree more with the need for speaking Spanish more than Catalan (89.1% vs. 74.2%). These results are in accordance with those for knowledge and use of Catalan. Those who know and use Catalan less do not consider it so essential as those who know it and use it. Thus, those in Palma and Ibiza/Formentera consider Spanish more important than Catalan (89.2% for Catalan vs. 80.9% for Spanish in Palma, and 89.3% for Spanish vs. 80.4% for
Catalan in Ibiza/Formentera). Across age groups, there are no noticeable differences: all respondents agree more strongly with the need for Spanish than for Catalan. However, combining the two degrees of agreement (completely and mostly agree), there are almost no differences between the two languages. The language that participants identify with, the ‘own’ language, is a better predictor of responses to this survey item. Those speakers who consider Catalan their ‘own’ language agree slightly more with the need to speak
Catalan than with Spanish, but the difference is minimal (71.5% vs. 62%), and those who consider Spanish their ‘own’ language rate it more necessary than Catalan (68.7% vs. 42.8%). Finally, speakers of other languages agree on the need to know Spanish (78.7%); however, Catalan does not enjoy such status in this group; only 34.5% consider Catalan necessary. This is consistent with the data on use of Catalan in familial
28 and other contexts, which indicated a tendency for speakers of other languages to use Spanish only (see
Chapter 2, §4.2.3.2 and §4.2.3.3).
Above we noted that a number of the respondents sampled considered Catalan their ‘own’ language although it was not their L1. In passing we explained that self-identification with a native language could be due to a sense of belonging to the society. The 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey taps into this issue when asking the participants whether knowing Catalan (or their local variety) was an indicator of “Balearity” (see
Appendix L). Notably, more participants disagree (62%) with this statement than those who agree (62% vs.
38%), rendering knowledge of the language independent from their belonging to the Islands. While none of the group variables considered here seem to be a predictor of responses to this survey item, there are some patterns in participants’ responses. We recurrently find that those groups that registered a high use of
Catalan (vs. Spanish) agree with the statement that knowing Catalan is a requirement for being
‘Balearic’ (see Chapter 2, §4.2.3.2 and §4.2.3.3). For instance, 48.2% of respondents who claim Catalan as their ‘own’ language agree with the statement. In addition, 42% of those born in the linguistic area are in agreement that Catalan is required for ‘Balearic’ identity. The opinion of speakers of other languages is worth further attention; 51.4% agree with this statement, perhaps believing that language and culture are inextricably related. Their detachment from the culture, however, explains why they feel they do not need to know Catalan, as was evident in their responses to other survey items. In contrast, the Spanish-dominant speakers, irrespective of knowledge of Catalan, have a sense of belonging to the community, thus, they consider knowledge of Catalan independent from “Balearity”.
Another survey question that can inform our understanding of language attitudes in Minorca queried whether Catalan and/or Spanish should be extended. As shown in Appendix M, nearly half of those surveyed are content with the current situation, especially with regard to Spanish: 47.3% would like to see no change, and only 9.5% would like to expand the use of Spanish. Significantly, however, 43.2% would like to expand the scope of Catalan. This sentiment is especially evident among those who consider Catalan their ‘own’ language and those born in the linguistic area. They consider that Catalan still needs to gain ground. The only group that considers that Spanish needs to expand more than Catalan does is, as expected,
29 the speakers of other languages. As for the age groups, those 65 and above widely consider that the situation is adequate; and those who do not lean towards Catalan, although less than the other age groups.
3.3. Summary
We can summarize the preceding discussion by pointing out the events that have altered the extension of knowledge, use, and prestige of Catalan: Franco’s regime, migratory waves, especially that of the 1960s, and the introduction of protective laws. The situation used to be one of bilingualism and diglossia and now it is a situation of bilingualism without diglossia (Fishman 1980). This is primarily reflected in the differences across age groups. While older speakers know Catalan and use Catalan more so than Spanish
(they learned Spanish as a second language), they did not have access to written Catalan. Middle-age
Minorcans attended school in Spanish, thus, proficiency in Spanish increased to the detriment of their
Catalan oral abilities. Access to written Catalan was still limited. The youngest generation, on the other hand, attend bilingual classes or classes predominantly in Catalan. Thus, the separation between home and society language present in the previous generations has disappeared in this group. Immigration, too, constitutes a predictor of the extension of Catalan; increased numbers of immigrants result in a decrease in the knowledge and use of Catalan at the societal level. This bears out in the place of residence: Palma and
Ibiza/Formentera exhibit the highest numbers of immigration and the lowest rates of Catalan knowledge and use. Also, better knowledge and use of Catalan is attested in those 65 and above, which predate the tremendous migratory wave from monolingual Spanish-speaking regions in the 1960s. Thus, national and international population movements exerted an effect in the knowledge and use of Catalan. Although immigration is increasing, thereby decreasing the overall percentage of Catalan speakers, the data indicate that all children are learning Catalan, not only because it is being taught in school but also because of its high rate of use with children (see Chapter 2, §4.2.3.2). As a result, the decrease in the extension of Catalan produced by immigration is compensated for by its increased use among the younger generations.
4. Valladolid
The discussion above explains why Minorca was selected as the location of the present study of contact Spanish. However, since it is impossible to find monolingual Spanish speakers on the island— immigrants from the Peninsula quickly develop passive skills in Catalan— monolingual Spanish control
30 data were gathered in Valladolid. This selection too is well-founded. Most Peninsular immigrants (not from the Catalan Countries) in Minorca are from Andalucía (Institut Balear d’Estadística, Appendix N).
Nonetheless, if the division was done between north (Madrid and north of it) and south (south of Madrid), similar numbers emerge (987 from the South, including the Canary Islands and Ceuta and Melilla, and 954 from the North). Although most of the northern migrants come from Madrid, Madrid was not selected for the high rates of immigration (Istituto Nacional de Estadística, Appendix A). Valladolid belongs to the
Autonomous Community of Castilla y León, which presents a largely monolingual population with little immigration (Instituto Nacional de Estadística, see Appendix A). The other three communities that present a small number of immigrants were País Vasco and Ceuta, where other languages are spoken, and
Cantabria. Since the difference in numbers between Castilla y León and Cantabria was insignificant,
Valladolid was chosen for convenience.
5. Research questions: The effect of external variables on bilingual speech
The preceding sections have described Minorcan society. As discussed, Minorca is a extensively bilingual society, with little contact with tourists and little immigration until recent years. In addition, it experienced the rapid introduction of Spanish during the Franco dictatorship, as attested by the proficiency in Spanish of the elderly population, and the equally rapid revival of Catalan with language protection laws.
These characteristics make Minorca a laboratory-like context for the study of Spanish in contact with
Catalan.
5.1. Bilingualism and Convergence
Bilingual speech manifests diverse types of contact phenomena. For example, bilingual varieties of
Spanish may demonstrate lexical and prosodic influences from the contact language. Likewise, contact may be evidenced in innovative grammatical forms and usages. This dissertation examines contact Spanish in
Minorca. More specifically, it seeks to determine whether Minorcan Spanish is distinct from non-contact
Spanish (i.e., Valladolid Spanish), as examined by reference to a specific morpho-syntactic variable: subject expression. In Minorca, we expect to find contact effects because it is a bilingual society. Indeed, the effects should be enhanced given that (i) Spanish and Catalan coexists in public and private contexts and (ii) they are typologically similar languages, thus, congruence is assured. Congruence is relevant as it might be
31 easier to use features from one language in the other when the languages are largely overlapping lexical and grammatical systems (see the works of Clyne 2003 and Muysken 2000 on congruence and code-switching).
5.2. External Factors and Bilingualism
Of particular interest are the potential non-target forms that may be manifest in the speech of Spanish-
Catalan bilinguals of diverse language profiles. We have already noted correlations between Minorcan bilinguals’ language knowledge and use of Spanish and Catalan and external factors such as place of birth, age, gender, and language preference. In light of these correlations, this project examines what external factors are implicated in the emergence of bilingual forms, i.e., contact-induced forms as a function of place of birth, age, L2 proficiency, and usage. Thus, the analysis of the language data collected will be mindful of the language history, language usage, and language attitudes of the speakers. The following chapter discusses the linguistic property under scrutiny: the expression (vs. omission) of pronominal and lexical subjects in contact speech varieties.
32 Chapter 3
Subject expression in Spanish and Catalan
1. Introduction
Subject expression is one of the most researched areas in Spanish morphosyntax, not only from a syntactic-theoretical point of view, but also from a variationist approach, and more recently from a contact linguistic perspective, addressing simultaneous and second language bilingualism. This dissertation project combines the latter two approaches, exploring the consequences of language contact with a variationist methodology.
Spanish is a null subject language, allowing for unexpressed expletive and referential subjects, as in
(1a) and (1b) respectively. While null expletive subjects have no overt counterpart, null referential pronouns, of interest here, alternate with overt forms; however, as the examples in (2) demonstrate, this alternation is not free—it is governed by the informational content of the utterance into which the pronoun is inserted.
(1) a. Ø Parece que Ø va a llover.
‘It seems it will rain.’
b. Ø Llevaré impermeable.
‘I’ll wear a raincoat.’
(2) a. Ø Llevaré impermeable porque *yo/Ø tengo gripe.
‘I’ll wear a raincoat because I have a cold.’
b. Pepé llevará paraguas y yo/*Ø llevaré impermeable.
‘Pepé will take an umbrella and I will wear a raincoat.’
The availability of null subjects has been thoroughly examined by researchers in syntax, whose efforts to model adult native-speaker competence have linked null subjects to the features that articulate
Infl(ection). This allows for cross-linguistic parametric differences (Chomsky 1995): languages such as Spanish present the requisite nominal features on the projections Tense and Agreement to license null referential pronominal subjects, whereas languages such as English do not (Fernández Soriano 1989, 1993,
1999, Jaeggli 1982, Jaeggli & Safir 1989, Luján 1999, Picallo 1993, Rigau 1986, Rizzi 1982, Rizzi 1997).
The two languages under study here, Spanish and Catalan, license null referential and expletive subjects.
The felicitous expression (vs. omission) of referential pronouns in null subject languages requires the coordination of the aforementioned ‘core’ or ‘narrow’ syntactic properties with discursive/pragmatic information, i.e., properties of the ‘peripheral’ system. In the extant literature, the distribution of overt pronouns has been studied by reference to the patterns manifested in first and second language acquisition and attrition. For example, in his study of child acquisition of Catalan, Grinstead (2004) observes that the felicitous distribution of overt and null subject pronouns emerges with the articulation of the Topic/Focus field in the left periphery of the clause (Rizzi 1997). In a similar vein, Sorace and her colleagues examine the end-state grammars of near-native speakers of Italian whose first language is English (Sorace 1990,
1993, 1999, 2000a, 2000b, 2004, Tsimpli et al. 2004). They find that, in contrast to speakers of the full
Italian variety, the advanced bilinguals demonstrate the persistent use of overt preverbal pronominal subjects, irrespective of the discursive content of the clause. This divergence, Sorace submits, is attributed to difficulties in the simultaneous integration of syntactic knowledge with discourse/pragmatic options.
Finally, Montrul (2004, 2008) reports that heritage speakers, who may be experiencing Spanish-language attrition, present non-target patterns of subject expression and subject omission. All of these authors suggest that target-deviant patterns in the expression of pronominal subjects may be attributed to the gradual emergence or depletion of the (representational or cognitive) resources that are required in merging syntactic and discursive knowledge.
Most research on language contact, including second language acquisition and first language attrition, has employed experimental methods to explain whether language contact exerts an effect on subject expression in null subject languages. Such research, however, does not consider subject expression as a variable phenomenon, since sentences are labeled as target- and non-target-like, based on a discourse-based variable, discourse function (i.e., whether the subject is a topic, or a topic shift or emphatic), which is controlled in experimental studies. But subject expression is a variable phenomenon, i.e. the distribution of
34 null and overt pronominal subjects cannot be reduced to a rule. This variability has been addressed in variationist studies. These studies draw on naturalistic corpora collected via sociolinguistic interviews.
They examine subject expression (the dependent variable) as a function of multiple variables or factor groups simultaneously, be they language-internal or language-external.13 This line of research has revealed that differences in pronominal expression may emerge as a function of regional dialect (Cameron 1996,
Otheguy et al. 2007), speech genre (Travis 2007), extent of language contact (Otheguy et al. 2007), or language-internal factors (Bentivoglio 1986, Enríquez 1984, Morales 1997, Silva-Corvalán 1982, 1994,
2001), to name but a few variables.
In summary,subject expression in Spanish has been examined from three very different approaches.
This dissertation project expands on antecedent studies from the variationist and contact traditions to examine subject expression in Spanish in contact with Catalan in Minorca. This chapter is organized as follows. Section 2 discusses the variables implicated in subject expression in Spanish and Catalan, although most published research has been devoted to Spanish. Section 3 discusses findings of research on subject expression among bilinguals, both in contact situations between two null subject languages and between a null and a non-null subject language. Lastly, Section 4 summarizes the major findings and Section 5 introduces the research questions related to subject expression that are addressed in this dissertation.
2. Variables involved in subject expression in monolingual Spanish and Catalan
Spanish and Catalan permit an alternation between null and overt subjects. This alternation is, nonetheless, not random. Several factors have been attributed to the attested patterns of distribution. These factors are mainly discourse- or morphology-related. Some studies additionally address language-external factors, such as age and gender. The latter, however, have been largely found not to constrain this distribution. The literature on the variable distribution of pronouns in Catalan is scant; to the best of my knowledge, it is reduced to Casanova (1999). In general, Catalan is assumed to behave like Spanish.
13 Take, for instance, the language-external variable or factor group Gender, which has two possible constraints or factors, Male and Female. As can be discerned from the example, constraints are the different variants in a variable. A variationist approach would examine whether Gender is significant in subject expression and whether being a Male or a Female correlates with a higher or lower incidence of overt subjects. Likewise, language-internal variables, such as Co-reference, with the constraints Co-referent (same subject as the previous clause) or Non-Co-referent (different subject from the previous clause), are examined.
35 However, given that subject expression has been shown to be variable across dialects of Spanish, it stands to reason that it will differ between these two closely related languages. This dissertation project readdresses this oversight in the literature by presenting novel data from Catalan and examining it in light of the variables that are implicated in Spanish subject expression.
2.1. Discourse-related variables
As noted, null referential subjects are made possible in Spanish and Catalan by syntactic mechanisms of licensing and identification. But the alternation with overt subjects is determined by properties of the discourse context.14 More specifically, null subjects are associated with notions of continuity, while overt subjects introduce new information or add emphasis to a previously mentioned topic. Within this notion of continuity lie DISCOURSE FUNCTION, DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, CO-REFERENCE (i.e., switch reference in the work of Cameron and his colleagues), TENSE/ASPECT/MOOD (TAM) CONTINUITY, SPEECH CONNECTIVITY,
PERSON, and CLAUSE TYPE. In this section, relevant literature on these variables is discussed. The variables and their related constraints are provided in the following table.
14 In theoretical accounts, the discussion of the distribution of overt subjects only focus on truth-conditional semantic phenomena; only null pronouns can be bound by a quantifier (i) (Montalbetti 1984), and overt pronouns cannot have a generic meaning (ii) (Hernanz 1988, Jaeggli 1986, Suñer 1983): (i) a. Todo estudiantei cree que proi es inteligente. b. Todo estudiantei cree que él*i/j es inteligente. (ii) a. Dijeron que habían venido. b. Ellos dijeron que habían venido. Note that in (i) only the null pronoun can be bound by the quantifier todo estudiante. In (ii) only (a) can have a generic meaning.
36 Table 3.1: Discourse-related Variables and Associated Constraints
Variables Constraints SUBJECT FORM Overt lexical Overt pronominal Null subject
DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic continuation Topic shift Promotion to topic Contrast
CO-REFERENTIALITY Co-referential Non-co-referential
DISTANCE FROM PREVIOUS MENTION 0 clauses 1 clause 2 clauses…
CLAUSE TYPE Main Embedded
TAM CONTINUITY Same TAM Different TAM
SPEECH CONNECTIVITY (CONNECT) Same referent, same TAM Same referent, different TAM Different referent
PERSON First (Singular/Plural), Second (Singular/Plural) Third (Singular/Plural)
The dependent variable in this research is the SUBJECT FORM. Studies predominantly consider the distribution of null and overt pronominal subjects (Bayley & Pease Alvarez 1997, Bentivoglio 1987,
Cameron 1994, 1995, Cameron & Flores 2003, Flores-Ferrán 2002, Silva-Corvalán 1994, Travis 2005,
2008, among others). Some, however, also consider the alternation with lexical subjects (Dumont 2006,
Lozano 2008, Silva-Corvalán 1994). The distribution of subjects in Spanish is correlated with numerous variables, although authors differ on which these are. Some variables are returned as significant in one study, while they are not significant in another study. As will be discussed below (§2.3), these divergent findings might be attributed to dialectal variation.
37 The variable that has consistently been returned as significant in variationist studies is DISCOURSE
FUNCTION or TOPIC CONTINUATION (e.g., Bayley & Pease-Álvarez 1996, 1997, Bentivoglio 1987, Enríquez
1984, Otheguy et al. 2007, Silva-Corvalán 1982, 1994). TOPIC CONTINUATION refers to whether the subject referent has been mentioned in the conversation or not. Note that this is independent of the syntactic function of the previous referent and the distance from its referent. Topic continuation contexts favor a null subject while topic shift and emphasis favor overt subjects (Bentivoglio 1987, Cameron 1994, 1995,
Cameron & Flores 2003, Flores-Ferrán 2002, Silva-Corvalán 1994, Travis 2005, 2008). A more specific variable would be CO-REFERENCE (i.e., switch reference), where the syntactic function of the previous referent matters. In particular, CO-REFERENCE examines continuity of subjects, i.e., whether the preceding subject shares the referent. Consider the following example, from Silva-Corvalán (2001):
(3) Me vine con Pepe hoy a la oficina. Pepe/él/Ø vive cerca de mi casa.
‘I came to the office with Pepe today. Pepe/he/Ø lives close to my house.’
In this example there are two clauses. The subject of the first clause is the first person singular, while in the second clause the subject is Pepe; thus, the subjects are non-co-referential. But Pepe is mentioned in the first clause, thus, there is topic continuity. Co-reference (4) has been found to favor null subjects (Bayley &
Pease-Álvarez 1996, 1997, Flores-Ferrán 2004, Otheguy et al. 2007, Silva-Corvalán 1994). The fact that a constraint favors a form does not imply that there is a set rule. For example, co-reference favoring null subjects does not imply that there is a rule that in co-referential contexts the subject must be null. In fact, the argument that subject expression is a variable phenomenon is based on the variation observed: co- referential subjects are produced as overt at rates of 20% to 40% (Bentivoglio 1994, Cameron 1995, Flores-
Ferrán 2004, Silva-Corvalán 1994, cited in Travis 2007). Such findings argue in favor of applying variationist methods to the study of subject expression.
(4) Pepe vino hoy a la oficina. Pepe/él/Ø vive cerca de mi casa.
‘Pepe came to the office today today. Pepe/he/Ø lives close to my house.’
Another related variable is DISTANCE FROM PREVIOUS REFERENT. Distance is measured in intervening subjects between the subject in particular and its referent, irrespective of the syntactic function of the
38 referent. If the subject of a clause is co-referential with that of a preceding clause, the distance from the referent is 0; in example (3), the subject is not co-referential, but the distance is still 0, since the referent, an object, appears in the preceding clause. Consider a modified version of example (3):
(5) Me vine con Pepe hoy a la oficina. Ø Tengo mucho trabajo. Pepe/él/Ø vive cerca de mi casa.
‘I came to the office with Pepe today. I have a lot of work to do. Pepe/he/Ø lives close to my
house.’
Now there is an intervening null subject (for the verb tengo), thus the distance is 1. Studies conclude that the further the referent is, the more probable it is to induce an overt form (Cameron 1995, Cameron &
Flores-Ferrán 2004, Flores-Ferrán 2002, Travis 2005, 2007).
The variable CLAUSE TYPE distinguishes between main and embedded clauses. Returning to example
(3), the target subject is in a main clause. An example of an embedded clause subject is given in (6).
(6) Me vine con Pepe hoy a la oficina. Ø Pensaba que Pepe/él/Ø vivía cerca de mi casa pero no.
‘I came to the office with Pepe today. I thought that Pepe/he/Ø lived close to my house but he
doesn’t.’
Embedded clauses favor null subjects (Lozano 2008, Margaza & Bel 2006, Morales 1997, Otheguy et al.
2007, Silva-Corvalán 1994), while main clauses do not favor either form. Therefore, in main clauses the forms are regulated by other variables.
The variable TENSE-ASPECT-MOOD (TAM) CONTINUITY indicates whether the tense of the target clause and that of the preceding clause are the same or different. In example (3) the tense is different; the first clause is in the preterit while the target clause is in the present indicative. In example (6), however, the target clause (Pepe vivía cerca de mi casa) is in the imperfect and so is the preceding verb form (pensaba), thus, it is a case of same TAM. TAM CONTINUITY has been found to correlate with the distribution of null and overt subjects (Ávila-Shah 2000, Bayley & Pease-Alvarez 1997, Paredes Silva 1993): TAM continuity favors null subjects (Otheguy et al.2007, Silva-Corvalán 1982, 1994, Travis 2007). Paredes Silva (1993) proposes the combination of TAM CONTINUITY with CO-REFERENCE in her study of Brazilian Portuguese, and reports an improvement in its predictability of overt forms. She calls this variable SPEECH
39 CONNECTEDNESS. This finding is later supported by Bayley & Pease-Alvarez (1997) and Otheguy et al.
(2007) for Spanish, with some modification.
Paredes Silva (1993) distinguishes six degrees of speech connectedness, as illustrated by the monologue in example (7) below. The first degree comprises cases of co-reference and same TAM (see 7a).
The second degree characterizes cases of co-reference with a change in TAM, as in (7b). For the third degree, shown in (7c), there is no co-reference, i.e., there are one or more intervening subjects, but the referent is in a subject position. The fourth degree (7d) is those cases of non-co-reference where the referent is not in a subject position. For the fifth degree (7e), there is a new discourse topic or a new narrative section, with or without change in the subject. Bayley & Pease-Álvarez (1997) explain that although the subject is not changed from (a) to (b), that there is the end of one section (the conflict with Manuel) and the beginning of a new section (the conflict with Andrés). For the sixth degree (7f), there is no-co-reference and there is an intervening referent that is a viable alternative candidate for the target subject. Note that the example is drawn from a corpus of oral language and is faithfully reproduced by the authors, Bayley &
Pease-Álvarez.
(7) Language-internal variable: Connect
a. Cuando ∅ estábamos adentro del Hospital no ∅ podíamos encontrar al doctor. ∅ teníamos
que esperar.
‘When we were inside the hospital we couldn’t find the doctor. We had to wait.’
b. Un niño que se llama Manuel Cabrejo estaba en mi equipo de fútbol. ∅ me tumbó porque me
metieron un gol de penal.
‘A boy named Manuel Cabrejo was on my soccer team. He knocked me down because they
scored a penalty goal against me.’
c. Y nos quedamos allí hasta que paró de temblar. Y luego salimos... de la casa.
‘We stayed there until it [the earth] stopped shaking. And then we left... the house.’
d. Después mi mamá me llevó a comer a Sizzler y yo comí carne, ensalada con papas.
‘Afterwards my mom took me to eat at Sizzler’s and I ate meat, salad with potatoes.’
40 e. Le dijo el polecia a Manuel, ‘para hacer esto a lo mejo[r] bas a ir a la carsel.’ Dijo que iba a
venir en dos semanas. Hora yo y Manuel (a) somos muy buen amigos. Hora ∅ (b) tengo otro
conflicto de una pelota con un niño que se llama Andrés.
‘The policemen said to Manuel, “for doing this most likely you’ll go to jail.” He said that he
was going to come in two weeks. Now Manuel and I are very good friends. Now I have
another conflict about a ball with a boy named Andrés.’
f. Yo estaba en la playa. Y mi amiga estaba conmigo. ∅ Jugaba al voleybol con mis otras
amigas.
‘I was at the beach. And my friend was with me. ∅ ws playing volleyball with my other
friends.’
Bayley & Pease-Álvarez omit the last category because they had no principled way of deciding whether the target subject referred to the viable alternative candidate or the preceding referent. Otheguy et al. (2007) simplify this categorization further to same referent or not, and, in cases of the same referent, whether the
TAM is the same or different. Example (3) would, thus, be coded as having a different referent.
One final variable that merits mention here is PERSON (AND NUMBER). Person distinguishes between the first, second, and third persons in singular and plural. It can be considered discourse-related because, in a communicative act, first and second person subjects are always given information (see Chafe 1994). If the variable person is significant because of its discursive properties, then, first and second persons should exhibit fewer overt subjects than the third person. In general, studies show the opposite trend (Bentivoglio
1987, Davidson 1996, Enríquez 1984, Morales 1997, Otheguy et al. 2007, Silva-Corvalán 1982, 1994,
Travis 2006, 2007). PERSON will be discussed in more detail below.
In summary, discourse continuity—a broad notion that comprises a number of discourse-related variables—plays a major role in the distribution of null and overt subjects. The next section focuses on lexico-semantic and morphology-related variables that have an effect on subject expression.
41 2.2. Lexico-semantic and morphology-related variables
Discourse structure cannot fully account for the expression vs. omission of subjects in Spanish. The variables explained in this section, and summarized in the following table, pertain to morphology or the lexicon: PERSON AND NUMBER, SEMANTIC and SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, ANIMACY, and VERB FORM
AMBIGUITY.
Table 3.2: Lexico-semantic and morphology-related Variables and Associated Constraints
Variables Constraints PERSON First (Singular/Plural), Second (Singular/Plural) Third (Singular/Plural)
ANIMACY Animate Inanimate
SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Psychological Speech Motion Copulative Other
SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive Unergative Unaccusative Copulative
VERB FORM AMBIGUITY Ambiguous, Unambiguous
As discussed in the preceding section, the variable PERSON distinguishes between three persons in singular and plural forms. Consider, for instance, the following example from Travis (2007), where the subject is in the first person singular.
(8) Yo la pongo encima de la mesa? …Se la pelo, y le quito así el piquito,….
‘I put it on top of the table? . . . (I) peel it for her, and (I) pull out the tip,…’
Further distinction is made between second person singular specific and non-specific and third person specific and non-specific. The non-specific forms are used meaning uno ‘one’:
42 (9) Estás acostada, estás acostado aquí en la noche, y de repente oyes una blacera y los policías
correteando.
‘You are lying down, you are lying down here at night, and, suddenly, you hear shooting and
policemen running around.’
The general or non-specific third person plural, as explained above, categorically takes the null form, thus, it has been excluded from variationist studies. The second person singular presents interesting contrasts between Madrid and Puerto Rican Spanish: while Madrid Spanish favors the null form with non- specific second person singular, Puerto Rican Spanish favors the overt form (Cameron 1996). This variation is further discussed below, in §2.3. Overt pronouns have been found to be favored with the first person singular form (Bentivoglio 1987, Davidson 1996, Enríquez 1984, Morales 1997, Otheguy et al.
2007, Silva-Corvalán 1982, 1994, Travis 2006, 2007). In particular, the use of overt forms is increased in conjunction with estimative verbs, which express the opinion of the speaker (Bentivoglio 1987, Enríquez
1984, Silva-Corvalán 1994, Travis 2005). Bayley & Pease-Álvarez (1996) also find that first person singular forms favor overt pronominal subjects. However, they report the same trend for third person singular and, therefore, they argue that it is due to the lack of saliency of singular endings. Singular forms have been reported to favor overt subjects more than plural forms (Cameron 1992, Enríquez 1984, Flores-
Ferrán 2002, Silva-Corvalán 1994). This trend has been tied to the dialectal variation found between varieties of Spanish in the Americas. For example, Otheguy et al. (2007) find that in Caribbean Spanish second person singular is the constraint that favors overt pronominal subjects the most, while in other varieties it is third person singular. Perphaps the most controversial hypothesis as to why this is so is the functional compensation hypothesis (Hochberg 1986), which explains the increased use of overt pronominal in Caribbean varieties as a compensation strategy for the phonological deletion of final -s, the second person singular verbal morpheme. This theory has been convincingly disproven by Ranson (1991) and Cameron (1996). Ranson (1991) examines the speech of another final -s deleting community, Puente
Genil, in Andalusia and finds no increased use of overt pronouns. In fact, she finds that ambiguity is normally resolved contextually. Cameron (1996) persuasively shows that the difference in use of overt
43 pronouns with second person singular in Madrid Spanish vs. Puerto Rican Spanish is not due to final -s deletion but to a reanalysis of non-specific second person form tú ‘you’ by analogy with non-specific uno
‘one’ and usted ‘you-formal’. In summary, singular verb forms favor overt pronominal subjects, first person singular, in particular.
The variable ANIMACY classifies referents as animates or inanimates. The referent in (8), the speaker, is an animate referent. An example of an inanimate referent is offered in (10), from Lozano (2008).
(10) Cada día caminaba de mi apartamento a la universidad por “El paseo de los ingleses”. Era un
camino muy lindo con vistas de hoteles y también el mar azul y claro del Mediterráneo.
‘Everyday I walked from my apartment to college through “El paseo de los ingleses”. It was a
very nice walk with a view to hotels and also the blue and clear Mediterranean Sea.’[ARGL,
upper-advanced, CEDEL2 corpus]
There is no overt pronominal form for inanimates in Spanish. Therefore, variationist approaches on the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects did not consider this variable because of its categorical distribution with inanimate referents. However, null pronominal subjects alternate with overt lexical subjects with inanimate referents. Lozano (2008) analyzes written data from a large corpus of L2 learners of Spanish (CEDEL) and finds an overproduction of overt pronominal subjects with third person singular animate subjects. Importantly, this overproduction is not attested with third person singular inanimate subjects. This study is further discussed in §3.2.
The variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE classifies verbs according to their meaning: psychological, speech act, motion, copulative, and other (for those that do not fit into any of the other categories). Numerous authors have shown that verbs that express the speaker’s opinion favor overt subjects more than other verb types (Bentivoglio 1987, Enríquez 1984, Silva-Corvalán 1994, Travis 2007). Similarly, the variable
SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE has been shown to be significant in the distribution subjects. Casanova (1999) finds that copulative verbs favor overt subjects more than predicative verbs in Catalan, an effect that she ascribes to the lack of semantic content of this type of verb. But Serratrice & Sorace (2003) and Serratrice et al.
(2004) found that syntactic verb type was not a significant factor group in the distribution of null and overt subjects in Italian.
44 The variable VERB FORM AMBIGUITY characterizes verb forms as ambiguous or unambiguous (i.e., whether the verb inflection is exclusive to one person or not). Ambiguous verb forms are the first and third person singular imperfect and past perfect indicative, present, imperfect, present perfect and past perfect subjunctive and conditional. In many studies, overt subjects have been found to appear more frequently with verbal forms that are ambiguous than with unambiguous ones (Bayley & Pease-Álvarez 1996, 1997,
Silva-Corvalán 1994, Travis 2005). However, this effect has not always been found, leading some researchers to conclude that other variables override VERB FORM AMBIGUITY (Casanova 1999, Morales
1997, Ranson 1991). Ranson, for instance, found that ambiguous forms exhibited fewer overt pronominal subjects than unambiguous ones in the Andalusian dialect she examined. She attributes this to the fact that the subject of ambiguous forms were identifiable in the context.
The effects of lexico-semantic and morphology-related variables seem to be less robust than those of discourse-related variables in the distribution of subject expression in Spanish. Bayley & Pease-Álvarez
(1997) and Otheguy et al. (2007), however, report person and number as the highest ranked variable, over speech connectedness.
2.3. External factors
As discussed, language-internal factors have been shown to play a role in subject expression in
Spanish. Language-external factors, however, rarely play a role in this distribution. The external factors discussed here are GENRE, DIALECTAL VARIATION, LANGUAGE CONTACT, GENDER, AGE, OCCUPATION and
STYLE, summarized in the following table.
45 Table 3.3: External Variables and Associated Constraints
Variables Constraints GENRE In a narrative Response to a question Response to a comment
DIALECTAL VARIATION Caribbean Mainland
LANGUAGE CONTACT Monolingual Bilingual
GENDER Male Female
AGE Age group 1 Age group 2 Age group 3
OCCUPATION Unskilled Skilled
STYLE Careful Casual
An external factor that has been found to play a role is GENRE (Ávila Jiménez 1996, Bayley & Pease-
Álvarez 1996, Flores-Ferrán 2002, Montes Miró 1986, Otheguy et al. 2007, Silva-Corvalán 1982, Solomon
1998, Travis 2007). Solomon (1998) and Flores-Ferrán (2002), for instance, reveal an increase in overt pronominal subjects in conflict narratives than in non-conflict narratives in Yucatec Spanish and New York
Puerto Rican Spanish, respectively.15 Travis (2007) compares two Spanish data sets, one produced in spontaneous sociolinguistic interviews with Spanish-English bilinguals in New Mexico and another produced in spontaneous conversation in Colombia. In the Colombian data, the priming effect is more short-lived, attributed to the interactional nature of the spontaneous conversations. Otheguy et al. (2007) also find GENRE to be a significant factor in New York Spanish. However, it is one of the lowest ranked variables. The different genres they consider include narrative, response to a question or response to a comment. Bayley & Pease-Álvarez (1996) do not find GENRE to be a significant factor. They distinguished between an autobiographical sketch, a personal narrative, and fictional stories.
15 Conflict was defined following Simmel (1955) to include oppositions, dualisms, fights, quarrels, etc.
46 REGIONAL VARIATION has been reported for subject expression in Spanish. Variationist studies to date report differences across dialects with respect to subject expression. Initially, the difference that garnered most attention was the overall percentage of overt subjects (see Cameron 1992, 1993, Lipski 1994,
Otheguy & Zentella, 2007, Otheguy et al. 2005, Travis 2007). The following table (adapted from Silva-
Corvalán 2001) presents an overview.
Table 3.4: Dialectal variation in overall rates of pronominal subject expression (adapted from Silva-Corvalán 2001)
Study Place Percentage of overt subjects
Enríquez (1984) Madrid 21% Mainland (Mexico, Colombia and Otheguy et al. (2007) 24% Ecuador) Newcomers in New York Miró Vera & Pineda (1982) Sevilla 27%
Silva-Corvalán (1982) Los Ángeles 35%
Barrenechea & Alonso (1977) Buenos Aires 36%
Otheguy et al. (2007) Caribbean Newcomers in New York 36%
Horchberg (1986) Boston 37%
Cifuentes (1980) Santiago 38%
Bentivoglio (1987) Caracas 40%
Morales (1982) Puerto Rico 40%
Cameron (1996) San Juan 60%
In general, Caribbean and Santiago de Chile Spanish demonstrate the highest rates of overt subjects, and Peninsular Spanish the lowest. These percentages, however, are difficult to compare. Although most of the studies draw on data from sociolinguistic interviews, they are not comparable, as Silva-Corvalán (2001) explains, because not all the studies include the same factors, and they aim to answer different questions.
More viable comparisons emerge exploring differences in patterns. Cameron (1996), as introduced in §2.2, reveals patterning differences between Puerto Rican and Madrid Spanish regarding non-specific second person singular; Puerto Rican Spanish favors overt pronominal subjects while Madrid Spanish disfavors them. Otheguy et al. (2007), also explained in §2.2, report differences between varieties of New York
47 Spanish, Caribbean, and Mainland. They found that second person singular is the constraint that favors overt pronominal subjects the most in Caribbean varieties while it is third person singular in Mainland varieties. Important in this discussion is the fact that contrasts in patterns provide a better comparative tool.
Another variable that has received much attention is CONTACT with English. Contact has been argued to act as an accelerator of linguistic change, targeting areas where variation exists in monolingual speech
(Silva-Corvalán 1994). The discussion on rates of pronominal expression across contact vs. non-contact varieties is as unproductive as it is for comparisons across regional varieties. Bayley & Pease-Álvarez
(1996, 1997), Flores-Ferrán (2004), Silva-Corvalán (1994), Torres-Cacoullos & Travis (forthcoming) and
Travis (2007) reveal no increase in subject expression in Spanish in the U.S. Lapidus & Otheguy (2005a, b), Lipski (1996), Montrul (2004), Otheguy & Zentella (2007), Otheguy et al. (2007), Toribio (2004), on the other hand, report an increase. Otheguy et al. (2007), for instance, reports a 36% overall pronominal subject rate in recently arrived immigrants from the Caribbean (Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, and
Cuba) in New York. New York born and raised Spanish speakers of Caribbean heritage, however, exhibited a 42% rate. In the case of Mainland (Mexico, Colombia, and Ecuador) Spanish speakers, those recently arrived displayed 24% overt pronominal subjects, while those born and raised in New York produced 33% overt pronominal subjects. Due to these disagreements across studies, some researchers have resorted to comparisons based on patterns. These differences will be fully discussed in §3.2. By way of illustration, consider Silva-Corvalan’s (1994) study, where she employed the same methodology with diverse communities; monolingual speakers in Mexico and bilingual Spanish speakers in L.A. She did not report an increase in overt pronominal subjects in contact varieties. She, did, however, find patterning differences between monolingual and bilingual speakers regarding the variable person. While monolingual speakers favor overt pronominal forms the most in first person singular, bilingual speakers favor overt subjects the most in third person singular.
Although the effect of external factors is largely considered secondary with respect to language- internal factors (Silva-Corvalán 2001), some authors have found an effect of specific social variables. The variable GENDER has very rarely been found significant, except in Ávila Jiménez (1996) and Bayley &
Pease-Álvarez (1996, 1997), who encourage further examination to explain this trend. The variable AGE has
48 been studied by Ávila-Jiménez (1996), Flores-Ferrán (2002), and Lizardi (1993), who found that older
Puerto Rican speakers, attendant to prescriptive grammars, produced a smaller number of overt pronominal subjects than younger speakers. The variable OCCUPATION was found significant in Ávila-Jiménez’s study, in which speakers in unskilled occupations used more overt pronominal subjects that speakers with higher education. Regarding the variable STYLE, she also found that in careful styles more null subjects were produced than in casual styles.
3. Bilingual subject expression
Having discussed the variables relevant to subject expression in monolingual Spanish and Catalan, we now turn to subject expression in bilingual communities. The study of subject expression in bilingual speech has focused mainly on pairings between a null subject language and a non-null subject language.
Researchers in generative syntax have examined the production and interpretation of overt pronouns in first and second language bilingualism. In turn, researchers in variationist sociolinguistics have examined the variables that characterize subject expression in bilingual speech varieties. The study of contact between null subject languages lacks the scholarly tradition that contact between typologically different languages has enjoyed. Thus, the scattered studies vary in depth of analysis and have returned contradictory results.
3.1. Contact between a null and a non-null subject language
Subject expression in Spanish in contact with English has been explored in the context of near-native speakers of Spanish and heritage speakers of Spanish in the U.S., that is, Spanish speakers raised in the
U.S. with reduced exposure to the language and with varying degrees of proficiency. Studies on heritage speakers have traditionally followed a variationist approach, while research on second language acquisition focuses on ultimate attainment of target grammars. The first approach considers bilingual speech as part of the variation of Spanish and explores it as any other variety, mainly through naturalistic data collected via sociolinguistic interviews, while the second normally approaches the data to make claims about more general linguistic processes such as learnability or the role of input, considering bilingual forms as deviations from a target norm. These latter studies typically draw on elicited data in experimental settings.
49 In recent years, these two approaches have benefitted from each other and they have begun to merge.
Researchers have attended to the speech of attritted and advanced bilinguals, by reference to naturalistic and elicited data. These efforts have revealed similarities in the linguistic behavior of heritage speakers and near-native speakers of null subject languages. Montrul (2004, 2008) examined subject expression in the fairy tale narratives elicited from Spanish heritage speakers with the aid of pictures (see also Toribio 2004).
Tsimpli (2003) and Tsimpli et al. (2004) analyze the production and comprehension of Italian-English and
Greek-English bilinguals, as compared to Italian and Greek monolingual speakers. In the comprehension task, the Picture Verification Task, which targeted null vs. overt subjects, participants were presented with a sentence and three images and had to choose the image that corresponded to the sentence (see also Sorace
& Filiaci 2006). Argyri & Sorace (2007) examine the speech of English-Greek bilingual children and compare them to Greek and English monolingual children and adults. They use an elicited production task, where images were presented and participants were asked a question about them, and an acceptability judgment task, where the participants saw a video with puppets and had to make a choice about the acceptability of the puppets’ production.
The aforementioned studies take into account the pragmatics of null and overt pronominal subjects
(i.e., the discourse function variable in variationist work). Note, however, that the other variables are not considered. Thus, subject expression is not considered variable by these authors and is examined as if the distribution were reducible to the discourse function of the subject. Thus, non-target-like behavior is assumed to be dependent on discourse function alone. All the studies conclude that contact with a non-null subject language results in the production of pragmatically odd overt pronominal subjects in the null subject language. Lozano (2008) constitutes an exception: in examining the written language of English L1 second language learners of Spanish and Spanish monolinguals, he considers the variables person and animacy, and concludes, in agreement with Silva-Corvalán (1994), that third person animate exhibits differential behavior in second language learners as compared to monolingual speakers. Central to the general discussion of increased pronominal rates is the idea that some areas of the grammar are more difficult to acquire or easier to lose. These are the peripheral areas of the grammar, i.e., where the syntax interfaces with the discourse-pragmatics and the lexicon. As noted above, these areas are acquired late, and they may be especially susceptible to interlingual influence (Müller & Hulk 2001). With respect to subject
50 expression, the findings are interpreted as reflecting a loss or suspension of the sensibility to the licensing pragmatics for overt subjects, attested in an overuse of pragmatically illicit overt pronominal subjects. Still, while the advancements in the understanding of language contact consequences are considerable, they fail to acknowledge the battery of variables that play a role in subject expression in Spanish and the variable behavior of these factor groups.
Variationist approaches, on the other hand, analyze naturalistic data by reference to multiple variables.
Nonetheless, their target of study is also the distribution of null and overt subjects in bilinguals, regulated by an area of the grammar which has been shown to be indeterminate or permeable in bilingual speech.
Bayley & Pease-Álvarez (1996) examine the speech of Spanish-English bilingual children in the U.S., and indicate the difficulty in the acquisition of the variable behavior of subject expression in Spanish. Otheguy et al. (2007) show the convergence with English in the fact that Mainland and Caribbean varieties of New
York Spanish experience an increase in subject expression. Silva-Corvalán (1994) compares monolingual speech with the speech of Mexicans in L.A and reports patterns of subject expression as a function of contact with English. In particular, speakers with greater contact with English display a higher rate of overt pronominal subject in the third person singular, while monolinguals and those with less exposure display higher rates in the first person singular.
Irrespective of methodology, researchers have attended to rates as well as patterns. Regarding rates, contradictory results have been reported for Spanish-English bilingualism in the US. Some researchers find no changes in bilingual speech as compared to monolingual speech. For instance, Bayley & Pease-Álvarez
(1996, 1997), Flores-Ferrán (2004), Silva-Corvalán (1994), Torres-Cacoullos and Travis (forthcoming) and
Travis (2007) report no increase in the overall rate of overt subjects among bilinguals, or among speakers with greater contact with English. Others report increased rates of pronominal expression that are interpreted as attributed to contact with English (Lapidus & Otheguy 2005a, b, Lipski 1996, Montrul 2004,
Otheguy & Zentella 2007, Otheguy et al. 2007, Toribio 2004).
Some researchers have shifted their attention from rates to usage. Silva-Corvalán (1994) finds no increase in rates of overt subjects in bilinguals with more exposure to English than in those with less exposure, but she finds different behaviors regarding co-reference, person, and verb form ambiguity, where
51 more exposure to English leads to a less consistent effect of these variables. More specifically, she reports contact effects in the production of third person (although not in first person): Bilinguals overproduce overt pronominal subjects in the third person, while monolinguals overproduce overt pronominal subjects in the first person. She also finds a weakening in the variable co-reference in bilinguals, and third generation bilinguals, who, unlike first and second generation bilinguals, do not attend to verb form ambiguity to produce a null or an overt pronominal subject. Bayley & Pease-Álvarez (1996) also find a weakening in the variable co-reference in their study of bilinguals in Northern California. However, this weakening only occurs in the factor ‘resumed reference,’ which refers to an active topic that has an intervening subject.
They find results similar to those of Silva-Corvalán (1994) regarding verb form ambiguity; as contact with
English increases, the use of the overt subjects to resolve verb form ambiguity decreases. Flores-Ferrán
(2004) examines the contact hypothesis by reference to the speech of Puerto Ricans in New York, with different degrees of exposure to English, as compared to Puerto Ricans in San Juan. She takes into account the overall rates as well as the behavior regarding person and switch reference. While she rejects the contact hypothesis, she does find contact effects in the group with more exposure to English, the NYC native-born, who produce a higher rate of overt pronominal subjects and disregard co-reference, i.e., provide overt pronominal subjects in contexts of same referent. Travis (2007) compares monolingual and bilingual data from different corpora (Colombia and New Mexico) and reports no increase in the overall rate of overt subjects in the contact variety and no differences in the patterning of null and overt subjects.
For both groups, semantic verb type, distance from previous mention, realization of previous mention, and verb form ambiguity have an effect, while clause type and TAM continuity do not. Additionally, the ranking of constraints is the same for both groups. Lastly, the variable ranking is almost the same; the strongest variable is semantic verb type for both groups and verb form ambiguity is one of the lower ranked variables in both corpora. The rankings of distance and previous realization are second and third in the Colombia corpus and third and second in the New Mexico corpus. This difference, which can be interpreted as minimal (see Tagliamonte 2006 on comparisons across data groups based on variable ranking), is the only one attested in this study.
The authors who report an increased rate of overt subjects in Spanish in contact with English also describe differences in the patterns of use of overt subjects between monolingual and bilingual speakers.
52 Lapidus & Otheguy (2005) find an increase in the overt non-specific third person plural pronoun ellos, especially in those speakers with more contact with English. Otheguy et al. (2007) examine language and contact convergence in New York Spanish. Therefore, they divide their participants according to their dialectal variety into Mainland and Caribbean, and according to their contact with English into New York born and raised (NYBR) and Newcomers. The internal variables they take into account are genre, person and number, TAM of the verb, whether there is a reflexive pronoun, specific referent or not, connect, semantic verb type, clause type, and appearance in a set phrase. They report on language contact based on the overall rate of overt subjects, larger in the New York born and raised than in the newcomers. Dialectal convergence is explained in terms of variable ranking. The three highest ranked variables (highlighted in the table) are different across dialects in the Newcomers (yellow and blue in the table) but not in the NYBR
(green in the table). Consider the Table 3.5, adapted from Otheguy et al. (2007):
Table 3.5: Variable Ranking in New York Spanish
Caribbean Newcomers Mainland Newcomers Caribbean NYBR Mainland NYBR
Variable Wald Variable Wald Variable Wald Variable Wald
Person 495.218** Person 408.05** Person 325.73** Person 413.80**
Connect 293.86** Connect 194.11** Connect 111.70** Connect 142.49**
Tense 239.48** Set phrase 71.17** Tense 73.89** Tense 101.40**
Clause 87.33** Tense 55.10** Picture 30.64** Clause 23.88**
Lexical 22.20** Clause 45.49** Clause 27.29** Genre 11.28**
Genre 12.30* Lexical 45.14** Lexical 13.06* Reflexive 11.07**
Picture 4.86* Reflexive 31.89** Set phrase 11.67** Set phrase 7.40*
Set phrase 2.23 Genre 13.45** Reflexive 11.40** Specific 4.70*
Reflexive 1.98 Specific 1.50 Genre 7.17* Picture 3.62
Specific 0.96 Picture 1.35 Specific 1.66 Lexical 2.17
53 Otheguy et al. (2007) consider constraint ranking a more revealing contrastive tool. They examine the constraints pertaining to the variable person and report that the varieties converge in the singular forms. As can be seen in Table 3.6, the constraint first person singular is ranked fourth in the Caribbean Newcomers and second in the Mainland Newcomers (highlighted in yellow). For the New York born and raised, it is third for speakers of both origins. The constraint second person singular specific (in lavender) is ranked first in Caribbean Newcomers and third in the Mainland Newcomers. Although it is still first for the
Caribbean New York born and raised, it moves up to second in the Mainland New York born and raised.
The constraint second person non-specific (in blue) is ranked second and significantly favors overt subjects in the Caribbean Newcomers, whereas it is ranked fourth in the Mainland Newcomers and significantly favors null subjects. Among the New York born and raised participants, the Caribbean group maintains its preference for overt pronominal subjects, while the Mainland speakers neither favor nor disfavor them.
Lastly, the constraint third person (in salmon) also exhibits convergence. Third person singular is the highest ranked constraint in the Mainland Newcomers while it is not significant in the Caribbean
Newcomers. In the New York born and raised, it is still the highest ranked constraint in the Mainland speakers and is now significant in the Caribbean speakers.
Table 3.6: Constraint ranking in New York Spanish
Caribbean Newcomers Mainland Newcomers Caribbean NYBR Mainland NYBR
Person Exp(B) Person Exp(B) Person Exp(B) Person Exp(B)
2SG Spec 3.22** 3SG 3.21** 2SG Spec 2.59** 3SG 3.07**
2SG 3.13** 1SG 1.98** 2SG 1.93** 2SG Spec 2.20** Nonspec Nonspec 3SG 1.09 2SG Spec 1.19 1SG 1.62** 1SG 1.98**
1SG 1.04 2SG 0.61** 3SG 1.54** 2SG 0.66 Nonspec Nonspec 3PL 0.30** 3PL 0.58** 1PL 0.28** 3PL 0.50**
1PL 0.29** 1PL 0.37** 3PL 0.27** 1PL 0.23**
54 Otheguy et al.’s work is centered on issues of language contact and bilingualism applying sociolinguistic methodology. This dissertation project is guided by this work.
To summarize this section, although there is no agreement on whether contact with English results in an increase in overt pronominal subjects, in general, bilingual speech differs from monolingual speech in the patterns of null vs. overt subjects.
3.2. Contact between two null subject languages
Two hypotheses have been posited regarding contact-induced influence, arguably attested in overall rates and more convincingly in patterns (e.g. Silva-Corvalán 1994): simplification (Sorace 2004) and convergence (Bullock & Toribio 2004, Toribio 2004). These two theories predict an increase in the overall rate of overt subjects, or a loss of pragmatic weight in overt pronominal usage in contact between a null- subject and a non-null-subject language. However, in the case of two null subject languages, simplification would predict an increase in the overall rate of overt subjects (or a loss of their pragmatic weight), whereas convergence would predict that the languages would become more similar with respect to rates and patterns of subject expression. A situation of contact between two null subject languages provides the ideal site for testing hypotheses of contact outcomes by reference to subject expression.
The existing literature regarding contact between two null subject languages is scant and presents some limitations, and, therefore, results can be deemed contradictory. For example, Bini (1993) explores spontaneous conversations of 11 beginning and 7 low-intermediate Spanish-speaking learners of Italian. All had finished high-school education and were attending la Escuela Oficial de Idiomas. They were recorded in conversations with other students, the teacher, describing images or narrating a movie or a book.
Margaza & Bel (2006) explore the subject expression of 10 Greek intermediate and 9 Greek advanced learners of Spanish (in comparison with 10 native speakers) in two tasks: a close text and a written production task of a free narrative text about a situation in their life where they had experienced fear, anxiety, danger, etc. As in the L2 studies, the target-like behavior is established by the discourse function
(i.e., the overt pronoun is target-like if it provides pragmatic weight). Both the Bini and Margaza & Bel studies report an overuse of overt pronouns. Lozano (2002), on the other hand, finds no such increase among 20 advanced Greek-speaking learners of Spanish. He used an acceptability judgment test, and he
55 also considered discourse function as the only variable implied in subject expression. Differences with other studies in terms of learners’ proficiency and tasks may partially explain the disparities. The participants in the former studies seem to be of lower proficiency than those in the latter. It may be the case that earlier stages of L2 acquisition require simplification to compensate for the inexperience with the language, which in later stages is overcome. More importantly, the role of a non-null subject L2 prior to learning the null subject L3 cannot be unraveled in the Bini and Margaza & Bel studies. The Spanish educational system requires a second language in the compulsory educational years; the most commonly taught are English, French, and German, all non-null subject languages. Lozano (2002) acknowledges the fact that his participants had previously acquired a non-null subject language. Interestingly, if there were an effect of the L2 on the L3 among his learners, it is overcome in advanced learners. Research on L3 acquisition indicates the influence of the L2 on the L3 (Chandrasekhar 1978, Chumbow 1981, Dewaele
1998, Hammarberg & Williams 1993, Hufeisen 1991, 1993, Möhle 1989, Ringbom 1987, Singleton 1987,
Stedje 1977, Vogel 1992, Williams & Hammarberg 1998, cited in Hammarberg 2001). To overcome these limitations, the proposed project examines Spanish in contact with Catalan in Minorca, where English is the
L3, and where advanced proficiency in Spanish is granted by the prestige of the language, the educational system, and its predominant position in the media.
3.3. Simplification in subject expression
First language studies have devoted extant attention to the acquisition of null and non-null subject languages (Borer and Wexler 1988, Clahsen 1991, Guilfoyle & Noonan 1988, Hyams 1988, 1991, 1992,
Lebeaux 1988, Radford, 1990). They report a null subject stage in acquirers of non-null subject languages, interpreted as indicating that null subjects are the default option. The null subject stage in non-null subject acquirers has been noted to take place before the acquisition of Tense and surpassed once the features of
Tense have been acquired (Bellugi 1967, Guilfoyle 1984). Thus, the stage is interpreted not as the default option but as an early stage at which arguments are not obligatorily projected in the syntax (Guilfoyle &
Noonan 1988, Lebeaux 1988, Radford 1990).
The hypothetical possible configurations in languages regarding subjects are (i) the existence of obligatorily null subjects, an option not attested in natural languages, (ii) the existence of obligatorily overt
56 subjects (e.g., English), and (iii) the existence of an alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects
(e.g., Spanish and Catalan). Although the simplest form of subject systems has been thought to be the null option because of the null subject stage in the acquisition of non-null subject languages, there is no natural language that employs only null subjects. Additionally, as pointed above, in childhood speech, the absence of pronominal subjects seems to be not a null subject but a reflection of the absence of the required functional projections. For these reasons, the idea of the obligatorily null option as the simplest form is not viable. Thus, the discussion focuses on whether it is simpler to have obligatorily overt pronominal subjects or the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects. Obligatorily overt pronominal subjects are theorized to be purely syntactic, in the sense that it is the strong nominal features of Agr and Tense that require the presence of an overt form. In alternating configurations, the weak nominal features of Agr and
Tense allow for a null pronominal subject (pro), a purely syntactic property. The alternation in the use of the null and the overt form, however, is restricted by the discourse-pragmatic interface with syntax, in that the use of the overt pronominal form carries pragmatic weight. It is in this sense that Sorace (2004) conceives the extension of overt pronominal subjects lacking pragmatic weight (as in English) as a simplification process.
3.4. Summary
Subject expression is Spanish has been researched mainly with three aims in mind: (i) to determine the linguistic variables at play in subject expression, (ii) to explain the variation attested across varieties of
Spanish, and (iii) to elucidate language contact outcomes. Pursuing the first of these, numerous studies have examined the role of internal variables (discourse, lexico-semantic, and morphology-related) and external variables. Although agreement has not been reached on some variables (e.g., verb form ambiguity), other variables are returned as significant in all studies (e.g., co-reference). Studies that take up the second aim explain variation as differences in the variables that are significant, their ranking, and the ranking of their constraints. Finally, efforts with aim (iii) seek to identify the areas that are permeable to interlingual influence, the role of superordinate vs. subordinate language, and the role of proficiency in contact outcomes.
57 Two main approaches have been applied to the study of subject expression in Spanish: a sociolinguistic and an experimental approach. They differ in several respects. First, the former draws on corpora of spontaneous speech or on naturalistic data collected via sociolinguistic interviews, whereas the latter uses elicitation techniques in more controlled environments. Second, the former considers the multiple variables that are at play in subject expression, whereas the latter refers to one, discourse function, typically only considering target-like the use of an overt pronoun if it provides contrast. Third, the former considers bilingual speech a variety of Spanish, while the latter considers it an ‘incomplete’, attrited, or non-target form. In recent years, these two approaches have started to share methodologies and concerns, enriching the study of subject expression in bilingual speech.
3.5. Contact subject expression between two null subject languages: Spanish in contact with
Catalan in Minorca
The present dissertation examines variation in subject expression in bilingual Spanish in Minorca,
Spain. As amply discussed in this chapter, variation is attested in subject expression across varieties of
Spanish, not only in overall rates of overt subjects, but also in the variables, constraints, and their hierarchies (i.e., in patterns). The present project compares subject expression in two null subject languages, Spanish and Catalan, thereby expanding the scope of variation studies to micro-variation across languages, and by exploring Spanish in contact with Catalan, to determine whether differences in patterns across the languages are reflected in a converged variety (Spanish in contact with Catalan in Minorca) or not. In brief, it compares Spanish and Catalan, on one hand, and monolingual and bilingual Spanish, on the other, in terms of rates of subject expression as well as patterns of subject expression, instantiated in variables, constraints, and their hierarchies. The work also seeks to contribute to a more profound understanding of bilingualism and contact outcomes. As discussed, novel behaviors may emerge as a consequence of simplification or convergence. Simplification would be reflected in an increase in the overall rate of overt subjects and a suspension of the pragmatic requirements on overt subjects, while convergence would predict neither. Regarding patterns, convergence predicts the emergence of a bilingual continuum, where bilinguals display forms that bridge between both languages and Spanish monolinguals
58 and Catalan data stand at each extreme of the continuum. Novel patterns, that is, unique innovations that cannot be attributed to the contributing languages, however, would constitute examples of simplification.
59 Chapter 4
The Present Study: Method.
Examining a Bilingual Community
Recent research on subject expression in Spanish focuses on (i) the variables that regulate subject expression, and (ii) the outcomes of contact between typologically dissimilar languages. This dissertation project combines both traditions by examining the variables that regulate subject expression in Spanish in contact with Catalan. The advances proposed here contribute to different literatures. Data from new regional varieties are introduced into the discussion, thus, microvariation in subject expression in Spanish is better understood. Additionally, data from Catalan contribute to our understanding of cross-linguistic variation between closely-related languages. To the best of my knowledge, the variables implicated in subject expression in Catalan have gone largely unexplored. In addition, within the language contact literature, different underlying processes have been proposed to explain language contact outcomes: simplification and convergence. The examination of contact outcomes that emerge in the speech of bilinguals of two sister languages can clarify which approach better explains the data. In the remainder of the chapter, we explain the methodology used in this project.
1. Research questions and hypotheses
The preceding chapters depict Minorca as a site of extended bilingualism both at the social and the individual level. Both Catalan and Spanish can be used in all contexts. Moreover, national migration assures continued contact between Spanish L1 and Catalan L1 bilinguals, and little international immigration precludes effects of other languages. These characteristics permit a relatively controlled study of Spanish-Catalan contact. Accordingly, the present project is motivated by three broad questions: Is
Minorcan bilingual Spanish different from monolingual Spanish (as exemplified by the variety spoken in
Valladolid) with respect to rates and patterns of subject expression? If so, what factors are implicated in the emergence of contact-induced patterns of subject expression in Minorcan Spanish? And how are such patterns to be interpreted? Embedded within this broad inquiry are a number of research questions probing language-internal and language-external factors that may be involved in contact patterns. 1.1. Internal factors: Variation in subject expression
As noted in Chapter 3, §2.1, subject expression exhibits variation across dialects of Spanish, which presents the possibility of examining variation across null subject languages (Spanish and Catalan in the present project) and between monolingual and bilingual varieties with respect to the language-internal variables (factor groups) and variable and constraint (factor) hierarchies that are implicated in subject expression. These variables include morphology-related factors (DISCOURSE FUNCTION, CO-
REFERENTIALITY, DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, CLAUSE TYPE, TAM CONTINUITY, and CONNECT) and lexico- semantic and morphology-related factors (PERSON, ANIMACY, SEMANTIC VERB TYPE, SYNTACTIC VERB
TYPE, and VERB FORM AMBIGUITY). The pertinent research questions and hypotheses follow.
(1) Internal factors in subject expression in monolingual Castilian Spanish (control group),
Minorcan Catalan (control group) and bilingual Spanish: Variables
Research Question 1: What language-internal variables are implicated in subject
expression in Catalan and in monolingual and bilingual Spanish? What differences
emerge?
Hypothesis
Previous variationist research indicates that several variables are implicated in
subject expression in Spanish (Bayley & Pease-Álvarez 1996, 1997, Bentivoglio
1987, Cameron 1995, Cameron & Flores-Ferrán 2004, Davidson 1996, Enríquez
1984, Flores-Ferrán 2002, Morales 1997, Otheguy et al. 2007, Silva-Corvalán 1982,
1994, Travis 2006, 2007). The specific variables vary from author to author. In fact,
variation exists in subject expresion in Spanish (Cameron 1995, Otheguy et al.
2007). Following this line of research, differences are expected in the variables
(factor groups) that are implicated in Catalan and in monolingual and bilingual
Spanish.
61 (2) Internal factors in subject expression in monolingual Castilian Spanish (control group),
Minorcan Catalan (control group), and bilingual Spanish: Variable hierarchies
Research Question 2: What are the variable hierarchies in Catalan and monolingual and
bilingual Spanish? What differences emerge?
Hypothesis
Otheguy et al (2007) compare the variable hierarchies in two varieties of Spanish:
Mainland and Caribbean with more and less contact with English. They report
differences in variable hierarchies between the two varieties and between contact and
less-contact forms. Following Otheguy et al. (2007) differences are predicted in the
variable hierarchies across language varieties in the present project.
(3) Internal factors in subject expression in monolingual Castilian Spanish (control group),
Minorcan Catalan (control group), and bilingual Spanish: Constraint hierarchies
Research Question 3: What are the constraint hierarchies in Catalan and monolingual and
bilingual Spanish? What differences emerge?
Hypothesis
Tagliamonte (2006) explains that comparisons across groups are better explained by
constraint hierarchies since they are more stable across speech samples. Cameron
(1996) compares Madrid and Puerto Rican Spanish with regard to the constraint
second person singular non-specific. Otheguy et al. (2007), too, report differences
across variaties before and after contact with English based on constraint hierarchies.
In line with this research, we expect to find differences in the constraint hierarchies
across different language varieties.
1.2. External factors
Also potentially implicated in speakers’ production of contact forms are external factors related to the bilingual individual and society, e.g., place of birth, age, native language, proficiency, and language usage.
Pertinent research questions and related hypotheses follow.
62 (4) External factors in contact effects: Place of birth
Research Question 4: Can place of birth determine the presence of contact-induced
Spanish language forms among Spanish-Catalan bilinguals currently residing in
Minorca?
Hypothesis
Since place of birth has been shown to correlate with knowledge and use of Catalan
(see Chapter 2, §4.2.2 and §4.2.3), we expect to find differences in the presence of
converged Spanish-language forms between those born in the linguistic area and
those born elsewhere. Those born in the linguistic area are normally Catalan L1
speakers while those born in the Peninsula are normally Spanish L1 speakers. While
there is no data regarding proficiency in Spanish in those born in the linguistic area,
those born elsewhere display a lower proficiency in Catalan. Thus, those born in the
linguistic area are expected to exhibit more cross-linguistic influence in Spanish than
those born elsewhere.
(5) External factors in contact effects: Age
Research Question 5: Are there observable differences in the presence of contact effects
in subject expression across age groups?
Hypothesis:
The different age groups exhibit varying degrees of knowledge and use of Catalan
and Spanish. Recall that the older group grew up with Spanish as a second language
and used it rarely, while the middle age groups exhibited an increase in the
knowledge and use of Spanish, with a concomitant lower competency in Catalan.
Finally, the younger group exhibits high proficiency in Catalan without diglossia (see
Chapter 2, §4.2.2 and §4.2.3). Therefore, differences are expected. Those 65 and
above are predicted to display more non-target-like Spanish language forms since
they received less input in Spanish than the other groups.
63 (6) External factors in contact effects: Native language
Research Question 6: Do bilingual native speakers of Catalan demonstrate more contact-
influenced Spanish language forms than native speakers of Spanish?
Hypothesis
Native speakers of Catalan use Catalan more often than native speakers of Spanish,
thus, more signs of contact are expected in the former group. Bilingual native
speakers of Spanish are not expected to perform similarly to Spanish monolinguals;
some signs of contact are predicted, given their contact with Catalan and with
speakers who model contact-induced patterns of subject expression.
(7) External factors in contact effects: Proficiency
Research Question 7a: What is the role of proficiency in determining contact outcomes?
Does increased Spanish proficiency among native speakers of Catalan correlate with a
more stable Spanish grammar?
Hypothesis
Lambert (1990), Flege et al. (2002), and Argyri & Sorace (2007) find that less cross-
linguistic influence is attested in more balanced bilinguals. More proficient Spanish
speakers are expected to show less evidence of contact than less proficient speakers.
Research Question 7b: Does increased Catalan proficiency among native speakers of
Spanish correlate with a less stable grammar in Spanish?
Hypothesis
Previous studies of heritage Spanish speakers in the U.S. show the impermeability of
the first language (see Montrul 2008 for a fuller discussion). As such, proficiency in
Catalan could correlate with a less stable grammar in Spanish. It is possible, though,
that contact with bilingual speakers and their converged speech is a better indicator
of contact-induced changes in their grammar than proficiency. Proficiency in Catalan
may boost the separation of the languages. This idea is consistent with Lambert
64 (1990). In this case, then, higher proficiency in Catalan would result in less cross-
linguistic influence than lower proficiency in Catalan.
(8) External factors in contact effects: Language usage
Research Question 8: Do language usage patterns determine contact outcomes?
Hypothesis
If use of the L2 correlates with proficiency in the L2, those Catalan L1 speakers with
higher use of (and proficiency in) Spanish may distinguish both languages better.
The bilingual tradeoff discussed in Chapter 2, §1.2, (see Cook 2003, Flege 1999,
Grosjean 1998, Montrul 2008) predicts that the use of L2 affects proficiency in the
L1 negatively, those Spanish L1 speakers that use Catalan more may show more
evidence of language contact in their Spanish. At the same time, reduced use of L1
by Catalan L1 speakers may result in more target-like behavior in Spanish. Spanish
L1 speakers are, therefore, predicted to exhibit more cross-linguistic influence with
reduced use of their L1.
1.3. Contact outcomes
The differences that emerge between contact and non-contact varieties of Spanish can inform general theories about language contact outcomes. Research on subject expression in typologically different languages cannot tease apart whether contact can result in a simplification or a converged form, however, contact between two null subject languages can explore this question. Regarding the linguistic consequences of language contact on bilingual speech, this study poses several questions:
(9) Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence
Research Question 9: Are contact effects, instantiated in the overall rate of overt subjects
in bilingual Spanish, indicative of simplification processes or convergence?
Hypothesis 1
Sorace (2004) proposes that contact outcomes constitute simplifications to
compensate for the cognitive load implicated in bilingualism. Therefore, Spanish in
65 contact with Catalan is predicted to produce a higher overall rate of null subjects to
compensate for the processing burden of bilingualism.
Hypothesis 2
Bullock & Toribio (2004) and Toribio (2004) propose that languages in contact
change to render the languages more similar. Thus, Spanish and Catalan in contact
Spanish should converge towards each other with respect to overall rates of subject
expression. If the overall percentage is not significantly different between Spanish
and Catalan, no increase is predicted.
(10) Contact outcomes: Convergence in subject expression variables
Research Question 10: Are there contact effects in the variables that are implicated in
subject expression in bilingual Spanish? That is, are there differences in the relevant
(read: significant) variables between Spanish and Catalan? If so, is there a bilingual
continuum? Are Catalan-dominant bilinguals producing Spanish subjects following the
variables that are significant in Catalan, while the Spanish-dominant bilinguals are more
target-like in Spanish?
Hypothesis
Otheguy et al. (2007) compare Mainland and Caribbean Spanish with different
degrees of contact with English. Part of the discussion is based on the variables
implicated in each variety and differences are reported. In line with these resuls, if
there are differences in variables between Catalan and Spanish with respect to
subject expression, a bilingual continuum, indicative of language contact effects, is
expected in variables.
(11) Contact outcomes: Convergence in subject expression variable hierarchies
Research Question 11: Are there contact effects in the variable hierarchies in bilingual
Spanish? That is, are there differences in variable hierarchies between Spanish and
66 Catalan? If so, is there a bilingual continuum? Are Catalan-dominant bilinguals following
a variable hierarchy closer to that in Catalan than the Spanish-dominant bilinguals?
Hypothesis
Otheguy et al. (2007) revealed dialect convergence in New York Spanish based on
changes in the variable hierarchies. Thus, if there are differences between Catalan
and Spanish with respect to subject expression, a bilingual continuum, indicative of
language contact effects, is expected in variable hierarchies.
(12) Contact outcomes: Convergence in subject expression constraint hierarchies
Research question 12: Are there contact effects in the constraint hierarchies in bilingual
Spanish? That is, are there differences in constraint hierarchies between Spanish and
Catalan? If so, is there a bilingual continuum? Are Catalan-dominant bilinguals following
a constraint hierarchy closer to that in Catalan than the Spanish-dominant bilinguals?
Hypothesis
Otheguy et al. (2007) justified dialect convergence in New York Spanish based on
comparisons of constraint hierarchies between recent arrivals and those born and
raised in New York. Therefore, if there are differences between Catalan and Spanish
with respect to subject expression, a bilingual continuum, indicative of language
contact effects, is expected in the constraint hierarchies.
In order to answer these questions, language samples were collected from monolingual and bilingual participants recruited in Valladolid and Minorca. A description of their language background and linguistic attitudes follows.
2. Participants
To establish the comparison between monolingual and bilingual speakers, monolingual Spanish
16 speakers were recruited in Valladolid and bilingual Spanish-Catalan speakers were recorded in Minorca.
16 Monolinguals were not recruited in Minorca because Spanish-speakers from the Peninsula quickly acquire passive skills in Catalan when they move there.
67 The bilingual participants were further divided into Catalan L1 and Spanish L1. Some of the Catalan L1 bilinguals, those who used Spanish less, where also recorded in Catalan. In addition to language background, the participants were divided by age. As commented in Chapter 2, recent Minorcan history renders age an especially interesting variable in the study of language contact in this region. A decrease in knowledge of Catalan was witnessed among the generation that grew up during Franco’s regime. But more recent protective laws correlate with an increase in knowledge and use of the language. Thus, we divide our participants by age groups, corresponding with these changes in society: Age Group 1, ranging from 13 to
35 years; Age Group 2, from 36 to 64 years of age; Age Group 3, age 65 and over.
Table 4.1: Participants
Catalan L1 bilinguals (n=23) Spanish L1 bilinguals (n=14) Spanish monolinguals (n=19) Age group Age group Age group Age group Age group Age group Age group Age group Age group 1 2 3 1 2 3 1 2 3 M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F 3 5 3 3 4 5 2 3 3 3 1 2 4 3 3 4 3 2
There were 19 Spanish monolinguals; all were born in Castile and spent most of their lives in Valladolid.
Their ages range from 13 to 27 in the first age group, 48 to 59 in the second and 84 to 89 in the third. For the bilinguals, the first age group ages range between 15 and 33, the second group ranges from 42 to 69, and the third group from 72 to 86.
All bilingual Catalan L1 speakers were born in Minorca and had lived there for the majority of their lives. Males in the age groups 2 and 3 had lived outside the island more than females because they had to serve in the military service. Four male participants in the age groups 2 and 3 had to leave to comply with this service or to study; one left for eighteen months to a Spanish-speaking area, one for three months to a
Catalan-speaking area and one for three and a half months in a Catalan-speaking area, and one year in a
Spanish speaking area. Within the age group 1, one male and four females are studying outside of the island, all but one in a Catalan-speaking area (range: 2-4 years). One female in the age group 2 lived outside of the island, in a Catalan-speaking area, for 6 years. Within the Spanish L1 bilinguals, five were born in Minorca. Among these, only three have left the island; one for one year in a Spanish speaking
68 region and four in a Catalan speaking area, one for one year in Germany and one for three years in a
Spanish speaking region and five years in a Catalan speaking region. Among those born elsewhere, the age of arrival varies from 4 to 54. Crucially, there is evidence of a shift in language preference only among those who were born in Minorca or those who arrived at an early age (up to 9 years old in our data). As will become apparent in the ensuing discussion, the groups of participants were rather heterogenous. Although this section discusses the data collected from every participant, a selection of the participants was performed based on the linguistic background to have a comparable number of participants per groups and to have more homogenous groupings. There were two participants per cell (i.e., two Catalan L1 females in age group 1).
Table 4.2: Selected participants
Catalan data Spanish data
Catalan L1 bilinguals Catalan L1 bilinguals Spanish L1 bilinguals Spanish monolinguals (n=12) (n=12) (n=12) (n=12) Age Age Age Age Age Age Age Age Age Age Age Age group group group group group group group group group group group group 3 1 2 3 1 2 3 1 2 3 1 2 M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
The bilinguals were asked to indicate on a 7-point scale whether they agreed or not with the statement
Me siento más a gusto cuando hablo menorquín ‘I feel more comfortable when I speak Minorcan
(Catalan)’. Their response was taken as a measure of language dominance, since it commonly coincided with the language that was spoken at home. They were also asked to rate their L2 proficiency on a 7-point scale (1=minimal and 7=native). As shown in Table 4.3, Catalan L1 bilinguals are dominant in Catalan and they demonstrate high proficiency in Spanish. Large disparities were found between production and comprehension. Therefore, instead of providing a composite of both, each one is provided. This table has
14 participants. From the initial 23 Catalan L1 bilinguals, only 12 were recorded in Catalan as well. These were those who were more proficient in Catalan and used Spanish more rarely. They happened to all live in villages in the center of the island. For the Spanish data, we wanted to include Catalan L1 bilinguals from the capital too. Thus, there is not a complete overlap of participants in the Catalan and Spanish data from
69 these bilinguals. Ten participants were examined in Spanish and Catalan, two only in Catalan (participants
33 and 34) and two only in Spanish (Participants 16 and 20).
Table 4.3: Catalan L1 bilinguals’ language dominance and L2 proficiency
Age of Dominant L2 Proficiency Participant Age Age group Gender L1 Arrival Language SpeakingListening 3 52 2 Female N/A Catalan Catalan 4 7
16 75 3 Female N/A Catalan Catalan 6 7
18 85 3 Male N/A Catalan Catalan 7 7
20 69 3 Male N/A Catalan Catalan 6 6
21 74 3 Female N/A Catalan Catalan 4 7
22 67 2 Female N/A Catalan Catalan 4 7
25 55 2 Male N/A Catalan Catalan 5 6
28 54 2 Male N/A Catalan Catalan 6 7
29 19 1 Female N/A Catalan Catalan 4 7
31 17 1 Male N/A Catalan Catalan 6 7
32 18 1 Male N/A Catalan Catalan 6 7
33 81 3 Male N/A Catalan Catalan 4.5 7
34 72 3 Female N/A Catalan Catalan 7 7
35 33 1 Female N/A Catalan Catalan 5.5 7 Scale: 1=minimal ability; 7=native ability
As shown in Table 4.4, all Spanish L1 bilinguals are dominant in Spanish, although some evidence of shifting exists in three participants, who use Catalan with their children or grandchildren. Their proficiency in Catalan varies greatly. They were asked to self-rate their L2 (Catalan) proficiency on a 7-point scale
(1=minimal and 7=native), and they range from 1 to 7. Only one of the participants rates her Catalan as 7; two participants who arrived in adulthood rate their Catalan as 1 although they rate their comprehension as
7. As for the rest, one rates his Catalan as 2, three rate their Catalan as 4, two as 5, and two as 6.
70 Table 4.4: Spanish L1 bilinguals’ language dominance and L2 proficiency
Dominant L2 Proficiency Participant Age Age group Gender Age of Arrival L1 Language SpeakingListening 4 42 2 Female 8 Spanish Spanish 7 7
6 63 2 Male 28 Spanish Spanish 4 7
8 53 2 Male 24.5 Spanish Spanish 2 7
9 81 3 Male Birth Spanish Spanish 4 5
10 86 3 Female 54 Spanish Spanish 1 7
13 32 1 Male 4 Spanish Spanish 5 7
14 53 2 Female 9 Spanish Spanish 5 7
23 16 1 Female Birth Spanish Spanish 6 7
27 76 3 Female 19 Spanish Spanish 1 7
30 27 1 Male Birth Spanish Spanish 4 7
36 15 1 Female Birth Spanish Spanish 6 6
Scale: 1=minimal ability; 7=native ability
Bilingual participants were asked about their use of each language, by reference to a frequency scale:
1=every day, almost all day; 2=every day, sporadically throughout the day; 3=a few times a week; 4=once a week; 5=one or twice a month; 6=once or twice a year; 7=every few years; 8=never. As shown in Table 4.4,
Catalan L1 speakers use Catalan on a daily basis. Those who speak Spanish on a daily basis (nine of the 14
Catalan L1 participants) also report using Catalan on a daily basis. Two use Spanish several times a week, two use it once a week and one uses it one or twice a month. As for the Spanish L1 speakers, six use
Catalan on a daily basis, in fact, one participant reports to use it 60% of the day. All the others use Spanish
(80% of the day) more than Catalan (20% of the day), and one participant uses each language 50% of the day. One uses Catalan once a week and one uses it once or twice a month. Three, however, never use
Catalan. These data mirror the data in the 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey (administered by the Department of
Linguistic Policies at Direcció General de Política Lingüística) in the Education and Cultural Ministry
(Coselleria d’Educació i Cultura)), where residents of Minorca who were born elsewhere have lower
71 knowledge and use of Catalan. Interestingly, Catalan L1 speakers know and use Spanish more than their
Spanish L1 counterparts know and use Catalan.
Table 4.5: Language use patterns
Catalan L1 bilinguals Spanish L1 bilinguals Dominant Use of L1: Use of L2: Dominant Use of L1: Use of L2: Participant Age Group Participant Age Group Language Catalan Spanish Language Spanish Catalan 3 2 Catalan 1 2 4 2 Spanish 2 2
16 3 Catalan 1 2 6 2 Spanish 2 2
18 3 Catalan 1 3 8 2 Spanish 2 8
20 3 Catalan 1 4 9 3 Spanish 1 2
21 3 Catalan 1 1 10 3 Spanish 1 8
22 2 Catalan 1 4 13 1 Spanish 2 5
25 2 Catalan 2 2 14 2 Spanish 2 2
28 2 Catalan 2 3 23 1 Spanish 2 2
29 1 Catalan 2 5 27 3 Spanish 1 8
31 1 Catalan 2 2 30 1 Spanish 2 2
32 1 Catalan 2 2 36 1 Spanish 2 4
33 3 Catalan 2 2
34 3 Catalan 2 2
35 1 Catalan 2 2
Scale: 1=every day, almost all day; 8=never
The survey also queried the importance that participants place on their first and the second language, with the question ¿Qué importancia tienen para ti las dos lenguas? ‘How important are both languages to you?’. As shown in Table 4.5, all participants rated their L1 higher than their L2 except for a female
Catalan L1 participant in the age group 3. Probably this participant’s loyalty to Spain together with the fact that she grew up with the belief that Spanish has more prestige explains this disparity. Among the Catalan
L1 speakers, eleven rate the importance of Spanish at the maximum 7, mostly pointing out the usefulness of the language. Among the Spanish L1 speakers, seven value Catalan as 7, in this case, however, they speak
72 of emotional attachment more than usefulness, three as 6, five as 5, two as 4, two as 3, one as 2, and one as
1.
Table 4.6: Importance of L1 and L2
Catalan L1 bilinguals Spanish L1 bilinguals Participant Age Dominant Importance Importance Participant Age Dominant Importance Importance Group Language of L1 of L2 Group Language of L1 of L2 3 2 Catalan 7 7 4 2 Spanish 7 7
16 3 Catalan 7 7 6 2 Spanish 7 4
18 3 Catalan 7 7 8 2 Spanish 7 6
20 3 Catalan 7 7 9 3 Spanish 7 7
21 3 Catalan 7 3 10 3 Spanish 7 2
22 2 Catalan 7 5 13 1 Spanish 7 3
25 2 Catalan 7 7 14 2 Spanish 7 5
28 2 Catalan 7 2 23 1 Spanish 7 6
29 1 Catalan 7 2 27 3 Spanish 7 1
31 1 Catalan 7 5 30 1 Spanish 7 7
32 1 Catalan 7 4 36 1 Spanish 6 4
33 3 Catalan 7 7
34 3 Catalan 5 7
35 1 Catalan 7 4
Scale: 1= very little; 7= very much
Participants were also asked to rate how much they agreed (1 not at all, 7 totally agree) with four related statements: (i) Hablar menorquín es un aspecto importante de mi identidad ‘Speaking Minorcan
(Catalan) is an important aspect of my identity’, (ii) La cultura menorquina es un aspecto importante de mi identidad ‘Minorcan culture is an important aspect of my identity’, (iii) Hablar castellano es un aspecto importante de mi identidad ‘Speaking Spanish is an important aspect of my identity’, (iv) La cultura española es un aspecto importante de mi identidad ‘Spanish culture is an important aspect of my identity’.
Their responses are recorded in Table 4.7. As shown, all the Catalan L1 bilinguals identify completely with
73 Minorcan Catalan, while only one of the Spanish L1 speakers does. Likewise, the Spanish L1 group identifies greatly with Spanish (all rate it as 7). Four of the Catalan L1 bilinguals rate the Spanish language as 7, four as 6, one as 5, one as 4, one as 3, and three as 2. Two of the Spanish L1 speakers rate Catalan as
6, contrasting it with Spanish, which they rate as 7, two as 4, one as 3, and seven as 1 (these participants were among the least proficient speakers). Regarding the identification with the two cultures, Catalan L1 speakers identify with Minorcan culture at an average rate of 6.71 (range: 5 to 7), and with Spanish 4.57
(range: 1 to 7). Spanish L1 speakers identify with Minorcan culture at an average rate of 6.41 (range: 5 to
7) and with Spanish 6.09 (range: 3 to 7). Thus, Spanish L1 bilinguals identify with both cultures at similar rates while Catalan L1 speakers identify with Minorcan culture more than with the Spanish one.
Participants were also asked if they feel Minorcan, Spanish, or Catalan. All but one, who moved to Minorca when she was 54, declared feeling Minorcan, and all except for two Catalan L1 speakers feel Spanish while only four feel Catalan (three of these have lived in Catalonia).
74 Table 4.7: Language, culture and identity
Catalan L1 bilinguals Spanish L1 bilinguals Participant Minorcan Minorcan Spanish Spanish Participant Minorcan Minorcan Spanish Spanish language, culture, language, culture, language, culture, language, culture, identity identity identity identity identity identity identity identity 3 7 5 6 2 4 6 7 7 7
16 7 7 6 6 6 1 7 7 7
18 7 7 7 6 8 1 7 7 7
20 7 6 6 6 9 4 7 7 7
21 7 7 4 4 10 1 5 7 7
22 7 7 7 7 13 1 7 7 3
25 7 7 5 7 14 4 5.5 7 7
28 7 7 2 2 23 6 6 7 6
29 7 7 3 2 27 1 7 7 7
31 7 6 2 1 30 7 7 7 3
32 7 7 2 1 36 3 5 7 6
33 7 7 7 7
34 7 7 7 7
35 7 7 6 6
Scale: 1= not at all in agreement; 7= completely in agreement
Participants were also asked to compare Catalan in Minorca with Catalan in Catalonia and to compare
Minorcan Spanish with Spanish from the Peninsula. Catalan L1 speakers agree that Minorcan Spanish is less correct than Peninsular Spanish (average agreement rate: 4.9) and that Minorcan Catalan is less correct than Catalonian Catalan (average agreement rate: 4.29). Spanish L1 speakers also agree that Peninsular
Spanish is more correct than Minorcan Spanish (average agreement rate: 5.91) and Catalonian Catalan is more correct than Minorcan Catalan (average agreement rate: 5.29). In both cases, Minorcan Catalan is more highly regarded than Minorcan Spanish, which is expected since Minorcan Catalan is widely-present
75 in Catalan studies and atlases while Minorcan Spanish is not present in Spanish atlases or in studies of variation in Spanish. Spanish L1 speakers rate both higher than Catalan L1 speakers.
Table 4.8: Dialectal variation and prestige
Catalan L1 bilinguals Spanish L1 bilinguals Participant Age Group Dominant Peninsular Catalan Participant Age Group Dominant Peninsular Catalan Language Spanish is from Language Spanish is from more Catalonia more Catalonia correct is more correct is more than correct than correct Minorcan than Minorcan than Spanish Minorcan Spanish Minorcan Catalan Catalan 3 2 Catalan 7 7 4 2 Spanish 1 1
16 3 Catalan 7 7 6 2 Spanish 7* 7
18 3 Catalan 1 7 8 2 Spanish 7 7
20 3 Catalan 7 N/A 9 3 Spanish 5 7
21 3 Catalan 4 7 10 3 Spanish 7 7
22 2 Catalan 7 7 13 1 Spanish 7 1
25 2 Catalan 7 7 14 2 Spanish 7 ? More 28 2 Catalan 7 23 1 Spanish 7 N/A authentic 29 1 Catalan 7 1 27 3 Spanish 7 N/A
31 1 Catalan 1 1 30 1 Spanish 3 N/A
32 1 Catalan 6 1 36 1 Spanish 7* 7
33 3 Catalan 7* 7
34 3 Catalan 7 7
35 1 Catalan 1 1
Scale: 1= very little; 7= very much * depends on the variety from Spain
Regarding language patterns, participants with active proficiency in both languages claim to accommodate to their interlocutor. In general, if two native speakers of Catalan interact, their conversation takes place in Catalan. In fact, Catalan L1 participants report being bothered if a Catalan speaker addresses
76 to them in Spanish. The passive speakers of Catalan do not mind being spoken to in Catalan but they respond in Spanish. Catalan L1 speakers, nonetheless, tend to respond in the language they have been talked to in, thus, they quickly change to Spanish in these situations. In cases when the hearers have different L1s, language shifting, where Catalan is spoken when looking at the Catalan speaker and Spanish when looking at the Spanish speaker, is widely used. This way, Spanish L1 speakers are exposed to Catalan but they are not expected to speak it. They normally know Catalan but feel very embarrassed to speak it. In addition, when people meet and they start speaking a language, they claim they would feel very uncomfortable addressing that person in the other language. As a consequence, Spanish L1 speakers have few possibilities to use Catalan or to shift to Catalan unless they meet someone new. In general Catalan L1 speakers complain that immigrants from the Peninsula do not speak Catalan but Spanish L1 speakers find little contexts where they would be able to use it since they carry the label “Spanish speaker”. In fact, the word charnego, whose use is decreasing, refers to Spanish speakers in Minorca. This situation results from the differential proficiencies in their L2, while Catalan L1 speakers are very proficient in Spanish, Spanish
L1 speakers are not so proficient in Catalan. Code-switching is accepted by some and rejected by others. In general, they consider that if a Spanish L1 speaker code-switches, this act indicates an extension of the use of Catalan, and it is positive, while if a Catalan L1 speaker code-switches, this fact indicates a regression in the use of Catalan, and, thus, it is negative. In general, language shifting is regarded as the natural way to proceed with a mixed audience. Code-switching seems to exert a different effect. Participants claim to code-switch from their less dominant language into their more dominant language for lack of lexical access. At the same time, participants from villages in the centre of the island claim that residents of Maó, the capital, where there is more mixing of people, code-switch more.
All of this information was collected during an interview process. The following section explains the materials used.
3. Materials
With its interest in the expression of subject pronouns in naturalistic speech, the present study draws on a language corpus collected by the author. In particular, naturalistic speech samples were collected from monolingual Spanish and Spanish-Catalan bilinguals while they participated in an interview that comprised
77 three parts, outlined in (13). The interview items were designed as much to elicit information as to encourage unfettered discussion on a range of topics.
(13) Interview
a. Part I: Language history
b. Part II: Ethnolinguistic interview
c. Part III: Survey of language attitudes and ideologies
Part I elicited pertinent language background information, including languages spoken, proficiencies, use, and dominance. The results are presented in the preceding section, where participants were profiled.
The full complement of questions appear in Appendix O. Part II of the interview was based on Tagliamonte
(2006) and adapted to the target culture. Participants were asked about their personal experiences (their studies, jobs, families, trips, hobbies) as well as about their home town, traditions, celebrations, typical dishes, etc. Some sample items appear in (14) and the full complement is in Appendix P.
(14) Ethnolinguistic interview, sample items
a. ¿Cómo se celebran las fiestas patronales aquí?
‘How do you celebrate your patron saint here?’
b. ¿Has tenido la oportunidad de ir a la escuela? Háblame un poco de como era tu vida
cuando eras pequeño/a. ¿Cómo era un día normal en la escuela?¿Recuerdas algún
profesor que te haya marcado positivamente? ¿Cómo era? ¿Y uno que no te gustara
mucho? ¿Por qué? ¿Cómo era?¿En qué lengua eran las clases? ¿Tenías un grupo de
amigos en la clase con los que jugaras en el recreo o por la tarde? ¿Cuántos erais? ¿Cómo
eran tus amigos? ¿A qué jugabais? ¿Cómo se jugaba?
‘Have you had the opportunity to go to school? Tell me a little bit about your life when
you were a child. How was a regular day at school? Do you remember a teacher that
marked you in a positive way? What was s/he like? And did you have one that you did
not like that much? Why? What was s/he like? What language were classes held in? Did
78 you have a group of friends in class to play during recess or in the evening? How many
were there? What were your friends like? What did you play? How did you play that?’
For the final part of the interview, participants listened to statements with which they were asked to indicate their agreement on a 7-point scale. These statements addressed language patterns, linguistic policies, comparison with other varieties, and identity matters. A sample follows, and the full listing of items appears in Appendix Q:
(15) Scalar items referencing language use and language loyalty, sample items
a. ¿En su opinión, qué importancia tienen las dos lenguas en Menorca?
‘In your opinion, how important are both languages in Minorca?’
b. ¿Qué importancia tiene para usted poder hablar menorquín en todos los ámbitos?
‘How important is it for you to be able to speak Minorcan (Catalan) in all contexts?’
c. Siento que un menorquín debe hablar catalán
‘I think that a person from Minorca must speak Catalan.’
(16) Scalar items referencing language and identity, sample items
a. Hablar menorquín es un aspecto importante de mi identidad.
‘Speaking Minorcan (Catalan) is an important aspect of my identity.’
b. La cultura española es un aspecto importante de mi identidad.
‘Spanish culture is an important aspect of my identity.’
c. Me siento más menorquín que español.
‘I feel more Minorcan than Spanish.’
(17) Scalar items referencing language ‘mixing’, sample items
a. Me suena bien cuando alguien mezcla el castellano y el menorquín en la misma
conversación.
‘It sounds good to me when somebody mixes Spanish and Minorcan (Catalan)in the same
conversation.’
79 b. En mi opinion, la mezcla de castellano y menorquín ayuda a mantener el menorquín.
‘In my opinion, mixing Spanish and Minorcan (Catalan) contributes to the maintenance
of Minorcan (Catalan).’
c. A veces empiezo una frase en menorquín y la termino en castellano.
‘Sometimes I start a sentence in Minorcan (Catalan) and finish it in Spanish.’
(18) Scalar items referencing linguistic insecurity, sample items
a. Me siento más a gusto cuando hablo menorquín.
‘I feel more comfortable when I speak Minorcan (Catalan).’
b. Cuando hago una llamada, me siento incómodo si tengo que hablar en castellano.
‘When I make a phonecall I feel uncomfortable if I have to speak Spanish.’
c. Me siento incómodo cuando alguien intenta hablarme en castellano.
‘I feel uncomfortable when somebody tries to speak to me in Spanish.’
(19) Scalar items referencing linguistic ideologies and languages policies, sample items
a. El castellano de la Península es más correcto que el castellano que se habla aquí.
‘Peninsular Spanish is more correct than the Spanish spoken here.’
b. El catalán de Cataluña es más correcto que el de aquí.
‘Catalan in Catalonia is more correct than the Catalan spoken here.’
c. Creo que el menorquín/catalán debería ser la única lengua oficial de Menorca.
‘I think that Minorcan (Catalan)/ Catalan should be the only official langauge of
Minorca.’
4. Procedure
Participants were recruited using snowball sampling. They were interviewed in their homes after signing an informed consent form. They were recorded with a Marranz PDM 620 and a Shure SM 10-A head-mounted microphone. The Spanish interview was carried out by a Spanish monolingual. A group of
80 Catalan L1 speakers was selected to be interviewed in Catalan too to provide a baseline for Catalan;17 however, these Catalan language interviews, which comprised only Part II of the full interview, were performed by a Catalan-dominant speaker from Minorca. The data from the selected participants were transcribed and coded as explained in the following section. The interviews were recorded and fully transcribed. The recordings range from 49.40 minutes (4,369 words) to 99.70 minutes (11,399 words).
Table 4.9: Bilinguals’ Spanish Recordings
Catalan L1 bilinguals Spanish L1 bilinguals
Dominant ParticipantAge Group Gender Time Words ParticipantAge Group Time Words Language
31 1 Male 60’21’’ 5,740 13 1 Male 44’12’’ 4,964
32 1 Male 62’58’’ 4,495 30 1 Male 29’54’’ 4,019
29 1 Female 59’50’’ 5,596 23 1 Female 32’16’’ 2,905
35 1 Female 53’54’’ 4,510 36 1 Female 60’47’’ 5,547
25 2 Male 70’98’’ 7,491 6 2 Male 99’70’’ 11,399
28 2 Male 67’92’’ 7,043 8 2 Male 37’43’’ 5,443
3 2 Female 80’37’’ 9,805 4 2 Female 36’38’’ 4,470
22 2 Female 56’00’’ 5,926 14 2 Female 36’30’’ 4,754
18 3 Male 95’35’’ 7,418 9 3 Male 62’51’’ 7,477
20 3 Male 64’22’’ 5,667 10 3 Female 53’12’’ 4,581
16 3 Female 52’91’’ 3,922 27 3 Female 35’14’’ 4,460
21 3 Female 37’38’’ 4,760
17 Their Catalan forms are potentially influenced by contact with Spanish. There are no Catalan monolinguals. Thus, we use as our baseline the Catalan that exists on the Island, which is inevitably in contact with Spanish. To minimize this limitation, we use Catalan-dominant speakers who use mostly Catalan.
81 Table 4.10: Monolinguals’ Recordings
Spanish Catalan
Participant Age Group Gender Time Words Participant Age Group Gender Time Words
47 1 Male 33’12’’ 4,491 31 1 Male 30’05’’ 4,171
48 1 Male 40’57’’ 5,719 32 1 Male 32’32’’ 3,961
49 1 Female 28’16’’ 4,093 29 1 Female 32’52’’ 4,664
55 1 Female 40’17’’ 5,533 35 1 Female 31’79’’ 4,413
41 2 Male 35’51’’ 4,504 25 2 Male 31’52’’ 4,056
46 2 Male 31’52’’ 5,213 28 2 Male 34’05’’ 6,150
40 2 Female 30’23’’ 3,746 3 2 Female 33’89’’ 5,852
42 2 Female 44’17’’ 7,042 22 2 Female 31’62’’ 4,195
39 3 Male 44’36’’ 4,494 20 3 Male 33’19’’ 4,422
56 3 Male 38’11’’ 3,790 33 3 Male 33’59’’ 5,205
38 3 Female 45’55’’ 6,060 21 3 Female 31’66’’ 4,846
53 3 Female 47’13’’ 7,088 34 3 Female 28’04’’ 4,596
5. Coding
Following antecedent work (Bayley & Pease-Álvarez 1996, 1997, Flores-Ferrán 2004, Otheguy et al.
2007, Travis 2005, 2007) all conjugated verbs were taken into account, except for those where variation is marginal or non-existent. Thus, there were a variety of predicates that fell ‘outside the envelope’ of variation: predicates that require an expletive subject (20a), predicates accompanying impersonal uses of the second person singular and third person plural (20b), reverse psychological predicates (20c), predicates in subject relative clauses (20d), and predicates in set phrases (20e). In each case, the null pronominal subject fails to alternate with an overt counterpart.
(20) ‘Outside the envelope’ of variation
a. Y hay una misa y luego un acto.
‘And there is mass and then a ceremony.’ (Participant 49, monolingual, female, age 18)
82 b. Dicen que cuando vas a buscar trabajo luego ponen en los currículums [anuncios] que
absténgase privadas.
‘It is said that when one goes and looks for a job, they say in the ads that private
(colleges) should abstain.’ (Participant 49, monolingual, female, age 18)
c. Me ha gustado siempre escribir mucho y leer mucho‘
‘I have always liked to read and to write a lot.’ (Participant 39, monolingual, male, age
89)
d. Sí, y Mariví, que se casa, por cierto.
‘Yes, and Mariví, who is getting married, by the way.’ (Participant 55, monolingual,
female, age 27)
e. Sí, sí, nadadora mítica pero de echarme a nadar siempre a medio día o no sé estoy vago
este año no me apetece nadar.
‘Yes, yes, legendary swimmer, I always went swimming at lunch time and I do not know
if I am lazy this year or what but I do not feel like swimming.’ (Participant 48,
monolingual, male, age 27)
Except for cases such as those above, all conjugated verbs were coded. The data were coded for language-internal and language-external variables. The external factors were determined by the participant.
If contact with Catalan has an effect on the Spanish of Minorca, this effect should be more evident among participants whose L1 is Catalan and who have low proficiency in Spanish and predominantly use Catalan.
(21) Coding of language-external variables
a. Participant’s age
b. Participant’s gender
c. Participant’s L1
d. Participant’s L2 proficiency
e. Participant’s L1 use
83 f. Participant’s L2 use
g. Participant’s place of residence
The language-internal factors coded for here are informed by results in the literature on subject expression in Spanish (see Chapter 3). The most commonly cited internal variable is DISCOURSE FUNCTION, where null subjects are favored in topic continuation contexts and overt subjects in topic shift and contrast contexts. For example, in discussing the example in (22), Lozano (2008) explains that the overt pronoun él is used to refer to the male character and ella to the female one. In addition, overt subjects are favored with verbal forms that are ambiguous (i.e. first and third person singular imperfect indicative and conditional, among others) than with unambiguous ones (Silva-Corvalán 1994, although see Casanova 1999, Morales
1997, Ranson 1991).
(22) Coding of language-internal variables: DISCOURSE FUNCTION
La última película que he visto es la de “El Ilusionista” [...] Los protagonistas son dos
jóvenes que se conocen y se enamoran. Él es de clase baja, mientras que ella es de familia
noble.
‘The last movie I have seen is “the Illusionist” [...] The main characters are a young
couple that meets and falls in love. He comes from a low class background while she is
from a noble family.’[...] [SPH, Spanish native, CEDEL2 corpus] (Lozano 2008)
Similarly, DISTANCE FROM PREVIOUS MENTION has an effect, where overt subjects are produced when their referent is distant. In general terms, continuity favors null subjects while discontinuity disfavors them.
CO-REFERENTIALITY, or whether the subject in the preceding sentence is the same, favors the use of a null subject. In (23a) the pronominal subject is expressed in the first instance and omitted afterwards where it is co-referential. Similarly, TENSE, ASPECT, MOOD (TAM) CONTINUITY favors null subjects; thus, the subject in
(23b) is null in the first clause and expressed in the second, where there is a change in TAM. Finally, null subjects are favored in embedded clauses (see Lozano 2008, Margaza & Bel 2006, Morales 1997, Otheguy et al. 2007, Silva-Corvalán 1994), as in (23c), in which a null subject is employed, despite the topic shift.
84 (23) Coding of language-internal variables: Continuity
a. CO-REFERENCE
Y yo los bañaba, y los vestía, les daba de comer, los ponía a dormir.
‘And I would bathe them, dress them, feed them, put them to sleep.’ [NMCOSS,
117–1A3: 248.-2512] (Travis 2007)
b. TAM CONTINUITY
Mañana voy. Yo dejé diez paquetes allá.
‘I will go tomorrow. I left ten packets there.’ [Colombia, cooking: 100-101] (Travis
2007)
c. CLAUSE CONTINUITY
No, no. . . De verdad.Yo quiero que hablemos, negro.
‘No, no. Really. I want us to talk, sweetheart.’ [Colombia, restaurant: 1149-1157]
(Travis 2007)
The distribution of overt subjects is also relevant to the establishment of the speaker’s position on an idea. Thus, the first person singular and verbs that express opinion or estimative verbs favor overt subjects
(Enríquez 1984, Morales 1997, Otheguy et al. 2007, Silva-Corvalán 1982, 1994, Travis 2007). For example, Morales (1996) shows that the subjects of verbs like pensar may be produced even in topic continuation contexts, as in (24a). The SYNTACTIC TYPE OF THE VERB is also coded, since Casanova (1999) found that in Catalan, copulative verbs favor overt subjects more than predicative verbs, an effect that she ascribes to the lack of semantic content of this type of verb (but see Serratrice & Sorace 2003 and Serratrice et al. 2004 regarding Italian).
(24) Coding of language-internal variables: Verb type
a. SEMANTIC VERB TYPE
Parece que ellos piensan que es signo de cultura.
‘It seems as if they think that is it a sign of culture.’ (Morales 1996)
85 b. SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE
El problema són els preus.
‘The problem is the prices.’ (Casanova 1999)
One factor that has traditionally been considered outside the envelope of variation is ANIMACY; this is because inanimate subjects do not alternate with a pronominal form. However, they do alternate with an overt lexical form. So, like Lozano (2008), I take into account ANIMACY as a variable in the distribution of null subjects.
(25) Coding of language-internal variables: ANIMACY
Cada día caminaba de mi apartamento a la universidad por “El paseo de los ingleses”.
Era un camino muy lindo con vistas de hoteles y también el mar azul y claro del
Mediterráneo.
‘Everyday I walked from my apartment to college through “El paseo de los ingleses”. It
was a very nice walk with a view to hotels and also the blue and clear Mediterranean
Sea.’[ARGL, upper-advanced, CEDEL2 corpus] (Lozano 2008)
In view of the above discussion, each token was coded for thirteen internal variables. Table 4.10 depicts the variables and the associated constraints. The constraints in the variables PERSON (first, second, third), CO-REFERENCE (co-referent or not), ANIMACY (animate, inanimate), CLAUSE TYPE (main vs. embedded), VERB FORM AMBIGUITY (ambiguous, unambiguous) and TAM CONTINUITY (same TAM, different TAM) do not require further elaboration. Within DISCOURSE FUNCTION, the factors are topic, defined here as having been mentioned above, topic shift (i.e., the introduction of a new topic), and contrast, which was used in cases when there was a correction, thus, “and not x” could be added. For
DISTANCE, the number of intervening subjects between the target subject and its referent (not necessarily a subject) was counted. Cases of new topics without a referent were coded as well. Similarly, the SUBJECT
FOCUS was coded as broad, narrow, and contrastive. Regarding SEMANTIC VERB TYPE, verbs were classified as estimative, which include opinion and psychological verbs (e.g., preferir ‘prefer’, disfrutar ‘enjoy’, gustar ‘like’) (see Morales 1997), motion, copulative, and other. Syntactically, they were classified as
86 transitive, unergative, unaccusative, and copulative. Regarding SPEECH CONNECTIVITY, they were coded as same referent and different referent. Additionally, same referent cases were further coded for same or different TAM. The coding of variables and associated constraints is exemplified in Table 4.10 by reference to the token underlined in (26):
(26) Sample token
Pues yo he ido siempre al mismo colegio, a las Teresianas y allí pues he estado desde
infantil hasta ahora, segundo de Bachillerato que he acabado y he hecho muchos amigos
y ahora, al final, nos graduamos y tuvimos una fiesta y van todos los familiares y hay una
misa y luego un acto y nos dan la banda y todo eso.
‘I have always gone to the same school, Teresianas, and over there I have been from
elementary school until now, segundo de Bachillerato (senior year in high school) that I
have finished and I have made a lot of friends and now, at the end, we graduated and we
had a party and all the family members come and there is mass and then a ceremony and
they give us a band and everything.’
This token (determined by the presence of the conjugated verb) is coded as null, topic continuation (the participant had already talked about her place and date of birth), 0 distance from previous mention, broad focus, co-referential, main clause, animate, first person singular, other verb type, unergative predicate, same
TAM, same referent and same TAM, and unambiguous.
87 Table 4.11: Variables and Associated Constraints
Sample token Variables Constraints He estado desde infantil hasta ahora. ‘I have been there since elementary until now’. SUBJECT FORM Overt lexical Null Overt pronominal Null subject
DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic continuation Topic continuation Topic shift Promotion to topic Contrast
DISTANCE FROM PREVIOUS MENTION 0 clauses 0 1 clause 2 clauses…
FOCUS Broad Broad Narrow Contrastive
CO-REFERENTIALITY Co-referential Co-referential Non co-referential
CLAUSE TYPE Main Main Embedded
ANIMACY Animate Animate Inanimate
PERSON First (Singular/Plural), First person singular Second (Singular/Plural) Third (Singular/Plural)
SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Psychological Other Speech Motion Copulative Other
SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive Unergative Unergative Unaccusative Copulative
TAM CONTINUITY Same TAM Same Different TAM
SPEECH CONNECTIVITY (CONNECT) Same referent, same TAM Same referent, same TAM Same referent, different TAM Different referent
VERB FORM AMBIGUITY Ambiguous, Unambiguous Unambiguous
88 The coded data were submitted to statistical analysis using a variable rule program, Goldvarb X, bearing in mind that all of these variables do not have the same weight. Recall that Otheguy et al. (2007) reveal a ranking of variables and constraints implicated in subject expression in New York Spanish, considering place of origin and length of residence. The two different linguistic communities, mainland and
Caribbean, have different rankings. In addition, length of residence indicates contact effects between
English and Spanish and between dialects. The range in the factor weights was used to establish the variable and constraint hierarchies.
6. Summary
This dissertation project examines the internal and external factors involved in subject expression in
Spanish to gain a better understanding of variation in Spanish and of contact outcomes. With this in mind,
Spanish monolinguals and Spanish-Catalan bilinguals were recorded in a sociolinguistic interview. A group of Catalan L1 speakers was also recorded in Catalan to provide the Catalan baseline. The data were coded for external and internal variables and submitted to statistical analysis. The results are presented in the following chapter.
89 Chapter 5
Results:
Microvariation and Contact Effects in Subject Expression
The coded data were submitted to statistical analysis using the variable rule analysis Goldvarb X. In
Goldvarb, the dependent variable is analyzed as a binary (i.e. the application of X vs. its non-application).
In the present study, the subject position can be occupied by a null pronominal, an overt pronominal, or a lexical subject. Thus, the comparisons are first drawn between overt (lexical and pronominal) and null subjects. Next, overt pronominal and lexical subjects are each, in turn, compared to their null counterpart.
Lastly, overt pronominal subjects are compared to lexical subjects. Goldvarb X provides overall rates of occurrence, but most importantly, it provides patterns of variability. As explained in Chapter 3, overall rates are not a good measure of variability since the discourse contexts for the production of a null or an overt form may vary from speaker to speaker in naturalistic data collection. Thus, we focus our analysis and our comparisons on patterns of variation, reflected in the variables returned as significant, their ranking, and the ranking of constraints.
The chapter first addresses these three indications of patterns of variation in the two baseline groups, monolingual Spanish and Catalan, followed by a comparison of both. Subsequently, the patterns of the two bilingual groups (L1 Spanish and L1 Catalan) are explored. A comparison between the four groups follows, to elucidate whether contact effects are attested. Lastly, a summary of the results is offered.
1. Spanish monolingual speakers
The Spanish of twelve Peninsular monolingual speakers was selected as a baseline. To the best of my knowledge, there is no detailed analysis including variable and constraint ranking for subject expression in
Peninsular Spanish. The results for the multivariate regressional analysis are summarized in Tables 5.1-5.4, with overt subject use counted as rule application, and summarized in the following sections. 1.1. Spanish monolingual speakers: Overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects
In this section, we examine the comparison between null and overt subjects in monolingual Spanish, represented in Table 5.1, collapsing pronominal and lexical overt subjects. The tables offer the percentage
(%), the number of tokens (N), and the factor weight, which goes from 0 to 1, of each run. Traditionally, constraints with values lower than .50 are considered disfavoring, those with values over .50 are considered favoring, and those with values close to .50 are considered neither favoring nor disfavoring. The significance (or p-value) is obtained for the group of significant variables (in gray background in tables).
The application value in this analysis is overt subjects, i.e., the results indicate whether a constraint favors
(if the factor weight is higher than .50) or disfavors (if the factor weight is lower than .50) overt subjects.
Factor groups returned as significant are highlighted.
Table 5.1: Results: Overt subjects vs. null subjects. Monolingual group. 18 Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt (pronominal and lexical) subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Monolingual group Corrected Mean .24 Log likelihood -1101.081 Significance .048 Total N 3439 Factor weight % N DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.38 15 2814 Topic shift 0.90 93.6 591 Emphasis 0.98 97.1 34 Range 60 FOCUS Broad 0.48 27.8 3359 Narrow 0.99 92.6 54 Contrastive 0.95 96.2 26 Range 52 DISTANCE New 0.82 92.8 595 0 0.37 10.4 1764 1 0.39 18.6 376 2 to 4 0.48 22.6 381 5 to 10 0.62 33.7 184 Above 10 0.70 39.6 139 Range 45
18 In all the tables, N is used for the number of tokens (=k in other formats).
91 PERSON 1SG 0.63 23.5 861 2SG 0.44 18.1 83 3SG 0.56 41.9 1329 1PL 0.29 10.4 614 2PL 0.19 16.7 12 3PL 0.43 31.1 540 Range 44 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.35 8.1 1390 No 0.60 43.7 2049 Range 25 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.49 36 673 Psychological 0.50 26.5 238 Speech 0.34 20.1 139 Movement 0.57 33.3 480 Other 0.50 27 1909 Range 23 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.47 6.5 947 Same referent, different 0.61 11.3 443 TAM Different referent 0.49 43.7 2049 Range 14 AGE 1 0.50 28.4 1174 2 0.56 30.9 1166 3 0.43 28.7 1099 Range 13 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.46 24.2 1568 Copulative 0.62 37 635 Unergative 0.48 29.5 936 Unaccusative 0.49 39 300 Range 15 TAM Same 0.57 27.6 2028 Different 0.49 31.8 1411 Range 9 ANIMACY Animate 0.51 26.4 2909 Inanimate 0.43 45.1 530 Range 9 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.57 35.4 585 Unambiguous 0.49 28.1 2854 Range 8 GENDER Male 0.47 28.9 1668
92 Female 0.53 29.7 1771 Range 5 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 29.3 3231 Embedded 0.51 29.8 208 Range 1
1.1.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in the overt (lexical and pronominal) vs. null
distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers
The choice of overt vs. null subjects in monolingual Spanish is conditioned by multiple factors. A variable rule analysis selects the group of variables that can better explain the phenomenon under study. As such, although each variable considered independently may be significant, Goldvarb selects the group of variables that explain the distribution as a group. Thus, some variables that may be selected as significant independently may not be included in the group selected as best run. Statistically significant factor groups, highlighted in gray background in the tables, included DISCOURSE FUNCTION, FOCUS, DISTANCE FROM
REFERENT, PERSON, CO-REFERENCE, SEMANTIC VERB TYPE, AGE, and VERB FORM AMBIGUITY.
1.1.2.Variable ranking in the overt (lexical and pronominal) vs. null distribution in Spanish
monolingual speakers
The variables are ranked in the table; the highest ranked variable appears at the top of the table, while the lowest ranked appears at the bottom. The ranking is based on the range of factor weights. Goldvarb returns a factor weight for each constraint in a variable. The factor weight goes from 0 to 1, with values over .50 interpreted as favoring the application of the variable selected, in this case, overt subjects, and values under .50 as disfavoring the application value. The range is the difference between the lowest and the highest factor weights, conventionally rounded to two decimal places.
The three highest ranked variables are DISCOURSE FUNCTION, FOCUS and DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, all discourse-related variables. These are followed by PERSON, a variable that ranks the highest in previous studies. Contrary to other studies, CLAUSE TYPE is ranked the lowest, with factor weights hovering around .
50 (i.e., neither favoring nor disfavoring the overt forms).
93 1.1.3. Constraint ranking in the overt (lexical and pronominal) vs. null distribution in
Spanish monolingual speakers
Goldvarb provides factor weights for each constraint. As explained above factor weights can go from 0 to 1. According to this value, the constraint can be interpreted as favoring or non-favoring. In this section, we examine the constraint rankings in each of the significant variables.
The variable DISCOURSE FUNCTION has three constraints, i.e. each token was coded as either topic continuation, topic shift or emphasis. As in previous research, topic continuation disfavors an overt form, while topic shift and emphasis favor, almost categorically, the appearance of an overt form. In contrast, topic continuation does not behave categorically. The null form, which is regarded as the default form in
Spanish, although favored, is not required in topic continuation contexts, as indicated by the factor weight
(.38).
The variable FOCUS was coded as broad, narrow, or contrastive focus. Parallel to topic continuation, broad focus, where the whole clause constitutes the focus, disfavors overt subjects, while narrow and contrastive focus on the subject favors overt subjects, almost categorically. As in topic continuation contexts, broad focus does not favor the null form. With a factor weight of .48, neither form can be said to be favored in these contexts. Thus, broad focus and topic continuation constitute the contexts where variation between null and overt subjects is regulated by other variables.
The variable DISTANCE was coded as a continuous variable. For interpretative purposes it was divided in 6 constraints, following Travis (2007). Importantly, new topics, which do not have a referent in the preceding conversation favor the appearance of an overt subject. As expected, the further the referent is in the conversation, the more favoring of the overt subject takes place. The null form is favored with up to 4 intervening subjects. After that, the overt form is favored.
The variable PERSON AND NUMBER is divided in three singular and three plural persons, all of them specific. In line with previous work, first person singular favors overt subjects, while first and second plural disfavor them. Second and third person singular and third person plural hover around .50 (i.e., neither favor nor disfavor overt subjects). The fact that the first person singular form selects more overt
94 forms is consistent with previous interpretations of speakers’ emphasis of their opinion or point of view
(Bentivoglio 1987, Enríquez 1984, Silva-Corvalán 1994, Travis 2005, see Chapter 3, §2.2). Note that although first and third person singular favor the overt form, in the case of the third person, the value is very close to .50 (i.e., neither favoring nor disfavoring), thus, interpreting it as correlated with verb form
AMBIGUITY is not necessary, specifically since first and third person singular only overlap in some tenses and not all. In other words, it seems that the favoring of overt subjects with first person singular happens independently of verb form AMBIGUITY. In addition, the fact that first and second plural forms favor null subjects has been interpreted as related to the rich verbal morphology of these forms. However, second person singular and third person plural also have rich verbal morphology, at least in the variety of Spanish under study, and their values are close to .50.
The variable CO-REFERENCE is binary; the target form either coincides with the subject of the preceding clause or not. When it is co-referent the null form is favored, while in non-co-referential contexts the overt form is preferred. This distribution is consistent with previous findings.
The variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE classifies verbs into copulative, psychological, speech, movement, and other. While speech verb forms favor the null form, the rest have values close to .50 (i.e., no favoring or disfavoring). Interestingly, neither speech nor psychological verbs favor the overt forms, contrary to previous studies.
The external variable AGE was divided into three age groups. Unexpectedly, the youngest group, age group 1, falls in between the age group 2, which favors overt subjects, and the age group 3, which disfavors them. The only reason why the variable AGE could be found to be significant is if there was a change in progress. However, in that scenario, groups 1 and 3 would be the most different, which is not the case observed here. As shown below, this variable is not significant in the distribution between null and overt pronominal subjects but in the distribution of null vs. lexical subjects. This variable is further discussed below.
The variable AMBIGUITY was coded for ambiguous and unambiguous verb forms. First and third person singular forms in the imperfect or past perfect indicative, present, imperfect, present perfect or past perfect
95 subjunctive or conditional were coded as ambiguous and the rest as unambiguous. The distribution shows that ambiguous forms favor overt subjects while unambiguous forms neither favor nor disfavor them.
In this section, we have presented the results for the distribution of overt subjects, both pronominal and lexical, as compared to their null counterpart. In the following section, comparison is established between overt and null pronominal subjects.
1.2. Spanish monolingual speakers: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects
The antecedent literature on monolingual Spanish has focused on the distribution of overt vs. null pronominal subjects. This section offers the results, represented in Table 5.2, regarding this distribution in monolingual Spanish speakers in Valladolid. The application value for this analysis is the overt pronominal subject; again, factor groups returned as significant are highlighted.
Table 5.2: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects. Monolingual group. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Monolingual group Corrected Mean .47 Log likelihood -642.873 Significance .021 Total N 2718 Factor weight % N ANIMACY Animate 0.58 11.8 2425 Inanimate 0.07 0.7 293 Range 52 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.48 9.5 2643 Topic shift 0.57 15.6 45 Emphasis 1.00 96.7 30 Range 51 FOCUS Broad 0.49 9.4 2677 Narrow 0.98 81 21 Contrastive 0.95 95 20 Range 50 PERSON 1SG 0.77 23.2 858 2SG 0.68 18.1 83 3SG 0.44 5.4 816 1PL 0.27 3 567
96 2PL 0.49 9.1 11 3PL 0.29 2.9 383 Range 50 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.34 5 1345 No 0.65 16 1373 Range 31 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.45 11.2 1338 Copulative 0.71 8.3 436 Unergative 0.47 10.7 739 Unaccusative 0.49 10.7 205 Range 26 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.36 7.7 467 Psychological 0.59 20.5 220 Speech 0.41 11.9 126 Movement 0.52 12.8 367 Other 0.54 9.4 1538 Range 23 DISTANCE New 0.63 15.7 51 0 0.47 5.4 1672 1 0.45 13.1 352 2 to 4 0.54 17.4 357 5 to 10 0.65 26.9 167 Above 10 0.65 29.4 119 Range 21 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.43 3.6 918 Same referent, different 0.59 8 427 TAM Different referent 0.52 16 1373 Range 16 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.62 14.5 442 Unambiguous 0.48 9.8 2276 Range 15 AGE 1 0.53 11.8 954 2 0.54 12 916 3 0.43 7.5 848 Range 11 GENDER Male 0.46 10.4 1324 Female 0.54 10.7 1394 Range 9 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 10.6 2557 Embedded 0.55 9.3 161
97 Range 5 TAM Same 0.52 8.8 1609 Different 0.48 13.2 1109 Range 4
1.2.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in the overt pronominal vs. null distribution
in Spanish monolingual speakers
The distribution discussed in this section is regulated by a combination of factors. The significant variables in the distribution of overt vs. null pronominal subjects are ANIMACY, DISCOURSE FUNCTION,
FOCUS, PERSON, CO-REFERENCE, DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, VERB FORM AMBIGUITY, and GENDER.
1.2.2. Variable ranking in the overt pronominal vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual
speakers
The highest ranked variables are ANIMACY, DISCOURSE FUNCTION, FOCUS, PERSON and CO-
REFERENCE. The predominance of discourse-related variables indicated in the distribution of overt
(pronominal and lexical) subjects vs. null subjects (§1.1.2) is less evident here. Especially interesting is the position of the variable ANIMACY, normally excluded from previous studies because inanimates are not normally produced with an overt pronoun. The low incidence in our data (0.7%, N=2) is in line with previous studies. The external variable GENDER, on the other hand, ranks very low; the lowest of the significant variables.
1.2.3. Constraint ranking in the overt pronominal vs. null distribution in Spanish
monolingual speakers
The variable ANIMACY presents a distribution where inanimates almost categorically disfavor the use of an overt pronominal subject, while animates neither favor nor disfavor them.
The variable DISCOURSE FUNCTION constitutes an interesting case. The constraints Topic and Emphasis in the distribution of null vs. overt pronominal subjects are similar to those for null vs. overt (lexical and pronominal) in §1.1.3. However, topic shift has a value close to .50. It may be the case that the preferred overt form in topic shift contexts is a lexical subject, while in emphasis contexts it is a pronoun. This idea is
98 further entertained in the examination of the distribution of overt pronominal vs. overt lexical subjects
(§1.4).
The variables FOCUS, CO-REFERENCE, and VERB FORM AMBIGUITY present values very similar to those in the alternation between null and overt lexical and pronominal subjects (§1.1.3). Thus, there seems to be no difference between overt pronominal and overt lexical subjects in this respect.
The variable PERSON presents some differences between pronominal and lexical subjects. First and third person singular favored overt subjects when lexical subjects were taken into account (§1.1.3).
Because first and second person singular do not alternate with lexical subjects, the values are more reliable when excluding lexical subjects. First person singular favors overt pronominal subject. Interestingly, second person singular does too. Second person plural disfavored an overt form, however, when leaving lexical subjects out, the value is close to .50; thus, it neither favors nor disfavors the overt form. The distribution of third person is probably better understood considering lexical and pronominal subjects since the alternation exists between those two and their null counterpart. While an overt form was favored in the distribution of null vs. overt (lexical and pronominal) subjects (§1.1.3) for the singular form but not for the plural form, the values were close to .50. In the case of the singular form, overt pronominal subjects are disfavored here, still with a value close to .50. The plural form, on the other hand, seems to disfavor overt overt pronominal forms, although, as shown below, it favors overt lexical forms. Thus, third person seems to favor overt lexical forms. Proposals that seek to explain the role of person in subject distribution as a factor of rich vs. poor verbal morphology (e.g., functional compensation hypothesis, see Hochberg 1986) are disconfirmed here since the second person form, which is morphologically rich in this dialect, favors overt subjects, and third person singular does not.
While the variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT behaves very similar to the distribution including lexical subjects, they differ in the constraint 2 to 4 intervening subjects, which disfavored the overt form and favors overt pronominal subjects here. Thus, overt pronominal subjects seem to be favored at smaller distances than overt lexical subjects.
99 The external variable GENDER is significant, as in Bayley & Pease-Álvarez (1996, 1997). As in their study, females favor the overt pronominal subject more than males. However, the reasons underlying this distribution remain unclear.
This section has presented the results comparing the use of overt and null pronominal subjects. In the next section, overt pronominal subjects are omitted from the analysis and the comparison is established between overt lexical subjects and null subjects.
1.3. Spanish monolingual speakers: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects
Null subjects alternate with overt lexical subjects. Nonetheless, this distribution has not been fully explored. This section considers this distribution in monolingual Spanish, summarized in Table 5.3. The application value for this analysis is overt lexical subjects, and factor groups returned as significant are highlighted.
Table 5.3: Results: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects. Monolingual group. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt lexical subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Monolingual group Corrected Mean .82 Log likelihood -570.344 Significance .040 Total N 3084 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.07 0.5 662 2SG 0 68 3SG 0.78 39.9 1285 1PL 0.43 7.9 597 2PL 0.11 9.1 11 3PL 0.64 29.7 529 Range 71 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.36 6.8 2497 Topic shift 0.92 93.8 582 Emphasis 0.81 80 5 Range 56 FOCUS Broad 0.48 22.4 3040 Narrow 0.99 89.2 37 Contrastive 0.95 85.7 7 Range 51
100 DISTANCE New 0.84 93.2 584 0 0.37 5.6 1638 1 0.36 7.6 316 2 to 4 0.44 7.8 309 5 to 10 0.61 12.4 137 Above 10 0.77 20 100 Range 49 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.50 32.6 631 Psychological 0.46 10 180 Speech 0.29 10.6 123 Movement 0.64 26.5 426 Other 0.49 21.5 1724 Range 35 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.37 3.5 1297 No 0.60 37.8 1787 Range 23 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.50 3.2 901 Same referent, different 0.61 4 396 TAM Different referent 0.48 37.8 1787 Range 14 AGE 1 0.47 21.3 1031 2 0.58 24.2 1032 3 0.46 24.6 1021 Range 12 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.48 16.7 1381 Copulative 0.53 33.4 596 Unergative 0.51 23.6 833 Unaccusative 0.51 34.7 274 Range 6 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 23.2 2903 Embedded 0.45 26 181 Range 6 TAM Same 0.51 22.6 1852 Different 0.48 24.5 1232 Range 4 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.48 27.4 521 Unambiguous 0.50 22.6 2563 Range 3 GENDER Male 0.50 23.1 1486
101 Female 0.50 23.6 1598 Range 1 ANIMACY Animate 0.50 18.9 2556 Inanimate 0.50 44.9 528 Range 1
1.3.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in the overt lexical vs. null distribution in
Spanish monolingual speakers
The multivariate regressional analysis indicates that the variables that can better account for the distribution of overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects include PERSON, DISCOURSE FUNCTION, FOCUS,
DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, SEMANTIC VERB TYPE, CO-REFERENCE, and AGE. Note that in the previous section, the variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE was not included in the set of significant variables. Thus, the weight of this variable in the distribution of null vs. overt (lexical and pronominal) subjects (§1.1.3) is due to overt lexical subjects and not to overt pronominal subjects. We also note the significance of the variable
AGE, which, as explained above, could be an indication of a change in progress. However, the ranking of constraints does not indicate this trend.
1.3.2. Variable ranking in the overt lexical vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual
speakers
The highest ranked variables are PERSON, DISCOURSE FUNCTION, FOCUS, DISTANCE, SEMANTIC VERB
TYPE, and CO-REFERENCE, a combination of morphology and discourse-related variables. In this case,
PERSON outranks all the other variables. Note, too, that AGE is the lowest ranked of the significant variables.
1.3.3. Constraint ranking in the overt lexical vs. null distribution in Spanish monolingual
speakers
The variable PERSON shows that third person favors overt lexical subjects while the other forms disfavor it. Interestingly, first person plural is close to .50 (i.e., neither favoring nor disfavoring), at least relative to its singular counterpart. Comparing these results with those discussed in the preceding section, on the distribution of null vs. overt pronominal subjects (§1.2.3), a trend regarding the type of overt subject
102 favored emerges; while first and second person favor overt pronominal subjects (as expected, since they do not alternate with lexical subjects), third person favors overt lexical subjects.
The variable DISCOURSE FUNCTION in this comparison behaves as in §1.1.3 (overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects). While topic continuation contexts neither favor nor disfavor the presence of an overt pronominal subject, these contexts seem to disfavor an overt lexical subject. Topic shift contexts, on the other hand, favor the use of an overt lexical subject. Emphasis contexts favor overt lexical and pronominal subjects.
The variables FOCUS and CO-REFERENCE present values very similar to those in §1.1.3 (overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects) and §1.2.3 (overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects).
Thus, there seems to be no difference between overt pronominal and overt lexical subjects in this respect.
The variable DISTANCE behaves as in §1.1.3 (overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects) in that the constraint 2 to 4 intervening subjects disfavors the overt form. However, as explained above, because the value is close to .50, 2 to 4 should be interpreted as neither favoring nor disfavoring.
Comparison with §1.2.3 (overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects) indicates that while the difference is slim, overt lexical subjects have higher factor weights for the constraints new topics and Above 10 intervening subjects than overt pronominal subjects. This result is expected since, at least for the third person, a pronoun cannot introduce a new referent, and with more than ten intervening subjects it is possible that another plausible referent intercedes.
The variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE indicates that movement verbs favor overt lexical subjects, while speech verbs disfavor them. The rest of the variables have values near .50, indicating a lack of favoring or disfavoring. The fact that psychological and speech verbs, reported in the literature as favoring overt subjects, do not favor overt subjects can be explained in relation to the variable PERSON. These types of verbs are reported in the literature to favor overt subjects, especially in the first person singular
(Bentivoglio 1987, Enríquez 1984, Silva-Corvalán 1994, Travis 2005, see Chapter 3, §2.2). First person singular cannot be expressed by a lexical subject, thus, it may be the case that the results reported in antecedent literature indicate an increased use of overt subjects with these verbs because of the higher incidence of these types of verbs with the first person singular(e.g. to express opinion), and this may
103 explain the lack of significance here where pronouns are excluded. At the same time, movement verbs can be said to be more factual, thus, they may be used more with the third person, which favors overt lexical subjects. Thus, the significance of this variable may be a reflex of the variable PERSON.
The constraints within the variable AGE exhibit a behavior parallel to that reported in section §1.1.3.
(overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects) Thus, this variable is significant in the distribution of null vs. overt lexical subjects. At this point, no explanation of the data seems plausible. The age group 2 favors overt lexical subjects whereas the other two groups are very close to .50 (i.e., neither favoring nor disfavoring). Note that this variable is very low ranked, with a range of 12 (compare, for reference, with the range in PERSON: 71). It is possible that this group uses more topic shift contexts or any other favoring context.
In this section, the alternation between an overt lexical subject and a null subject was explored.
Comparison with the previous sections allows for the contrasts between overt pronominal and lexical subjects. The following section, compares these two, to the exclusion of null subjects.
1.4. Spanish monolingual speakers: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects
Preceding literature on monolingual Spanish has neglected the alternation between lexical and pronominal overt subjects, focusing mostly on the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects.
This oversight in the literature is redressed in this section. This section summarizes the results in Table 5.4.
The application value for this table is overt pronominal subject; factor groups returned as significant are highlighted.
104 Table 5.4: Results: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects. Monolingual group Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. an overt lexical subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Monolingual group Corrected Mean .84 Log likelihood -161.681 Significance .035 Total N 993 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.99 98.5 202 2SG 100 15 3SG 0.23 7.9 557 1PL 0.33 26.6 64 2PL 0.81 50 2 3PL 0.26 6.5 168 Range 76 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.88 58.3 410 Topic shift 0.15 1.3 553 Emphasis 0.98 86.7 30 Range 83 ANIMACY Animate 0.67 35.8 754 Inanimate 0.10 0.8 239 Range 56 DISTANCE New 0.31 1.4 552 0 0.66 49.5 182 1 0.79 65.2 69 2 to 4 0.79 70.4 81 5 to 10 0.81 71.2 59 Above 10 0.74 60 50 Range 50 FOCUS Broad 0.52 25.7 918 Narrow 0.41 34 50 Contrastive 0.07 76 25 Range 45 AGE 1 0.62 32.9 328 2 0.40 29.6 355 3 0.49 19 310 Range 23 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.32 59.8 112
105 No 0.52 23.3 881 Range 20 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.51 38.5 374 Copulative 0.44 14.6 233 Unergative 0.49 26.8 269 Unaccusative 0.62 18.8 117 Range 18 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.63 30.6 206 Unambiguous 0.47 26.6 787 Range 16 GENDER Male 0.42 27.3 473 Female 0.57 27.5 520 Range 15 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.58 53.2 62 Same referent, different 0.44 68 50 TAM Different referent 0.50 23.3 881 Range 14 TAM Same 0.44 24.2 553 Different 0.58 31.4 440 Range 14 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.49 27.7 932 Embedded 0.60 23 61 Range 11 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.52 14.2 240 Psychological 0.48 68.4 57 Speech 0.45 53.6 28 Movement 0.46 29.4 160 Other 0.51 27 508 Range 7
1.4.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in the overt lexical vs. overt pronominal
subject distribution in Spanish monolingual speakers
The alternation between overt pronominal and lexical subjects is regulated by the variables PERSON,
DISCOURSE FUNCTION, ANIMACY, AGE, and CO-REFERENCE. Crucially, the variables FOCUS and DISTANCE, significant when the null form is included, are not significant. Thus, these two variables have an effect on the alternation between null and overt subjects, irrespective of the form of the overt subject.
106 1.4.2. Variable ranking in the overt lexical vs. overt pronominal subject distribution in
Spanish monolingual speakers
The highest ranked variables are PERSON, DISCOURSE FUNCTION, and ANIMACY. Nonetheless, the rest of the significant variables are also highly ranked, including the variable AGE.
1.4.3. Constraint ranking in the overt lexical vs. overt pronominal subject distribution in
Spanish monolingual speakers
The distribution of lexical vs. pronominal subjects with regard to the variable PERSON confirms the observations made in the preceding sections. First person singular and second person singular and plural favor overt pronominal subjects, while first person plural and third person favors overt lexical subjects. It remains unclear why first person plural and second person plural do not behave alike. Because there are only two instances of second person plural, the trend reported here, i.e. favoring overt pronominal subjects, may not be reliable. Note that the plural forms can alternate with a lexical subject.
The variable DISCOURSE FUNCTION indicates that in topic continuation contexts where null subjects are not used, overt pronominal subjects are heavily preferred to overt lexical subjects. In contexts of emphasis, overt pronominal subjects are preferred to both null and lexical forms. With topic shift, however, lexical forms are favored.
The constraint Inanimate in the variable ANIMACY disfavors the use of the pronominal form. However, it does not affect the alternation between null and overt lexical subjects (see §1.3.3). Thus, the effect of animacy reflects the unavailability of a pronominal form for inanimate referents.
The external variable AGE was found significant in the alternation between null and lexical subjects
(§1.3) but not in the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects (§1.2). The age group 1 neither favors nor disfavors an overt form. Once null forms are left out, as in this comparison, this group favors pronominal subjects to lexical subjects. Age group 2 favors overt forms to null forms, in particular it favors lexical subjects. Age group 3 favors null subjects. Once these are left out, it neither favors nor disfavors pronominal or lexical subjects. Thus, groups 1 and 3 pattern alike but for the distribution of null vs. overt pronominal subjects, where this factor is not significant. The group that is different is group 2, thus, an
107 explanation based on linguistic change or even cognitive limitations is not available. Bialystok et al. (2008) show that aging affects working memory, thus, holding a referent in memory could be more taxing for participants in group 3. However, this explanation would predict group 3 to produce more overt lexical subjects, since those do not require holding a referent in memory.
The variable CO-REFERENCE exhibits a preference for null forms in co-referent contexts. However, once the null form is left out, lexical subjects are favored in co-referential contexts over pronominal subjects while in non-co-referential contexts both lexical and pronominal subjects are equally preferred. It is counterintuitive that co-referential contexts, when the null option is left out, favor overt lexical subjects over pronominal forms. The variable DISTANCE, not significant in this comparison, seemed to indicate that lexical subjects were preferred over pronominal ones when there were more intervening subjects. Because
DISTANCE is not significant here, this observation is just a trend, and it is not in conflict with the preference for lexical subjects in co-referential contexts19.
1.5. Spanish monolingual speakers: Summary
Both morphology- and discourse-related variables are relevant in the distribution of null vs. overt pronominal vs. overt lexical subjects in monolingual Spanish. The overall trends found are consistent with previous findings: non-co-referential, topic shift, emphasis, narrow, contrastive, first person singular, distant referents and new referents favor the overt forms. However, contrasting the three subject types reveals that the alternation between lexical and pronominal subjects can further our understanding of subject expression in Spanish. For instance, first, second person singular, and second person plural forms favor overt pronominal subjects, while third person singular forms, first and third plural forms favor overt lexical subjects. Additionally, the literature indicates that null subjects are favored in topic continuation
19 In fact, future research can determine if Montalbetti’s (1984) observation that overt pronouns cannot refer back to a quantifier may account for this preference. Consider the following example: (i) Todo estudiante cree que es inteligente. Por lo tanto, ∅/ los estudiantes/*ellos hablan como si lo fueran. In the sentence in (i) the prefered option is the null form, however, the NP is allowed while the overt pronominal form is unfelicitous. It would be necessary to test that in those cases where the overt lexical form is used over the pronominal form in co-referential contexts when the referent is a quantified phrase. Future research should address this hypothesis.
108 contexts. However, the findings here further show that overt lexical subjects are used in topic shift contexts, while overt pronominal subjects prevail in emphasis contexts.
The role of external variables remains unclear. GENDER is only significant in the null vs. overt pronominal subject distribution, and even then, it is rather low ranked. AGE was found significant in the null vs. overt subject (range: 13), null vs. lexical overt subject (range: 12), and lexical vs. pronominal overt subject distribution (range: 23). It is worth mentioning, though, that the ranges are low.
This section has discussed the results for the monolingual Spanish speakers. In the next section, the results for the Catalan data are revealed.
2. Catalan data
The Catalan data from twelve of the Catalan L1 speakers constitute the other baseline for examining the effects of contact on subject expression in bilingual Spanish in Minorca. To test a contact hypothesis, both Spanish and Catalan need to be explored regarding subject expression. To the best of my knowledge, there are no studies addressing subject expression in Catalan. However, as discussed in Chapter 2, there are no monolingual speakers of Catalan, thus, for the purpose of the study, Catalan-dominant speakers were selected to be from the villages of the center of the island, where there is less contact with Spanish (see
Chapter 4 for details).
As in the previous section, which offered a baseline for monolingual Spanish, this section also presents the four possible comparisons between null and overt pronominal and lexical subjects, in establishing a baseline for Catalan.
2.1. Catalan data: Overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects
The results from the alternation between overt and null subjects are presented in Table 5.5 and were obtained using overt subject as the application value.
109 Table 5.5: Results: Overt subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan data. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt (lexical and pronominal) subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan data Corrected Mean .30 Log likelihood -1194.182 Significance .030 Total N 3586 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.61 21.1 1202 2SG 0.08 2.7 37 3SG 0.62 43.4 1235 1PL 0.24 9.7 464 2PL 0.81 66.7 3 3PL 0.31 24.2 645 Range 74 DISTANCE New 0.99 99.8 463 0 0.30 11.1 1854 1 0.26 15.4 442 2 to 4 0.39 24.1 486 5 to 10 0.49 32.9 213 Above 10 0.73 55.5 128 Range 73 FOCUS Broad 0.49 27.2 3560 Narrow 0.99 92.3 26 Contrastive 100 13 Range 50 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.42 17 3121 Topic shift 0.90 99.4 465 Emphasis 100 13 Range 49 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.30 6.4 916 Same referent, different 0.47 13.9 553 TAM Different referent 0.60 40.5 2117 Range 30 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.34 9.3 1469 No 0.61 40.5 2117 Range 27 AGE
110 1 0.37 22 1193 2 0.56 30.3 1194 3 0.57 30.8 1199 Range 20 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.53 38.2 958 Psychological 0.42 16.6 355 Speech 0.37 23.9 205 Movement 0.53 30.7 417 Other 0.51 23.7 1651 Range 16 ANIMACY Animate 0.53 23.6 2804 Inanimate 0.40 42.5 782 Range 12 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.49 20 1801 Copulative 0.46 37.5 873 Unergative 0.57 28.6 657 Unaccusative 0.51 46.3 255 Range 11 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.53 35.4 754 Unambiguous 0.49 25.7 2832 Range 4 GENDER Male 0.48 26.9 1791 Female 0.52 28.6 1795 Range 5 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 27.9 3391 Embedded 0.46 25.1 195 Range 4 TAM Same 0.52 25.2 1957 Different 0.48 30.7 1629 Range 4
2.1.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs.
null subjects in the Catalan data
The multivariate regressional analysis indicates that the alternation between null and overt subjects is best accounted for by a group of variables, including PERSON, DISTANCE, FOCUS, DISCOURSE FUNCTION,
CONNECT, AGE, SEMANTIC VERB TYPE, and ANIMACY.
111 2.1.2. Variable ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the
Catalan data
The highest ranked variables are PERSON, DISTANCE, FOCUS, DISCOURSE FUNCTION, and CONNECT.
The fact that all but one of these variables are discourse-related cannot go unnoticed.
2.1.3. Constraint ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the
Catalan data
The variable PERSON again displays a preference for overt subjects with first and third person singular.
In this table, overt pronominal and lexical subjects are collapsed, thus, the values for first and second person singular are not reliable. A difference with previous tables is the fact that third person plural disfavors overt subjects. This variable will be further discussed when lexical and pronominal overt subjects are separated.
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, as in the table regarding overt vs. null subjects in Valladolid monolingual Spanish (§1.1.3), manifests the preference for overt subjects in new topics and in distances over ten intervening subjects while the rest favor the null form.
The variable FOCUS does not include the constraint contrastive focus because all such instances were produced as overt. While narrow focus contexts clearly favor the overt forms, in broad focus both forms co-exist at similar rates.
The variable DISCOURSE FUNCTION does not provide the factor weight for the constraint emphasis since all the tokens manifested overt forms, and, thus, Goldvarb X returned a knockout and the constraint had to be omitted from the multivariate regressional analysis. Topic shift favors overt forms (as did narrow focus), while topic continuation contexts neither favor nor disfavor overt forms (as was the case in broad focus).
Thus, in topic continuation and in broad focus contexts the distribution is regulated by other variables.
The variable CONNECT displays the gradience expected, where the constraint reflecting the least connectedness, different referent, favors overt forms, the constraint reflecting the most connectedness, same referent and same tense, disfavors the overt form, and the constraint in between, i.e., same referent but different tense, neither favors nor disfavors the overt forms.
112 The variable AGE reveals an increment of overt subject expression in older generations. This fact could be explained either reduced cognitive ability in older groups favoring a simpler form. As explained in
§1.4.3 (overt pronominal vs. overt lexical subjects in Valladolid monolingual Spanish), Bialystok et al.
(2008) report a deficit in working memory in older participants. If this deficit in memory affected holding a referent in memory, then older generations would be expected to exhibit an increment in overt subject expression, which is the case.
The variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE exhibits largely the same ranking as in the monolingual Spanish data (see §1.1.3) and the reverse ranking from the bilingual data sets (to be discussed in §4.1.3 and §5.1.3).
Psychological and speech verbs favor the null option.
With regard to the variable ANIMACY, the disfavoring of overt pronominal subjects with inanimate referents is parallel to the one observed for the monolingual Spanish data.
2.2. Catalan data: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects
The results for the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects are revealed in this section.
Table 5.6, with the application value overt pronominal subject, summarizes the results.
113 Table 5.6: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan data. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan data Corrected Mean .51 Log likelihood -839.423 Significance .007 Total N 2934 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.67 21 1200 2SG 0.15 2.7 37 3SG 0.48 4.9 735 1PL 0.33 6.1 446 2PL 0.92 50 2 3PL 0.31 4.9 514 Range 78 ANIMACY Animate 0.66 13.7 2483 Inanimate 0.02 0.2 451 Range 64 DISTANCE New 0.99 66.7 3 0 0.45 7.2 1775 1 0.43 10.3 417 2 to 4 0.61 19.8 460 5 to 10 0.65 24.3 189 Above 10 0.78 36.7 90 Range 56 FOCUS Broad 0.50 11.4 2923 Narrow 0.98 81.8 11 Contrastive 100 6 Range 48 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.50 11.5 2927 Topic shift 0.91 57.1 7 Emphasis 100 7 Range 41 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.62 7.2 638 Psychological 0.43 16.1 353 Speech 0.39 14.3 182 Movement 0.53 14.5 338 Other 0.47 11.5 1423 Range 23
114 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.36 4.9 901 Same referent, different 0.53 12.5 544 TAM Different referent 0.58 15.4 1489 Range 22 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.40 7.8 1445 No 0.60 15.4 1489 Range 21 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.46 12.3 1642 Copulative 0.57 6 581 Unergative 0.58 16.7 563 Unaccusative 0.38 7.4 148 Range 20 AGE 1 0.41 9.1 1023 2 0.56 13.4 961 3 0.54 12.6 950 Range 15 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.60 16.8 585 Unambiguous 0.47 10.4 2349 Range 13 GENDER Male 0.45 9.7 1451 Female 0.55 13.6 1483 Range 10 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.51 11.8 2774 Embedded 0.42 8.8 160 Range 9 TAM Same 0.51 9.5 1617 Different 0.49 14.3 1317 Range 2
2.2.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. null
subjects in the Catalan data
The multivariate regressional analysis performed indicates that the variables that constrain the alternation between overt and null pronominal subjects are PERSON, ANIMACY, DISTANCE, FOCUS,
CONNECT, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, AGE, AMBIGUITY, and GENDER.
115 2.2.2. Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data
The highest ranked variables are unsurprising. PERSON and DISTANCE are highly ranked in all contrasts discussed so far. ANIMACY is significant when overt pronominal subjects are examined. FOCUS and
DISCOURSE FUNCTION are highly ranked, although just the first one is significant.
2.2.3. Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in the Catalan data
The variable PERSON exhibits the behavior observed in the other data sets except for the second person.
In the following sections, it will become apparent that first and second person singular favor pronominal over lexical subjects. It is, nonetheless, intriguing that second person singular disfavors overt pronominal subjects while second person plural favors them. There are only two cases of second person plural in the data, thus, this result should be taken with caution.
The variable ANIMACY displays the ranking discussed above; inanimates almost categorically disfavor overt pronominal subjects while animates favor overt pronominal subject.
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT exhibits the described ranking, with a favoring distance starting at 2 to 4 intervening subjects.
The variable FOCUS presents a ranking where broad focus contexts neither favor nor disfavor overt pronominal subjects while overt pronominal subjects are favored almost categorically in topic shift contexts and categorically in contrastive contexts.
The variable CONNECT manifests the ranking previously observed and discussed where a higher degree of discourse connectedness disfavors overt subjects and a lower degree disfavors them.
Regarding SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, unaccusative predicates disfavor overt pronominal subjects, while unergative and copulative slightly favor them. Transitive predicates display no favoring or disfavoring.
The variable AGE requires more attention. As in the monolingual Spanish data, age group 1 is more similar to age group 3 than to age group 2 in the Catalan Data. Recall that this participant group is not strictly monolingual. They have regular access to Spanish in Minorca. Age group 2 can be argued to have greater contact with Spanish since it is a group that predominantly writes and reads in Spanish, as discussed
116 in Chapter 2. Nonetheless, the generational distribution explained in Chapter 2, where age group 1 has literacy in both languages and age groups 2 and 3 only in Spanish, if at all in age group 3, and the distribution found here may be different. Age group 1 is predominantly composed of people with literacy in both languages, Spanish and Catalan, although most of their education has been in Catalan. Age group 2 includes people who learned to read and write only in Spanish and attended school when instruction was mandatorily in Spanish. All the participants in this group learned to read and write in Catalan in adulthood.
Age group 3 comprises L1 Catalan speakers who are functionally illiterate and speakers with literacy only in Spanish. With this distribution, age group 2 can be seen as the group for which both languages share more ground or are more in contact, thus, the higher rate of overt pronominal subjects in this age group could be ascribed to contact with Spanish, assuming that overt pronominal subjects are the default, in line with the simplification approach introduced by Sorace (2004). This hypothesis, however, remains to be tested.
The distribution of overt vs. null pronominal subjects regarding AMBIGUITY is the predicted one: ambiguous forms favor overt pronominal subjects while unambiguous ones do not.
Regarding GENDER, females favor overt subjects more than males, the ranking found in the monolingual Spanish data and in Bayley & Pease-Álvarez (1996, 1997). The small range cannot go unremarked; both hover around .50 (i.e., neither favor nor disfavor the overt form).
2.3. Catalan data: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects
The results summarized in this section correspond to the alternation between overt lexical and null subjects. Table 5.7 shows the results with the application value overt lexical subjects.
117 Table 5.7: Results: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan data. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt lexical subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan data Corrected Mean .46 Log likelihood -428.607 Significance .009 Total N 3208 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.06 0.2 950 2SG 0 36 3SG 0.92 41.7 1199 1PL 0.25 4.1 437 2PL 0.41 50 2 3PL 0.62 21.1 620 Range 86 DISTANCE New 1.00 99.8 461 0 0.20 4.6 1706 1 0.18 6.3 396 2 to 4 0.21 6.7 388 5 to 10 0.45 14.5 166 Above 10 0.86 41.8 91 Range 82 FOCUS Broad 0.49 20 3191 Narrow 1.00 88.2 17 Contrastive 100 7 Range 50 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.43 7.1 2747 Topic shift 0.84 99.3 461 Emphasis 100 6 Range 41 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.29 1.8 1347 No 0.66 33.7 1861 Range 37 AGE 1 0.29 15.6 1091 2 0.58 22.2 1051 3 0.65 23.4 1066 Range 36 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.47 35.2 910 Psychological 0.33 0.7 285
118 Speech 0.38 13.1 175 Movement 0.46 21.6 366 Other 0.58 15.5 1472 Range 25 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.39 25.8 656 Unambiguous 0.53 18.9 2552 Range 14 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.47 10.1 1569 Copulative 0.51 34.9 836 Unergative 0.53 16.8 559 Unaccusative 0.58 43.9 244 Range 11 GENDER Male 0.53 20.8 1637 Female 0.47 19.9 1571 Range 7 ANIMACY Animate 0.49 13.2 2427 Inanimate 0.54 42.4 781 Range 6 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.48 1.7 864 Same referent, different 0.54 1.9 483 TAM Different referent 0.50 33.7 1861 Range 6 TAM Same 0.52 19 1785 Different 0.47 21.9 1423 Range 5 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 20.4 3030 Embedded 0.49 19.7 178 Range 1
2.3.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in
the Catalan data
The distribution of overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects for Catalan is regulated by the variables
PERSON, DISTANCE, FOCUS, CO-REFERENCE, AGE, and AMBIGUITY.
119 2.3.2. Variable ranking in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the
Catalan data
The highest ranked variables are PERSON, DISTANCE and FOCUS. AGE, the only external variable selected as significant, is ranked quite high.
2.3.3. Constraint ranking in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in
the Catalan data
The variable PERSON displays the preference for overt lexical subjects with the third person, especially third person singular in this set of data. As in the previous table, second person plural favors an overt lexical subject. However, the number of tokens is very low and, therefore, the representativeness of this result is restricted.
A common pattern emerges in the variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT with lexical subjects; the favoring for the overt form happens with the constraint Above 10 Intervening Subjects.
The variable FOCUS, too, exhibits the categorical favoring of overt lexical subjects in narrow and contrastive contexts and lack of preference in broad focus contexts.
The variable CO-REFERENCE indicates that while non-co-referential contexts favor overt lexical subjects, co-referential contexts disfavor them.
The variable AGE becomes more clear in this distribution. Age 2 and age 3 favor overt lexical subjects and behave very similarly while age group 1 disfavors overt lexical subjects. It may be possible that the different rankings observed are due to the fact that both age 2 and age 3 behave alike and, thus, group 1 is sometimes closer to group 2 and sometimes to group 3, because these two are not significantly different from each other.
The variable VERB FORM AMBIGUITY reports that ambiguous contexts disfavor overt lexical subjects. In the preceding section, this context favored overt pronominal subjects. Since overt pronominal subjects are also favored in emphasis and contrastive focus contexts, it appears to be the case that, in general, pronominal subjects are used to disambiguate, while overt lexical subjects are used to introduce new information.
120 2.4. Catalan data: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects
The results for the alternation between overt pronominal and lexical subjects in Catalan are summarized in this section and presented on Table 5.8. The application value was overt pronominal subjects.
Table 5.8: Results: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects. Catalan data. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. an overt lexical subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan data Corrected Mean .58 Log likelihood -130.867 Significance .046 Total N 2718 Factor weight % N DISTANCE New 0.06 0.4 463 0 0.96 61.4 210 1 0.89 63.4 71 2 to 4 0.91 76.7 120 5 to 10 0.86 64.8 71 Above 10 0.77 47.2 72 Range 90 PERSON 1SG 0.98 99.2 257 2SG 100 1 3SG 0.14 6.8 544 1PL 0.62 60.9 46 2PL 0.73 50 2 3PL 0.36 17.1 158 Range 84 ANIMACY Animate 0.83 51.9 668 Inanimate 0.04 0.3 339 Range 79 FOCUS Broad 0.50 34.3 970 Narrow 0.21 37.5 24 Contrastive 0.88 46.2 13 Range 67 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.58 63.5 531 Topic shift 0.39 0.9 463 Emphasis 0.97 53.8 13 Range 58
121 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.45 12.9 373 Psychological 0.83 96.7 60 Speech 0.59 53.1 49 Movement 0.49 38.3 128 Other 0.48 42.1 397 Range 38 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.78 82.6 138 No 0.45 26.9 869 Range 32 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.43 56.2 363 Copulative 0.47 10.8 332 Unergative 0.71 50.8 191 Unaccusative 0.45 9.1 121 Range 28 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.63 37.1 272 Unambiguous 0.45 33.6 735 Range 18 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.51 34.9 958 Embedded 0.34 28.6 49 Range 17 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.45 75 60 Same referent, different 0.36 88.5 78 TAM Different referent 0.52 26.9 869 Range 16 AGE 1 0.55 35.9 270 2 0.55 35.6 368 3 0.42 32.5 369 Range 14 GENDER Male 0.56 29.6 490 Female 0.44 39.3 517 Range 12 TAM Same 0.45 31.3 499 Different 0.55 37.8 508 Range 11
122 2.4.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in subject expression in overt pronominal
subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in the Catalan data
The variables implied in the alternation between overt pronominal and lexical subject in Catalan are
DISTANCE, PERSON, ANIMACY, and FOCUS.
2.4.2. Variable ranking in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical
subjects in the Catalan data
The highest ranked variables in this distribution are the four significant factors. DISTANCE outranks the other variables.
2.4.3. Constraint ranking in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical
subjects in the Catalan data
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, as in the other data sets, exhibits the preference for overt lexical subjects with new topics and overt pronominal subjects elsewhere. Interestingly, when the distance is large enough, lexical subjects, although still disfavored, are used more frequently than at smaller distances.
The variable PERSON confirms the trend observed in the Spanish monolingual group and, as will be shown below (§4.4.3 and §5.4.3), in the bilinguals as well; when the null option is omitted, first and second person favor the use of overt pronominal subjects while the third person favors the use of overt lexical subjects.
The variable ANIMACY shows that inanimates disfavor overt pronominal subjects while animates favor them; similar trends will be observed in Catalan L1 Spanish (§5.4.3).
In Catalan, as in Spanish, FOCUS contexts play a role: contrastive focus contexts favor overt pronominal subjects, narrow focus contexts favor overt lexical subjects and broad focus does not favor either.
123 2.5. Catalan data: Summary
The scenario represented here indicates that Catalan resembles Spanish with respect to patterns in the expression of subjects. Although differences are observed, they seem to be minimal. The following section compares these two data sets more rigorously.
3. Microvariation: comparison between Spanish and Catalan
The Spanish and Catalan data sets were submitted to a variable rule analysis, with a total of 7,039 tokens. The selected run indicates that the distribution of null vs. overt subjects is best explained by a combination of factors, including DISCOURSE FUNCTION, DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, FOCUS, PERSON,
CONNECT, SEMANTIC VERB TYPE, AGE, ANIMACY, LANGUAGE, AMBIGUITY, and GENDER, in that order.
Important to us is the fact that the variable LANGUAGE was selected, and the only one offered in the table since the other variables have been previously discussed in the sections for each of the languages (§1 and
§2).
Table 5.9: Results from Catalan and Spanish data combined. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt (lexical and pronominal) subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan vs. Spanish data Corrected Mean .24 Log likelihood -2327.888 Significance .035 Total N 7039 Factor weight % N LANGUAGE Spanish 0.46 29.3 3439 Catalan 0.53 28 3600 Range 7
The fact that the variable LANGUAGE was significant justifies the separate runs provided in §1 and §2 of this chapter. The difference captured here indicates that the patterns of distribution for null and overt pronominal and lexical subjects differ in Spanish and Catalan. Regardless, the weights are remarkably close to .50 (i.e, no clear favoring or disfavoring). The percentages, used in the previous literature as a measure of comparison for bilingual and monolingual varieties would not capture this difference. As will be shown in §6, the overall rate of overt subjects is not significantly different in Spanish and Catalan. We return to the
124 tables in §1 and §2 to explain the differences between Spanish and Catalan in the distribution of null and overt subjects.
As was seen in Tables 5.1-5.8 and noted the discussion surrounding them, Spanish and Catalan differ in the variables that are significant and in their ranking in ways similar to those reported for dialectal differences in Otheguy et al. (2007). More important are differences in constraint ranking. The variable CO-
REFERENCE revealed a difference in patterning between Catalan and Spanish. In non-co-referential contexts
Catalan favors overt pronominal subjects, while Spanish favors overt lexical subjects. The variable
DISTANCE exhibited similar differences between the languages; however, the distance at which overt subjects are favored is 5 intervening subjects in Spanish and 10 intervening subjects in Catalan. Regarding the variable PERSON, we observe that while the second person singular favors an overt pronominal subject in Spanish and a null form in Catalan, the second person plural favors an overt pronominal subject in
Catalan, and in Spanish the values are near .50, indicating no clear preference. Finally, the variable
SEMANTIC VERB TYPE also indicates differences between the languages. Catalan favors overt pronominal subjects with psychological verbs while Spanish disfavors them. In addition, movement verbs favor overt lexical subjects in Spanish while in Catalan the weights are near .50. These differences are summarized in
Table 5.10.
Table 5.10: Differences in constraint patterning between Spanish and Catalan. Catalan Spanish
Non-co-referential contexts favor overt pronominal subjects overt lexical subjects
Distance favoring overt subjects 10 and above 5 and above
2 person singular favors a null subject an overt pronominal subject
2 person plural favors an overt pronominal subject a null and an overt pronominal subject equally
Psychological verbs favor overt pronominal subjects disfavor overt pronominal subjects
Movement verbs exhibit no preference favor overt lexical subjects
This section has presented the differences found between Spanish and Catalan with respect to subject expression. The following section examines bilingual Spanish in order to detect differences from
125 monolingual Spanish and to determine whether attested differences can be attributed to contact with
Catalan.
4. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers
This section offers the results for subject expression in the eleven Spanish L1 bilingual speakers. The group is largely composed of people who migrated to Minorca in their early 20s or people born or raised in
Minorca of Spanish-speaking parents who migrated there. As such, it is the most diverse group in this project. These Spanish L1 bilinguals were born in different places, a variable included in the analysis, and they have varying proficiencies and language use patterns in their L2, Catalan. 20 The speakers’ place of residency is also considered in the data analysis, although all the participants from the Spanish L1 group live on the east coast, mainly in the capital, Maó, home to the largest Spanish-speaking population in
Minorca.
Comparisons are done as in §1 and §2 of this chapter. First the overt vs. null subject distribution is examined and, then, we compare the null form with each of the overt ones. Lastly, the two overt forms are compared.
4.1. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects
This section provides the results regarding the opposition null vs. overt subjects, irrespective of the form of the overt subject. These results, in Table 5.11, were obtained with Goldvarb X. The application value is overt subject.
20 The Catalan L1 group also presents varying degrees of proficiency and language use, however, the range of variation is significantly lower.
126 Table 5.11: Results: Overt vs. null subjects. Spanish L1 bilinguals. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt (lexical and pronominal) subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Spanish L1 Corrected Mean .29 Log likelihood -1172.47 Significance .025 Total N 3278 Factor weight % N DISTANCE New 1.00 98.9 451 0 0.24 10.8 1727 1 0.32 23.5 452 2 to 4 0.42 31.1 405 5 to 10 0.50 36.7 158 Above 10 0.72 56.5 85 Range 76 PERSON 1SG 0.54 20.1 1371 2SG 0.26 11.1 27 3SG 0.66 47.9 1019 1PL 0.12 8.8 354 2PL 0 6 3PL 0.41 34.1 507 Range 54 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.42 18.6 2828 Topic shift 0.88 98.9 450 Emphasis 100 16 Range 46 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.34 9.5 1398 No 0.62 44.5 1880 Range 27 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.48 24.5 1558 Copulative 0.57 39.9 709 Unergative 0.54 26.3 741 Unaccusative 0.32 41.1 270 Range 26 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.36 7.9 953 Same referent, different 0.48 13 445 TAM Different referent 0.58 44.5 1880
127 Range 22 LISTENING PROFICIENCY 5 0.64 43.6 296 6 0.44 18.7 299 7 0.49 29.3 2683 Range 20 SPEAKING PROFICIENCY 1 0.52 29.6 597 2 0.59 37.1 299 4 0.54 34.5 890 5 0.51 27.9 596 6 0.40 20.1 598 7 0.45 29.9 298 Range 19 ANIMACY Animate 0.54 26 2653 Inanimate 0.35 45 625 Range 18 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.47 39.2 835 Psychological 0.61 27.4 234 Speech 0.42 27.2 158 Movement 0.44 22.7 365 Other 0.52 26.9 1686 Range 18 AGE 1 0.44 23.5 1194 2 0.51 32.2 1191 3 0.57 34.3 893 Range 13 PLACE OF BIRTH Minorca 0.52 27.9 1194 Pamplona 0.47 25.7 296 Córdoba 0.45 32 294 Sevilla 0.52 37.1 299 Ávila 0.57 30 300 Gran Canaria 0.47 29.9 298 Cataluña 0.46 29.5 298 Granada 0.50 29.8 299 Range 12 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.51 30 3063 Embedded 0.41 24.2 215 Range 10
PLACE OF RESIDENCY Maó 0.50 30.8 2680 San Lluís 0.45 18.7 299 Es Grau 0.52 29.8 299
128 Range 8 GENDER Male 0.55 33.3 1486 Female 0.46 26.5 1792 Range 8 TAM Same 0.51 27.7 1993 Different 0.49 32.5 1285 Range 2 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.52 35.2 659 Unambiguous 0.50 28.2 2619 Range 2 USE OF L2 2 0.50 30.8 1787 4 0.50 18.7 299 5 0.50 25.7 296 8 0.50 32.1 896 Range 1 USE OF L1 1 0.50 34.3 893 2 0.50 27.8 2385 Range 0 FOCUS Broad 28.9 3254 Narrow 100 28 Contrastive 100 18 Range 0
4.1.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in subject expression in overt pronominal
and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers
The choice between null and overt subjects in the Spanish of Spanish L1 bilingual speakers is conditioned by multiple variables. The statistically significant variables were DISTANCE FROM REFERENT,
PERSON, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, CONNECT, ANIMACY, SPEAKING PROFICIENCY, and LISTENING
PROFICIENCY. Note that DISCOURSE FUNCTION does not reach significance. Emphasis, however, had to be excluded from the multivariate regressional analysis because it exhibited no variation; it categorically favored overt subjects. A similar case is that of the variable FOCUS, which had to be omitted from the multivariate regressional analysis because narrow and contrastive focus contexts both elicited only overt subjects.
129 4.1.2. Variable ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish
L1 bilingual speakers
The two highest ranked variables are DISTANCE FROM REFERENT and PERSON. The third variable is
DISCOURSE FUNCTION; however, this variable was not selected as significant. SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE and
CONNECT, which were not selected as significant in the monolingual Spanish group, are ranked high for this bilingual group.
4.1.3.Constraint ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish
L1 bilingual speakers
As will become apparent below, differences between monolingual and bilingual Spanish data are better explained in terms of constraint rankings than in terms of the variables returned as significant or their ranking. In this section, we examine the constraints for each significant variable.
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT indicates an increase in the probability of producing an overt subject as distance from the referent increases. However, favoring of the overt forms does not happen until the constraint above 10 intervening subjects. The constraint 5 to 10 intervening clauses neither favors nor disfavors the overt forms. Topic Shift almost categorically favors the overt forms.
The variable PERSON provides a distribution very similar to that in the monolingual data, with different weights but still the same favoring/disfavoring patterns. In this case, third person singular favors overt subjects more clearly, while first person singular is close to .50, indicating no favoring or disfavoring of overt subjects. The plural forms and second person singular disfavor the overt forms.
The variable SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE shows that copulative verbs favor overt subjects significantly more than unaccusative verbs, which disfavor them. Casanova (1999) proposes that copulative verbs lack semantic content and, thus, tend to appear with overt subjects, a claim that is supported in these data.
Transitive and unergative predicates exhibit weights close to .50, while unaccusative verbs disfavor overt subjects.
The variable SPEECH CONNECTIVITY displays the expected constraint ranking. The constraint Different
Referent favors the overt form, while those with the same referent disfavor it. Note, however, that the
130 constraint Same Referent but Different Tense hovers around .50, that is, it exhibits no preference for overt or null forms. Thus, the combination of CO-REFERENCE and TAM CONTINUATION can better account for this group’s behavior than CO-REFERENCE or TAM CONTINUATION alone.
The PROFICIENCY variables require more attention. Participants rated their oral proficiency both in active and in passive skills on a 7-point scale, where 1 indicated minimum skill and 7 native-like proficiency. If an increase in overt subjects results from contact, those speakers with more contact, i.e. those who use both languages more regularly would exhibit a higher rate of overt subjects. On the other hand, higher proficiency may result in divergence, i.e. in language separation. LANGUAGE USE was not selected as significant, whereas PROFICIENCY was. In general, higher speaking proficiency in Catalan correlates with lower use of overt subjects in Spanish although the results are not linear. Speaking proficiency 6 disfavors overt subjects the most, while proficiency 2 favors them the most. The rest hover around .50. All participants ranked their listening proficiency from 5 to 7. Those in the lowest proficiency group favor overt subjects while those in the proficiency group 6 disfavor them. The highest proficiency group is close to .50.
The constraints in the variable ANIMACY indicate the unavailability of overt pronominal counterparts for inanimates, as in §1 (monolingual Spanish speakers) and §2 (Catalan data).
4.2. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects
This section summarizes the results in Table 5.12, which capture the distribution of null vs. overt pronominal subjects in the Spanish of Spanish L1 bilinguals. The application value is overt pronominal subjects.
131 Table 5.12: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects. Spanish L1 bilinguals. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Spanish L1 Corrected Mean .80 Log likelihood -837.652 Significance .005 Total N 2639 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.69 19.7 1365 2SG 0.51 11.1 27 3SG 0.42 6.7 569 1PL 0.16 2.4 331 2PL 0 6 3PL 0.27 3.7 347 Range 53 DISTANCE New 0.86 28.6 7 0 0.38 7 1657 1 0.63 17.2 418 2 to 4 0.71 23.1 363 5 to 10 0.77 26.5 136 Above 10 0.84 36.2 58 Range 48 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.50 12.5 2633 Topic shift 0.04 16.7 6 Emphasis 100 9 Range 47 LISTENING PROFICIENCY 5 0.61 17.3 202 6 0.28 5.4 257 7 0.52 12.9 2180 Range 33 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.52 14.6 1378 Copulative 0.49 8.6 466 Unergative 0.54 13.2 629 Unaccusative 0.24 4.2 166 Range 30 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.57 6.3 937 Same referent, different 0.67 11.2 436 TAM Different referent 0.39 17.6 1266 Range 27
132 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.41 9 558 Psychological 0.62 24.1 224 Speech 0.48 15.4 136 Movement 0.44 7.8 306 Other 0.53 12.9 1415 Range 22 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.40 7.9 1373 No 0.61 17.6 1266 Range 22 PLACE OF RESIDENCY Maó 0.51 12.5 2119 San Lluís 0.38 5.4 257 Es Grau 0.55 20.2 263 Range 17 AGE 1 0.44 9.8 1013 2 0.51 13 928 3 0.56 15.9 698 Range 12 PLACE OF BIRTH Minorca 0.53 11.6 974 Pamplona 0.43 8.7 241 Córdoba 0.47 11.9 227 Sevilla 0.50 12.6 215 Ávila 0.53 13.9 244 Gran Canaria 0.52 13.6 242 Cataluña 0.44 9.9 233 Granada 0.51 20.2 263 Range 11 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.55 17.1 515 Unambiguous 0.49 11.4 2124 Range 7 GENDER Male 0.53 12.9 1138 Female 0.48 12.3 1501 Range 5 SPEAKING PROFICIENCY 1 0.50 15.3 496 2 0.50 12.6 215 4 0.52 14.5 682 5 0.50 11.3 485 6 0.47 7.9 519 7 0.51 13.6 242 Range 5 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 12.7 2458 Embedded 0.48 9.9 181
133 Range 2 USE OF L2 2 0.50 13.5 1430 4 0.50 5.4 257 5 0.48 8.7 241 8 0.50 14.5 711 Range 2 USE OF L1 1 0.50 15.9 698 2 0.50 11.3 1941 Range 1 TAM Same 0.50 10.3 1606 Different 0.49 16.1 1033 Range 1 ANIMACY Animate 14.7 2310 Inanimate 0 344 Range 0 FOCUS Broad 12.3 2639 Narrow 100 5 Contrastive 100 10 Range 0
4.2.1.Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. null
subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers
The alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects is constrained by several variables, in particular, PERSON, DISTANCE, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, and LISTENING PROFICIENCY. In this case, too, emphasis categorically selected overt pronominal subjects, maybe explaining why the variable DISCOURSE
FUNCTION does not reach significance. The variable FOCUS could not be included in the multivariate regressional analysis because narrow and contrastive focus categorically selected overt subjects.
4.2.2. Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual
speakers
The highest ranked variables are PERSON and DISTANCE, in a reverse order if compared to the previous section (overt pronominal and lexical vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilinguals). DISCOURSE FUNCTION, though not significant, follows. The other two significant constraints—SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE and
LISTENING PROFICIENCY— are ranked next. CONNECT is still highly ranked although it is not significant.
134 4.2.3. Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1
bilingual speakers
The variable PERSON presents differences from the distribution in §4.1.3 (overt lexical and pronominal vs. null subjects), which are very similar to the differences between the equivalent comparisons in the monolingual Spanish group (in §1.1.3 and §1.2.3). Following the conclusions from the discussion of the monolingual data, the effect of first and second person singular are better interpreted in the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects since no alternation with lexical subjects is possible. These two persons favor pronominal subjects, although the second person is close to .50 (i.e., neither favors nor disfavors the overt form). The rest disfavor overt pronominal subjects.
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT indicates that when distance increases more overt pronominal subjects are used. In fact, overt pronominal subjects are favored in all constraints but in 0 distance. This pattern differs from that found in §4.1.3 (overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects), where the favoring constraint was above 10 intervening subjects.
The variable LISTENING PROFICIENCY presents a higher contrast than in §4.1.3 (null vs. overt lexical and pronominal subjects). The proficiency group 5 favors overt pronominal subjects, while proficiency group 6 disfavors them and group 7 neither favors nor disfavors them.
The variable SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE shows that the constraints hover around .50 except for unaccusative predicates, which disfavor the use of an overt pronominal subject. This trend may be related to the fact that pronominal subjects are largely preverbal and unaccusative predicates exhibit postverbal subjects in broad, narrow, and contrastive contexts. As indicated below, this disfavoring is much less marked with lexical subjects.
4.3. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects
This section explains the results from the alternation between lexical and null subjects in the Spanish
L1 group. The results, shown in Table 5.13, were obtained with the application value overt lexical subject.
135 Table 5.13: Results: Overt lexical subject vs. null subjects. Spanish L1 bilinguals. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt lexical subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Spanish L1 Corrected Mean .53 Log likelihood -456.956 Significance .045 Total N 2923 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.10 0.5 1102 2SG 0 24 3SG 0.90 46.1 986 1PL 0.26 6.6 346 2PL 0 6 3PL 0.78 32.7 496 Range 80 DISTANCE New 1.00 98.9 450 0 0.20 4.4 1616 1 0.26 9.4 382 2 to 4 0.40 13.8 325 5 to 10 0.53 17.9 123 Above 10 0.86 42.2 64 Range 80 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.40 7.8 2504 Topic shift 0.89 98.9 449 Emphasis 100 7 Range 49 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.34 1.9 1293 No 0.63 37.3 1667 Range 28 LISTENING PROFICIENCY 5 0.71 36.5 263 6 0.53 15 286 7 0.47 21 2411 Range 24 PLACE OF RESIDENCY Maó 0.51 23.3 2427 San Lluís 0.58 15 286 Es Grau 0.35 15 247 Range 23 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.45 13.4 1363 Copulative 0.54 36.5 671 Unergative 0.60 17.1 662
136 Unaccusative 0.41 39.8 264 Range 19 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.51 22.1 2763 Embedded 0.34 17.3 197 Range 17 PLACE OF BIRTH Minorca 0.51 20.6 1085 Pamplona 0.57 19.7 279 Córdoba 0.41 25.9 270 Sevilla 0.55 30.8 273 Ávila 0.58 21.1 266 Gran Canaria 0.39 21.1 265 Cataluña 0.49 23.6 275 Granada 0.47 15 247 Range 17 GENDER Male 0.60 26.2 1349 Female 0.42 18.2 1611 Range 17 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.48 1.8 897 Same referent, different 0.65 2.3 396 TAM Different referent 0.47 37.3 1667 Range 17 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.56 35.5 787 Psychological 0.51 5.5 181 Speech 0.44 16.1 137 Movement 0.40 17.3 341 Other 0.50 18.2 1514 Range 16 AGE 1 0.44 16.5 1101 2 0.50 24.8 1074 3 0.59 25.2 785 Range 15 ANIMACY Animate 0.52 15.6 2333 Inanimate 0.42 45.1 627 Range 11 USE OF L2 2 0.49 22.6 1600 4 0.51 15 286 5 0.52 19.7 279 8 0.51 23.4 795 Range 4 SPEAKING PROFICIENCY 1 0.50 19.5 522
137 2 0.51 30.8 273 4 0.50 26.8 796 5 0.51 20.4 545 6 0.49 14.3 559 7 0.48 21.1 265 Range 3 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.48 25.2 571 Unambiguous 0.51 21 2389 Range 3 USE OF L1 1 0.52 25.2 785 2 0.49 20.6 2175 Range 2 TAM Same 0.49 21.3 1838 Different 0.51 22.6 1122 Range 2 FOCUS Broad 21 2929 Narrow 100 23 Contrastive 100 8 Range 0
4.3.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in
Spanish L1 bilingual speakers
The alternation between lexical and null subjects responds to several variables. The multivariate regressional analysis indicated that PERSON, DISTANCE, CO-REFERENCE, LISTENING PROFICIENCY,
SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, and GENDER were significant. The variable FOCUS could not be included because narrow and contrastive focus categorically returned overt subjects.
4.3.2. Variable ranking in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual
speakers
PERSON and DISTANCE were again the highest ranked variables, followed by the non-significant
DISCOURSE FUNCTION, which did not include the constraint Emphasis. These were followed by CO-
REFERENCE and LISTENING PROFICIENCY. Although PLACE OF RESIDENCY ranks high, it is not significant.
GENDER, despite being significant, is ranked in the middle.
138 4.3.3. Constraint ranking in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual
speakers
The variable PERSON indicates some similarities with and differences from the monolingual Spanish group. As in the monolingual Spanish group, first and second person favor the null form while the third person favors overt lexical subjects. The difference lies in the first person plural, which also disfavors overt lexical subjects in this group.
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT exhibits the same pattern as in §4.3.1 (overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects), where the alternation included overt pronominal subjects. Although increased distance favor overt forms in all the groups, the favoring of overt pronouns happens at much less distance (only one intervening subject) than the favoring of overt lexical subjects (5 or more intervening subjects) in this group.
The variable CO-REFERENCE, as in the monolingual data, favors the null form in co-referential contexts and the overt lexical form in non-co-referential contexts.
The variable LISTENING PROFICIENCY presents a different pattern in this distribution. Proficiency 5 still favors overt forms, however, both 6 and 7 neither favor nor disfavor the overt lexical subject.
The variable SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE reveals a different behavior than with overt pronominal subjects.
Although unaccusative predicates still disfavor overt forms, the value is closer to .50 than with overt pronominal subjects. Unergative predicates favor overt lexical subjects, whereas the rest have values close to .50, interpreted as neither favoring nor disfavoring overt lexical subjects.
The variable GENDER indicates a different trend from that observed in the monolingual Spanish data in the present project and that reported in Bayley & Pease-Álvarez (1996, 1997). Male participants favored overt lexical subjects while female participants favored the null form. In the monolingual Spanish group in this study and in Bayley & Pease-Álvarez, the distribution where GENDER was found significant was the contrast between null and overt pronominal subject.
139 4.4. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects
The alternation between pronominal and lexical subjects returned a number of contrasts in the Spanish monolingual data and the Catalan data. This section examines this alternation in Spanish L1 bilinguals. The results in Table 5.14 were returned with the application value overt pronominal subject.
Table 5.14: Results: Overt pronominal vs. overt lexical subjects. Spanish L1 bilinguals. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. an overt lexical subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Spanish L1 Corrected Mean .11 Log likelihood -138.836 Significance .026 Total N 982 Factor weight % N DISTANCE New 0.07 0.4 447 0 0.81 62.4 189 1 0.94 67 109 2 to 4 0.94 65.1 129 5 to 10 0.94 62.7 59 Above 10 0.85 44.9 49 Range 88 PERSON 1SG 0.98 97.9 281 2SG 100 4 3SG 0.17 7.9 494 1PL 0.50 25.8 31 2PL 0 0 3PL 0.20 8 176 Range 81 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.81 62.6 522 Topic shift 0.15 0.2 445 Emphasis 0.83 53.3 15 Range 69 PLACE OF RESIDENCY Maó 0.52 32.3 836 San Lluís 0.12 24.6 57 Es Grau 0.66 58.4 89 Range 54 LISTENING PROFICIENCY 5 0.49 27.3 132 6 0.10 24.6 57 7 0.54 36.1 793 Range 45
140 FOCUS Broad 0.51 34.4 937 Narrow 0.13 17.9 28 Contrastive 0.56 52.9 17 Range 43 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.85 81.5 135 No 0.43 26.7 847 Range 42 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.50 15.7 331 Psychological 0.29 84.4 64 Speech 0.68 48.8 43 Movement 0.69 29.8 84 Other 0.48 40 460 Range 40 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.64 52.5 385 Copulative 0.29 14.3 286 Unergative 0.59 43.2 199 Unaccusative 0.44 6.2 112 Range 35 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.76 61 77 Same referent, different 0.44 84.5 58 TAM Different referent 0.48 26.7 847 Range 32 GENDER Male 0.37 29.7 502 Female 0.63 39 480 Range 26 PLACE OF BIRTH Minorca 0.56 33.8 337 Pamplona 0.41 26.7 75 Córdoba 0.45 29.3 99 Sevilla 0.38 24.3 111 Ávila 0.47 37.8 90 Gran Canaria 0.71 37.8 90 Cataluña 0.38 28.6 91 Granada 0.53 58.4 89 Range 18 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.64 38.2 233 Unambiguous 0.46 33 749 Range 18 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.49 34.1 929 Embedded 0.65 35.8 53 Range 16
141 AGE 1 0.60 35 280 2 0.47 31.8 390 3 0.45 36.5 312 Range 14 TAM Same 0.48 30.1 561 Different 0.53 39.7 421 Range 6 SPEAKING PROFICIENCY 1 0.49 43.3 180 2 0.48 24.3 111 4 0.50 32.4 315 5 0.49 32.7 165 6 0.51 33.9 121 7 0.54 37.8 90 Range 6 USE OF L2 2 0.52 35.2 559 4 0.47 24.6 57 5 0.47 26.7 75 8 0.48 36.1 291 Range 5 USE OF L1 1 0.48 36.5 312 2 0.51 33.1 670 Range 3 ANIMACY Animate 48.4 703 Inanimate 0 283 Range 0
4.4.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt
lexical subjects in Spanish L1 bilingual speakers
Several significant variables were obtained for the alternation between pronominal and lexical overt subjects: DISTANCE, PERSON, LISTENING PROFICIENCY, FOCUS, CO-REFERENCE, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, and
GENDER.
4.4.2. Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Spanish L1
bilingual speakers
142 DISTANCE and PERSON are again the highest ranked variables, followed by DISCOURSE FUNCTION, which this time included emphasis and was still returned as non-significant. PLACE OF RESIDENCY, too, is ranked high but not significant. LISTENING PROFICIENCY, FOCUS and CO-REFERENCE follow.
4.4.3. Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Spanish
L1 bilingual speakers
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT suggests that while overt lexical subjects are the preferred form with new referents, overt pronominal subjects are selected by all the other constraints. Incidentally, the favoring of overt pronominal subjects at distances above 10 intervening subjects are lower than at lower distances, probably indicating that at a higher distance the favoring shifts back to lexical subjects as if they constituted new referents.
The variable PERSON reveals that while first and second person favor overt pronominal subjects, third person favors overt lexical subjects.
The variable LISTENING PROFICIENCY shows that Spanish L1 bilingual participants that reported their listening proficiency as 6 (on a 7-point Likert scale, 1 = minimum proficiency, 7 = native-like proficiency) disfavor the use of pronominal subjects, while the other two groups neither disfavor nor favor overt pronominal subjects. When null subjects were also included, speakers reporting proficiencies 6 and 7
(henceforth groups 6 and 7) disfavor the overt form while those reporting a proficiency of 5 (henceforth group 5) favor them. Thus, group 5 favors both overt forms equally, while groups 6 and 7 disfavor them.
Group 7, however, when the null form is left out, favors pronominal vs. lexical overt subjects, unlike group
6. In sum, group 5 favors overt vs. null forms, irrespective of the form of the overt subject. Groups 6 and 7 favor null subjects. When null subjects are omitted, group 6 prefers lexical subjects while group 7 prefers pronominal subjects. It could be posited that lower proficiency in the L2 promotes a higher use of overt pronominal subjects. This idea is further developed in Chapter 6.
The variable FOCUS unveils that broad focus neither favors nor disfavors overt pronominal subjects over overt lexical subjects. However, narrow focus favors lexical subject and contrastive contexts slightly favor pronominal subjects.
143 The variable CO-REFERENCE indicates that co-referential subjects favor pronominal subjects while non- co-referential contexts slightly favor lexical subject. Note that this trend, though expected, is the opposite trend found in the monolingual group.
The variable SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE indicates that copulative verbs favor overt lexical subjects, which carry more informational content than pronominal subjects. These results are line with Casanova’s (1999) idea that this type of verbs lack semantic content, thus, the subject must be more informational. Transitive and unergative verbs favor pronominal subjects while unaccusative verbs disfavor them. As explained above, the preference for postverbal subjects with unaccusative predicates and the tendency for pronominal subjects to appear preverbally may explain this trend.
The variable GENDER indicated above that males favor overt lexical subjects over null subjects.
Females favor overt pronominal subjects more than males, as in §4.3.3 (overt lexical vs. null subjects).
4.5. Spanish L1 bilingual speakers: Summary
There are some differences between this bilingual group and the Spanish monolinguals. The variables that are significant in subject expression varied less across analyses by subject type (the comparison of null vs. overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects) in the bilingual group than in the monolingual group. For the bilingual group DISTANCE, PERSON, LISTENING PROFICIENCY, and SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE were returned as significant in all comparisons. The next section explores these distributions in the Spanish of Catalan L1 bilinguals.
5. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers
This section analyzes the results for subject expression in the Spanish of twelve Catalan L1 bilinguals.
This group constitutes a more homogenous group than the other bilingual group. All participants were born and raised in Minorca, although some lived in the Peninsula during their military service or their college studies. Place of residency is included because people on the east coast (Maó) have more contact with
Spanish-speaking immigrants than those in the villages in the center (Ferreries, Mercadal and Fornells).
Speaking and listening proficiency in the L2 (Spanish) is higher in this group in comparison with the proficiency in the L2 (Catalan) of the Spanish L1 bilinguals, that is, overall Catalan L1 speakers’
144 proficiency in their L2 is higher than Spanish L1 speakers’ proficiency in their L2. In fact, this group rates their proficiency in Spanish from 6 to 7 on a 7-point Likert scale, where 7 represents native-like abilities.
Their speaking proficiency, based on the same scale, varies from 4 to 7. While all the Catalan L1 bilinguals use their first language everyday, the use of their L2 varies across speakers. Note, however, that unlike some of the Spanish L1 who never used Catalan (8 on the language use scale), the lowest frequency of use of Spanish for this group is 5, once or twice a month.
This section is organized as the previous sections, comparing null subjects to both types of overt subjects first, with each type at a time and, finally, the two types of overt subjects.
5.1. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects
This section compares overt subjects, irrespective of type, and null subjects. The results are provided in
Table 5.15, with the application value overt subject.
Table 5.15: Results: Overt vs. null subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt (pronominal and lexical) subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan L1 Corrected Mean .26 Log likelihood -1304.25 Significance .050 Total N 3608 Factor weight % N SPEAKING PROFICIENCY 4 0.75 32.1 1192 5 0.75 32.6 298 6 0.46 27.3 1818 7 0.05 20.7 300 Range 70 PLACE OF RESIDENCY Ferreries 0.26 22.7 625 Mercadal 0.48 32.4 1497 Fornells 0.46 28.7 300 Maó 0.84 27.4 594 Alaior 0.43 27.5 592 Range 58 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.38 17.5 3094 Topic shift 0.96 97.1 514 Emphasis 100 20
145 Range 58 USE OF L2 1 0.27 29.2 291 2 0.55 28.1 1518 3 0.70 28.5 599 4 0.40 30.3 601 5 0.38 29.2 599 Range 43 DISTANCE New 0.80 96.7 515 0 0.39 11.5 1966 1 0.46 21.5 441 2 to 4 0.56 29.2 428 5 to 10 0.62 31.8 157 Above 10 0.69 44.6 101 Range 42 PERSON 1SG 0.57 21.3 1334 2SG 0.20 17.4 23 3SG 0.59 43 1265 1PL 0.21 9.9 435 2PL 29.8 551 3PL 0.39 0 3 Range 40 GENDER Male 0.65 26.8 1822 Female 0.35 30.9 1786 Range 29 AGE 1 0.41 25.9 1224 2 0.45 33.1 1198 3 0.65 27.5 1186 Range 24 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.40 9.8 1452 No 0.57 41.6 2156 Range 16 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.50 36 993 Psychological 0.59 30.1 296 Speech 0.61 36.2 127 Movement 0.49 30 337 Other 0.48 24 1855 Range 13 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.49 9.1 972 Same referent, different 0.61 11.5 480 TAM Different referent 0.48 41.6 2156 Range 13
146 LISTENING PROFICIENCY 6 0.59 29.3 598 7 0.48 28.7 3010 Range 11 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 28.8 3461 Embedded 0.40 28.6 147 Range 10 USE OF L1 1 0.46 28.9 1787 2 0.54 28.7 1821 Range 9 TAM Same 0.53 28.1 2139 Different 0.46 29.7 1469 Range 8 ANIMACY Animate 0.51 24.9 2810 Inanimate 0.46 42.4 798 Range 6 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.53 35.6 705 Unambiguous 0.49 27.1 2903 Range 4 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.49 24.6 1633 Copulative 0.51 35.8 886 Unergative 0.52 25.1 859 Unaccusative 0.49 45.7 230 Range 4 FOCUS Broad 27.9 3568 Narrow 100 42 Contrastive 100 21 Range 0
5.1.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs.
null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers
The multivariate regressional analysis reveals that the alternation between overt and null subjects in the
Spanish of Catalan L1 bilinguals is constrained by several factors: SPEAKING PROFICIENCY, PLACE OF
RESIDENCY, DISCOURSE FUNCTION, DISTANCE, PERSON, GENDER, CO-REFERENCE, SEMANTIC VERB TYPE and USE OF L1.
147 5.1.2. Variable ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan
L1 bilingual speakers
The highest ranked variables, SPEAKING PROFICIENCY and PLACE OF RESIDENCE, are surprising, since language-external factors have mostly been found not to be significant in the distribution of null and overt subjects. Nonetheless, these variables are not social, like the variables traditionally tested (i.e. GENDER and
AGE). They reflect on language contact, and in the case of the latter, on dialectal variation. The highest ranked linguistic variables are DISCOURSE FUNCTION, DISTANCE, and PERSON.
5.1.3. Constraint ranking in overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects in
Catalan L1 bilingual speakers
The variable SPEAKING PROFICIENCY indicates that lower Spanish L2 proficiency correlates with an increased use of overt subjects. In fact, there seems to be a split between the two highest proficiencies and the two lowest proficiencies. Importantly, speaking proficiency groups 5 and 7 (on a 7-point Likert scale, where 7 was native-like proficiency) have a significant lower number of tokens, provided by a single participant for each. Proficiency groups 4 and 6 have more tokens and from several speakers. These exhibit marked differences between the groups. While proficiency group 4 favors the overt form, proficiency group
6 neither favors nor disfavors overt subjects.
Regarding PLACE OF RESIDENCY, speakers from most of the central villages exhibit no preference for either form, with values hovering around .50 (i.e, neither favoring nor disfavoring values). Residents in
Maó, where more contact with Spanish takes place, favor overt subjects. Ferreries, on the opposite end of the spectrum represented here, disfavors overt subjects and it is the west-most village represented in this study. People from Maó are actually regarded as language mixers, who speak ‘Maó Spanish’, a very
‘catalanized’ Spanish. These results are consistent with the idea that Maó Spanish is indeed different. In fact, dialectal variation has been reported for Catalan regarding the vowel systems from east to west
(Mascaró i Pons 1987) so it would not be surprising to find variation in the morpho-syntax as well.
The constraint emphasis in the variable DISCOURSE FUNCTION categorically selects overt subjects. As in the previous two groups, topic shift favors overt subjects while topic continuation disfavors them.
148 As in the previous groups, DISTANCE FROM REFERENT exhibits gradience in the constraints. The further the referent is, the higher the probability is of producing an overt subjects. New referents, too, favor the overt forms. The shift to a preference for overt subjects takes place at a distance of about 2 to 4 intervening subjects.
Also as in the previous groups, the variable PERSON manifests a preference for overt subjects in first and third person singular. However, as argued above, because first and second person do not alternate with lexical subjects, the data are not reliable when pronominal and lexical subjects are collapsed into a single category as they are here.
The variable GENDER, as in the distribution of overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in the Spanish L1 bilinguals (§4.3.3), indicates that males produce more overt subjects than females. As discusses above, why this is so remains unclear.
The variable CO-REFERENCE exhibits the same behavior in all groups, co-referent contexts favor the null form while non-co-referent context favor the overt form, although the value is close to .50.
The variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE is in agreement with previous research that psychological and speech verbs favor overt subjects. The rest of the verb types are close to .50, indicating no clear preference.
The variable USE OF L1 is low ranked, however, it indicates that those that use their L1 less, although still every day, favor overt subjects. If they speak their L1 less it is due to the fact that they are using their
L2 regularly, an epiphenomenon of language contact.
5.2. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects
The alternation between overt pronominal subjects and null subjects, to the exclusion of overt lexical subjects, is explored in this section. The results, presented in Table 5.16, were obtained using overt pronominal subject as the application value.
149 Table 5.16: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan L1 Corrected Mean .49 Log likelihood -822.846 Significance .019 Total N 2925 Factor weight % N SPEAKING PROFICIENCY 4 0.84 16.1 964 5 0.39 15.5 238 6 0.43 10.6 1478 7 0.01 2.9 245 Range 82 PLACE OF RESIDENCY Ferreries 0.26 6.9 519 Mercadal 0.50 14.5 1184 Fornells 0.40 14.1 249 Maó 0.87 12.8 494 Alaior 0.34 10.4 479 Range 61 ANIMACY Animate 0.65 14.4 2464 Inanimate 0.04 0.2 461 Range 61 USE OF L2 1 0.21 14.2 240 2 0.56 13.1 1256 3 0.77 10.3 477 4 0.41 11.4 473 5 0.31 11.5 479 Range 56 DISTANCE New 0.89 26.1 23 0 0.39 6.5 1861 1 0.62 16.6 415 2 to 4 0.71 23.5 396 5 to 10 0.76 27.2 147 Above 10 0.76 32.5 83 Range 50.4 PERSON 1SG 0.66 21.2 1333 2SG 0.35 13.6 22 3SG 0.47 4.1 752 1PL 0.23 4.2 409 2PL 0 3 3PL 0.33 5.4 409 Range 42.9
150 GENDER Male 0.69 9.4 1472 Female 0.30 15 1453 Range 39 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.50 12.1 2904 Topic shift 0.88 28.6 21 Emphasis 100 16 Range 39 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.47 15.3 1454 Copulative 0.64 5.3 601 Unergative 0.50 12.4 734 Unaccusative 0.27 8.1 136 Range 37 AGE 1 0.41 9.1 998 2 0.42 15.9 954 3 0.67 11.6 973 Range 26 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.39 5.8 675 Psychological 0.62 27.1 284 Speech 0.64 27.7 112 Movement 0.58 13.6 273 Other 0.50 10.9 1581 Range 25 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.39 7.8 1419 No 0.61 16.3 1506 Range 22 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.53 7 951 Same referent, different 0.63 9.2 468 TAM Different referent 0.44 16.3 1506 Range 19 LISTENING PROFICIENCY 6 0.63 11.1 476 7 0.47 12.4 2449 Range 16 USE OF L1 1 0.42 12.8 1457 2 0.58 11.6 1468 Range 15 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 12.3 2810 Embedded 0.40 8.7 115
151 Range 11 TAM Same 0.53 11.5 1737 Different 0.46 13.1 1188 Range 6 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.55 14.3 530 Unambiguous 0.49 11.7 2395 Range 6 FOCUS Broad 12 2918 Narrow 100 6 Contrastive 100 1 Range 0
5.2.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. null
subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers
The results from the variable rule analysis indicate that DISTANCE, PERSON, SEMANTIC AND SYNTACTIC
VERB TYPE, ANIMACY, GENDER, PLACE OF RESIDENCY, and SPEAKING PROFICIENCY account for this alternation. The variable FOCUS had to be omitted because the constraints narrow and contrastive selected overt pronominal subjects in every occasion.
5.2.2. Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual
speakers
The external variables SPEAKING PROFICIENCY and PLACE OF RESIDENCE are again the highest ranked variables, followed by ANIMACY, DISTANCE, PERSON, and GENDER. The role of ANIMACY in the contrast between null and overt pronominal subjects (excluding overt lexical subjects) is due to the fact that inanimates do not exhibit an overt pronominal form.
5.2.3. Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1
bilingual speakers
The variable SPEAKING PROFICIENCY displays a different behavior in comparison to the previous table only in the constraint Proficiency level 5, which was a favoring constraint and is now a disfavoring one.
152 The constraints within PLACE OF RESIDENCY exhibit the same behavior reported when lexical subjects were also included, in §4.1.3 (overt pronominal and lexical subjects vs. null subjects).
The variable ANIMACY, not significant when lexical subjects are included, is explained by the unavailability of overt pronominal forms for inanimates.
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT again presents an increase in the probability of an overt form as distance increases. New topics favor overt pronominal forms. Unlike when the lexical forms are included in the analysis, the overt pronominal subjects are favored with distances as low as one intervening subject.
The variable PERSON shows that only the first person singular favors overt pronominal subjects. This result is consistent with previous literature.
Males in the variable GENDER favor the overt pronominal form while females disfavor it, as in other comparisons reported above.
As in the Spanish L1 group, within the variable SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, unaccusative predicates disfavor overt pronominal subjects while copulative predicates favor them and the rest of verb types neither favor nor disfavor them.
The constraints psychological and speech verbs in the variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE favor overt pronominal subjects, while copulative verbs disfavor them and the rest neither favor nor disfavor them.
5.3. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects
The results from the distribution between overt lexical subjects and null subjects is discussed in this section. The results in Table 5.17 were obtained with the application value overt lexical subjects.
153 Table 5.17: Results: Overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt lexical subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan L1 Corrected Mean .42 Log likelihood -573.389 Significance .050 Total N 3252 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.04 0.1 1051 2SG 0.04 5 20 3SG 0.91 41.6 1234 1PL 0.46 6.2 418 2PL 0 3 3PL 0.75 26.8 529 Range 87 DISTANCE New 0.99 96.7 509 0 0.26 5.7 1845 1 0.26 7 372 2 to 4 0.40 9.6 335 5 to 10 0.43 8.5 117 Above 10 0.77 24.3 74 Range 73 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.36 6.9 2744 Topic shift 0.96 97 508 Emphasis 100 4 Range 59 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.62 33.3 954 Psychological 0.64 5.5 219 Speech 0.57 15.6 96 Movement 0.27 21.3 300 Other 0.45 16.3 1683 Range 37 SPEAKING PROFICIENCY 4 0.58 22 1037 5 0.47 23 261 6 0.50 20.5 1661 7 0.25 18.8 293 Range 34 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.49 12.7 1411 Copulative 0.41 33.4 854 Unergative 0.55 16.3 768 Unaccusative 0.72 42.9 219
154 Range 31 USE OF L2 1 0.34 19.8 257 2 0.54 19.4 1354 3 0.61 22.2 550 4 0.40 23.4 547 5 0.48 22.1 544 Range 27 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.35 2.5 1342 No 0.61 34 1910 Range 26 AGE 1 0.42 19.9 1133 2 0.46 23.3 1046 3 0.61 19.9 1073 Range 19 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.46 2.3 905 Same referent, different 0.64 2.7 437 TAM Different referent 0.49 34 1910 Range 18
PLACE OF RESIDENCY Ferreries 0.43 18 589 Mercadal 0.52 23.6 1325 Fornells 0.47 19.2 265 Maó 0.56 18.8 531 Alaior 0.49 20.8 542 Range 12 USE OF L1 1 0.46 20.6 1601 2 0.54 21.4 1651 Range 9 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 20.9 3115 Embedded 0.41 23.4 137 Range 9 TAM Same 0.53 20.7 1939 Different 0.45 21.4 1313 Range 8 GENDER Male 0.52 20.8 1684 Female 0.48 21.2 1568 Range 5 LISTENING PROFICIENCY 6 0.54 22.4 545
155 7 0.49 20.7 2707 Range 5 ANIMACY Animate 0.50 14.1 2455 Inanimate 0.51 42.3 797 Range 2 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.51 27.8 629 Unambiguous 0.50 19.4 2623 Range 2 FOCUS Broad 20.1 3215 Narrow 100 36 Contrastive 100 1 Range 0
5.3.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in
Catalan L1 bilingual speakers
The alternation of overt lexical subjects and null subjects is conditioned by several factors. The variables selected as significant were PERSON, DISTANCE, CO-REFERENCE, and TAM CONTINUITY. Previous research indicates that the variable CONNECT, which combines CO-REFERENCE with TAM CONTINUITY, predicts the use of an overt subject better than CO-REFERENCE or TAM CONTINUITY alone (Bayley & Pease-
Álvarez 1996, 1997, Otheguy et al. 2007). In our data, the reverse is true, while CO-REFERENCe and TAM
CONTINUITY are significant, their combination (i.e. CONNECT) is not. The fact that CONNECT, which combines these last two variables, was not selected as significant while these two were indicates that the combination of both does not account for this set of data better than each variable independently. It is worth pointing out, too, that no external variables were selected as significant. In the alternation between null and overt subjects (including both types), in §5.1, and the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects, in §5.2, several external variables were significant (GENDER, PLACE OF RESIDENCY, SPEAKING
PROFICIENCY, and USE OF L1). The significance reported in §5.1 could be due to the alternation between null and pronominal subjects or lexical subjects. Because it is significant in the alternation between null and pronominal subjects (§5.2) but not in the alternation between lexical and null subjects (this section), we can conclude that external factors play a role in the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects.
156 5.3.2. Variable ranking in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual
speakers
The two highest ranked variables are PERSON and DISTANCE, which rank very high in both bilingual groups, the highest of the linguistic internal factors.
5.3.3. Constraint ranking in overt lexical subjects vs. null subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual
speakers
The variable PERSON in the Catalan L1 bilingual Spanish data displays a behavior similar to that of monolingual Spanish speakers, where first and second person singular disfavor overt lexical subjects, while the third person favors them. Interestingly, and in contrast with Spanish L1 speakers, first person plural is close to .50 (i.e., no favoring or disfavoring overt lexical subjects).
The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT presents the same results as in all the other groups and comparisons. The favoring limit, however, is set at above 10 clauses. A trend observed across the groups is that distance needs to be higher for favoring overt lexical subjects than for favoring overt pronominal subjects over null subjects.
The variable CO-REFERENCE presents a familiar ranking; non-co-referential contexts favor overt lexical subjects while co-referential contexts disfavor them.
The variable TAM CONTINUITY exhibits counterintuitive results, where same TAM favors overt lexical subjects more than different TAM. While this explains why CONNECT was not selected as significant, it remains a question why these results obtain. In any case, this variable is low ranked, and both values are near .50.
5.4. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects
This section presents the results for the alternation overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects in Table 5.18.
The application value for these results was overt pronominal subjects.
157 Table 5.18: Results: Overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals. Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. an overt lexical subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan L1 Corrected Mean .14 Log likelihood -118.203 Significance .022 Total N 1059 Factor weight % N PERSON 1SG 0.99 99.7 297 2SG 0.97 75 4 3SG 0.10 5.9 547 1PL 0.49 39.5 43 2PL 0 0 3PL 0.17 14.3 168 Range 89 DISTANCE New 0.09 1.2 500 0 0.91 55.7 237 1 0.88 72 100 2 to 4 0.88 74.8 127 5 to 10 0.91 80 50 Above 10 0.66 60 45 Range 82 ANIMACY Animate 0.79 51.5 720 Inanimate 0.06 0.3 339 Range 73 DISCOURSE FUNCTION Topic 0.75 64.8 540 Topic shift 0.21 1.2 499 Emphasis 0.92 80 20 Range 71 SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE Transitive 0.43 56.2 413 Copulative 0.72 11.8 323 Unergative 0.54 41.7 218 Unaccusative 0.11 10.5 105 Range 61 FOCUS Broad 0.52 35.1 996 Narrow 0.13 14.3 42 Contrastive 0.69 76.2 21 Range 56 SEMANTIC VERB TYPE Copulative 0.34 12.4 363
158 Psychological 0.33 86.8 91 Speech 0.82 67.4 46 Movement 0.57 36.6 101 Other 0.61 39.3 458 Range 49 PLACE OF RESIDENCY Ferreries 0.66 26.4 144 Mercadal 0.48 35.9 488 Fornells 0.47 40.2 87 Maó 0.60 40.8 169 Alaior 0.34 32.2 171 Range 32 CO-REFERENCE Yes 0.71 78.6 154 No 0.46 27.7 905 Range 25 USE OF L2 1 0.49 41.9 93 2 0.51 39.5 435 3 0.47 29.1 172 4 0.63 29.7 182 5 0.37 32.2 177 Range 15 AGE 1 0.53 29.6 321 2 0.55 38.4 398 3 0.41 36.5 340 Range 14 AMBIGUITY Ambiguous 0.60 30.7 254 Unambiguous 0.47 36.5 805 Range 14 SPEAKING PROFICIENCY 4 0.45 41 393 5 0.43 38.1 97 6 0.57 32.9 507 7 0.42 11.3 62 Range 14 CONNECT Same referent, same TAM 0.48 78.1 96 Same referent, different 0.39 79.3 58 TAM Different referent 0.51 27.7 905 Range 12 USE OF L1 1 0.56 37.1 531 2 0.44 33.1 528 Range 12 GENDER Male 0.46 28.7 491
159 Female 0.53 40.7 568 Range 7 CLAUSE TYPE Main 0.50 35.4 1014 Embedded 0.56 28.9 45 Range 6 LISTENING PROFICIENCY 6 0.46 30.3 175 7 0.51 36.1 884 Range 5 TAM Same 0.49 34.3 616 Different 0.52 36.3 443 Range 3
5.4.1. Variables implicated in subject expression in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt
lexical subjects in Catalan L1 bilingual speakers
The distribution of overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects is regulated by a number of factors.
Statistically significant variables included PERSON, DISTANCE, ANIMACY, FOCUS, and SEMANTIC VERB
TYPE.
5.4.2. Variable ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Catalan L1
bilingual speakers
It is not surprising by this point that the highest ranked constraints are PERSON, DISTANCE, and
ANIMACY. ANIMACY, as stated above, is a restricting factor in the production of overt pronominal subjects, thus, all comparisons including overt pronominal subjects return ANIMACY as significant. The absence of external factors indicates that these are relevant for comparisons between null and overt pronominal subjects only.
5.4.3. Constraint ranking in overt pronominal subjects vs. overt lexical subjects in Catalan
L1 bilingual speakers
The variable PERSON behaves as explained in the monolingual data in §1.4.3 (overt pronominal vs. overt lexical subjects). First and second person singular favor pronominal subjects, third person favors lexical subjects, and first person plural favors neither.
160 The variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT also offers some insight into this distribution. While pronominal subjects are dispreferred in new topics, they are preferred to varying degrees at several distances. Crucially, at distances above 10 intervening subjects the application value is significantly reduced, i.e. the alternation with lexical subjects is more frequent.
The variable ANIMACY, as explained above, indicates that inanimates almost categorically disfavor overt pronominal subjects, while animates favor them. Why animates favor overt pronominal subjects over overt lexical subjects is unclear.
The variable FOCUS reveals that while in broad focus neither form is preferred, pronominal subjects are preferred in contrastive focus contexts and overt lexical subjects in narrow focus contexts.
The variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE indicates that speech, movement, and other types of verbs favor overt pronominal subjects over overt lexical subjects, while psychological and copulative do not. As explained above, copulative verbs, which lack semantic meaning, appear more frequently with lexical subjects, which are more informative. However, the preference for lexical subjects with psychological verbs is unexpected, since normally the preference for overt subjects with this type of verbs is tied to the preference for first person singular, which cannot be an overt lexical form.
5.5. Catalan L1 bilingual speakers: Summary
This section reveals patterns common across the participant groups, as in the variable CO-REFERENCE, while other variables seem to offer more disparities among the four groups of speakers. Interestingly, external variables play a role in the bilinguals’ patterns, suggesting contact-induced forms. We will return to this idea in Chapter 6, where the research questions presented in Chapter 4 are discussed in light of these results. In the Catalan L1 bilingual group, PERSON and DISTANCE rank very high in determining patterns of subject expression, as in every comparison in all the groups examined.
6. Contact effects: monolingual vs. bilingual speakers
As discussed in §3, Spanish and Catalan differ in the variables that are significant in subject expression, their ranking, and their constraint ranking. These differences are parallel to differences reported across Spanish dialects. To test for contact effects in the bilingual Spanish data, we first consider overall
161 rates, to determine whether language contact results in an increase in the overall rate of overt subjects.
Then, more subtle contact effects are tested with regard to variables and constraints implicated in subject expression. Lastly, Spanish L1 bilinguals are compared with Catalan L1 bilinguals to elucidate the presence of a bilingual continuum.
The overall percentages of null, overt pronominal, and overt lexical subjects for the four groups of data
(monolingual Spanish, Spanish L1 bilingual Spanish, Catalan L1 bilingual Spanish and Catalan L1 bilingual Catalan) were submitted to statistical analysis using SPSS v. 17. A repeated-measures ANOVA was conducted with a 3 (SUBJECT FORM: null, overt pronominal and overt lexical subjects) x 4 (DATA
GROUP: monolingual Spanish, Spanish L1 bilingual Spanish, Catalan L1 bilingual Spanish and Catalan L1 bilingual Catalan) factorial design. The results indicated a significant main effect for SUBJECT FORM
(F(2,88) = 1285.399, p < .01). Bonferroni posthoc tests revealed that all participants produced more null than overt subjects and more overt lexical than overt pronominal subjects (all p < .01). However, there was no main effect for DATA GROUP (F(3,44) = .256, p > .05). Thus, there were no significant differences in the overall rate of overt subjects between Spanish and Catalan or bilingual and monolingual Spanish (Spanish monolingual data: 29.3%, Catalan data: 28%, Spanish L1 bilingual data: 29.9% , and Catalan L1 bilingual data: 29.2%).
To examine possible differences in patterns, the bilingual and monolingual Spanish data were submitted to statistical analysis using Goldvarb X, including the variable TYPE OF SPEAKER, bilingual or monolingual. The multivariate regressional analysis indicates that several factors are significant, among them TYPE OF SPEAKER. As shown in Table 5.19, subject distribution is significantly different between monolingual and bilingual speakers, a difference that would have gone unnoticed in the percentage.
162 Table 5.19: Bilingual vs. monolingual Spanish subject expression Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt (lexical and pronominal) subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Bilingual vs. monolingual Spanish Corrected Mean .26 Log likelihood -3562.036 Significance .029 Total N 10370 Factor weight % N SPEAKERS Bilingual 0.53 29.5 6931 Monolingual 0.45 29.3 3439 Range 8
A close examination will reveal what differences exist between monolingual and bilingual subject expression patterns. In the following section, the discussion is focused on the differences in subject patterns across the groups, instantiated in the factor weight provided above. Subsequently, the differences encountered between bilingual and monolingual speakers in the constraint ranking of null and overt subjects is discussed in §6.2.
6.1. Group differences in subject expression: Bilingual vs. monolingual speech
The four data groups were compared regarding subject expression. Tables 5.20-5.23 show that patterns of subject expression in the monolingual and bilingual varieties differ; while monolingual varieties disfavor overt subjects, bilingual varieties favor them. We examine each of the alternations at a time.
In spite of the similarity in the overall rates of overt subjects across the four groups of data, the alternation between null and overt subjects displays significant differences across the groups. A multivariate regressional analysis including all the data and coding the data for group indicates that this distribution is constrained by the variables PERSON, ANIMACY, VERB FORM AMBIGUITY, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE,
DISCOURSE FUNCTION, DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, FOCUS, TAM, AGE, CONNECT and, crucially, DATA
GROUP, further discussed in §6.2.
163 Table 5.20: Overt subject expression across the groups Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt (lexical and pronominal) subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background All groups Corrected Mean .26 Log likelihood -4790.294 Significance .009 Total N 13970 Factor weight % N GROUP Monolingual Spanish 0.44 29.3 3439 Spanish L1 bilinguals 0.54 29.9 3300 Catalan L1 bilinguals 0.51 29.2 3631 Catalan data 0.51 28 3600 Range 10
The alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects is constrained by a number of factors, crucially, among them is DATA GROUP.21 Thus, significant differences in patterning hold between the
Catalan data, and the monolingual and bilingual Spanish data, as shown in Table 5.21 and further discussed in the following section.
Table 5.21: Overt pronominal subject expression across the groups Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background All groups Corrected Mean .56 Log likelihood -3562.036 Significance .045 Total N 11257 Factor weight % N GROUP Monolingual Spanish 0.46 10.6 2718 Spanish L1 bilinguals 0.51 12.8 2654 Catalan L1 bilinguals 0.52 12.6 2944 Catalan data 0.51 11.9 2941 Range 6
21 The complete list of significant variables for this run includes PERSON, ANIMACY, VERB FORM AMBIGUITY, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, DISCOURSE FUNCTION, DISTANCE, FOCUS, AGE, GENDER, CONNECT and DATA GROUP.
164 Finally, as shown in Table 5.22, the distribution of null and overt lexical subjects is also regulated by
DATA GROUP, among other variables (PERSON, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE, DISCOURSE FUNCTION, DISTANCE,
FOCUS, AGE, GENDER, CONNECT). The differences in patterning are discussed in the following section.
Table 5.22: Overt lexical subject expression across the groups Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt lexical subject vs. a null subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background All groups Corrected Mean .53 Log likelihood -1985.859 Significance .011 Total N 12622 Factor weight % N GROUP Monolingual Spanish 0.43 22.9 3152 Spanish L1 bilinguals 0.58 21.8 2960 Catalan L1 bilinguals 0.49 21.1 3259 Catalan data 0.51 20.3 3251 Range 15
The distribution of lexical and pronominal overt subjects is constrained by the variables PERSON,
ANIMACY, TOPIC CONTINUITY, CO-REFERENCE, DISTANCE, FOCUS, and DATA GROUP. The differences in patterning across the groups indicate that while monolingual Spanish and Spanish L1 bilinguals disfavor overt pronominal subjects, Catalan L1 bilinguals and Catalan data favor them. Recall, however, that as shown in the ANOVA, the overall rates of overt subjects are not significantly different across the groups and that all groups favor null over overt subjects and overt lexical over overt pronominal subjects.
Table 5.23: The distribution of overt pronominal and lexical subjects across the groups Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an overt pronominal subject vs. an overt lexical subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background All groups Corrected Mean .88 Log likelihood -572.097 Significance .029 Total N 4061 Factor weight % N GROUP Monolingual Spanish 0.43 28.5 1008 Spanish L1 bilinguals 0.44 34.5 986 Catalan L1 bilinguals 0.57 35.1 1059 Catalan data 0.56 34.6 1008 Range 0
165 Indication of differences in patterning is found in the significance of the variable DATA GROUP. In the next section, we examine differences in patterns, instantiated in differences in variables and, especially, constraints. To make these comparisons, we refer back to the tables from the individual runs per data group offered in §1, §2, §4 and §5.
6.2. Variables and constraints: Evidence of contact effects and a bilingual continuum
In the preceding section, an analysis of all the data was run coded by DATA GROUP (i.e. monolingual
Spanish, Spanish L1 bilingual Spanish, Catalan L1 bilingual Spanish and Catalan data), indicating that
DATA GROUP is a significant factor in subject expression. Consequently, there are significant differences between Catalan, monolingual Spanish and bilingual Spanish data sets. However, it remains unclear whether all groups are significantly different from each other. Posterior pairwise comparisons were run to determine which groups are significantly different from each other. These pairwise comparisons show that
Spanish and Catalan differ significantly from each other (Table 5.9, §3 above). The monolingual Spanish group differs from both bilingual groups (Tables 5.24 and 5.25). The two bilingual groups do not differ from each other (Table 5.26). The Spanish of the Spanish L1 bilinguals differs from the Catalan data (Table
5.27). Finally, the Catalan L1 bilingual Spanish data do not differ from the Catalan data (Table 5.28).
Table 5.24 Monolingual Spanish vs. Spanish L1 bilinguals Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing an null pronominal subject vs. an overt (pronominal or lexical) subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Spanish monolingual vs. Spanish L1 bilinguals Corrected Mean .26 Log likelihood -2354.689 Significance .030 Total N 6739 Factor weight % N GROUP Monolingual Spanish 0.45 29.3 3439 Spanish L1 bilinguals 0.55 29.9 3300 Range 10.0
166 Table 5.25 Monolingual Spanish vs. Catalan L1 bilinguals Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing a null pronominal subject vs. an overt (pronominal or lexical) subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Spanish monolingual vs. Catalan L1 bilinguals Corrected Mean .25 Log likelihood -2392.133 Significance .0 Total N 7070 Factor weight % N GROUP Monolingual Spanish 0.47 29.3 3439 Catalan L1 bilinguals 0.53 29.2 3631 Range 0
Table 5.26 Spanish L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan L1 bilinguals Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing a null pronominal subject vs. an overt (pronominal or lexical) subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Spanish L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan L1 bilinguals Corrected Mean .28 Log likelihood -2539.895 Significance .044 Total N 6886 Factor weight % N GROUP Spanish L1 bilinguals 0.52 29.6 3278 Catalan L1 bilinguals 0.49 28.8 3608 Range 0
Table 5.27 Spanish L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan data Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing a null pronominal subject vs. an overt (pronominal or lexical) subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Spanish L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan data Corrected Mean .29 Log likelihood -2433.459 Significance .046 Total N 6871 Factor weight % N GROUP Spanish L1 bilinguals 0.52 29.5 3284 Catalan data 0.48 27.7 3587 Range 4
167 Table 5.28 Catalan L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan data Multivariate regressional analyses of the contribution of internal and external factors to the probability of producing a null pronominal subject vs. an overt (pronominal or lexical) subject; factor groups selected as significant in gray background Catalan L1 bilinguals vs. Catalan data Corrected Mean .27 Log likelihood -2598.49 Significance .007 Total N 7039 Factor weight % N GROUP Catalan L1 bilinguals 0.50 29.2 3631 Catalan data 0.50 28 3600 Range 0
6.2.1.Variables implicated in subject expression and their ranking
As gathered from the preceding discussion, although the variables implicated across groups are not the same nor is their ranking, some variables play a role in the distribution of null vs. overt pronominal and lexical subjects across the groups. Table 5.29 lists the significant variables for each group in each of the subject type pairings in the order they are ranked. External factors are excluded of the following discussion because they are better understood in considering each of the groups than in comparisons across the groups.
168 Table 5.29: Comparison of significant variables and their rankings across groups Contrasts Monolingual data Spanish L1 Catalan L1 Catalan data bilinguals bilinguals
Null vs. Overt TOPIC CONTINUITY DISTANCE SPEAKING PERSON FOCUS PERSON PROFICIENCY DISTANCE DISTANCE SYNTACTIC VERB PLACE OF FOCUS RESIDENCY PERSON TYPE TOPIC CONTINUITY TOPIC CONTINUITY CO-REFERENCE CONNECT CONNECT DISTANCE SEMANTIC VERB LISTENING SEMANTIC VERB TYPE PROFICIENCY PERSON TYPE AGE SPEAKING GENDER ANIMACY PROFICIENCY AMBIGUITY CO-REFERENCE ANIMACY SEMANTIC VERB TYPE USE OF L1
Null vs. Pronominal ANIMACY PERSON SPEAKING PERSON TOPIC CONTINUITY DISTANCE PROFICIENCY ANIMACY FOCUS LISTENING PLACE OF DISTANCE RESIDENCY PERSON PROFICIENCY FOCUS ANIMACY CO-REFERENCE SYNTACTIC VERB CONNECT TYPE DISTANCE DISTANCE SYNTACTIC VERB PERSON AMBIGUITY TYPE GENDER GENDER AGE SYNTACTIC VERB AMBIGUITY TYPE GENDER SEMANTIC VERB TYPE
Null vs. Lexical PERSON PERSON PERSON PERSON TOPIC CONTINUITY DISTANCE DISTANCE DISTANCE FOCUS CO-REFERENCE CO-REFERENCE FOCUS DISTANCE LISTENING TAM CO-REFERENCE SEMANTIC VERB PROFICIENCY AGE TYPE SYNTACTIC VERB AMBIGUITY CO-REFERENCE TYPE AGE GENDER
Pronominal vs. PERSON DISTANCE PERSON DISTANCE Lexical TOPIC CONTINUITY PERSON DISTANCE PERSON ANIMACY LISTENING ANIMACY ANIMACY AGE PROFICIENCY FOCUS FOCUS CO-REFERENCE FOCUS SEMANTIC VERB CO-REFERENCE TYPE SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE GENDER
Regarding the alternation between null and overt pronominal and lexical subjects, DISTANCE and
PERSON are the only variables that are significant for all the groups. There are no clear discernible patterns.
Spanish L1 bilinguals are the only speakers for whom TOPIC and SEMANTIC VERB TYPE are not significant and SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE is significant. For the Catalan L1 bilinguals, like for the Spanish monolinguals,
CO-REFERENCE is significant. In the Catalan data, like in the monolingual Spanish data, FOCUS is
169 significant and, like in the Spanish L1 bilingual data, CONNECT and ANIMACY are significant. AMBIGUITY is only significant for the monolingual group.
The distribution of null and overt pronominal subjects is regulated by PERSON and DISTANCE in all the groups, and ANIMACY in all the groups but the Spanish L1 bilingual group. TOPIC and CO-REFERENCE are only significant in the monolingual group. FOCUS and AMBIGUITY are significant in the monolingual and
Catalan data only. SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE is significant in all the groups except the monolinguals.
SEMANTIC VERB TYPE is only significant in the Catalan L1 group and CONNECT in the Catalan data.
In the alternation between overt lexical and null subjects, all the groups return the variables PERSON,
DISTANCE, and CO-REFERENCE as significant. FOCUS is again significant in the monolingual and Catalan data. The rest of the variables are only significant in one group: DISCOURSE FUNCTION and SEMANTIC VERB
TYPE in the monolingual Spanish group, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE in the Spanish L1 bilingual group, TAM in the Catalan L1 bilingual group and AMBIGUITY in the Catalan data group.
The final alternation, that between the two overt forms (pronominal vs. lexical), only exhibits a common factor across the groups, PERSON. ANIMACY is significant for all except the Spanish L1 bilinguals and DISTANCE and FOCUS for all but the monolinguals. CO-REFERENCE is significant for the monolinguals and the Spanish L1 bilinguals. TOPIC is only significant for the monolinguals, SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE for the Spanish L1 bilinguals and SEMANTIC VERB TYPE for the Catalan L1 speakers.
Although not all the variables significant in one group are significant in the others, the differences across the groups are very small. Crucially, a pattern where Catalan L1 bilingual data are more similar to the Catalan data and the Spanish L1 bilingual data to the monolingual speaker data does not emerge. The differences reported so far can be due to dialectal variation. The next section examines constraint ranking.
Differences in constraint ranking are indicative of more profound differences among the varieties studied.
6.2.2. Constraint ranking
As discussed in §3 and depicted in Table 5.10, Spanish and Catalan exhibit some contrasts in the patterns observed in constraint ranking. Table 5.30 presents comparisons of constraint rankings across
170 groups for the constraints where differences were found. The ensuing discussion discusses each of the variables examined.
Table 5.30: Comparison of patterns (as instantiated in constraints) across groups.
Spanish Spanish L1 Catalan L1 Catalan
Non-co-referential Lexical Pronominal Pronominal Pronominal contexts favor
Distance favoring 5+ 5+ 2+ 10+ overt subjects
2 person singular Pronominal Null or pronominal Null Null favors
Speech verb Null Not significant Pronominal Pronominal
Psychological verbs No pronominal Not significant Lexical Pronominal
Movement verbs Lexical Not significant No preference No preference
The variable TOPIC CONTINUITY presents a uniform pattern across the board, where topic continuity favors null subjects, topic shift favors overt lexical subjects, and emphasis favors overt pronominal subjects. This trend, despite being significant in all alternations only for the monolinguals, is shared across the groups.
The variable FOCUS displays a similar pattern. In all groups broad focus displays no preference for subject form, narrow focus favors overt lexical subjects, and contrastive focus favors overt pronominal subjects. In the monolingual group, this variable is not significant for the lexical vs. pronominal overt subject distribution, however, contrastive focus seems to disfavor overt pronominal subjects.
171 The variable CO-REFERENCE in all groups favors null subjects when the subject is co-referential with the previous subject, and overt subjects when it is not. However, in the monolingual group, the overt subject preferred in non-co-referential contexts is the pronominal subject and in the other groups it is the lexical. Likewise, when the null form is not used in a co-referential context, the monolinguals prefer an overt lexical subject while the other groups prefer a pronominal one.
The variable DISTANCE reveals that, when a new topic is introduced, an overt lexical subject is favored, almost categorically in the case of the bilinguals. Although all the groups manifest an increase in the probability of an overt subject as distance increases, the limit at which overt subjects start to be favored varies from group to group. The Catalan L1 group favors overt subjects with 2 to 4 intervening subjects and above, the monolinguals and the Spanish L1 bilinguals with 5 intervening subjects and above, and the
Catalan data with 10 intervening subjects and above. In general, overt pronominal subjects are preferred at smaller distances than overt lexical subjects.
The variable CONNECT is only significant in the Spanish L1 bilingual data and the Catalan data. For both, the less connected the subject is to the preceding context, the more overt subjects are used.
The variable AMBIGUITY is only significant for the Spanish monolingual data and the Catalan data. For both, ambiguous verb forms favor overt pronominal forms. For the Catalan data, in fact, ambiguous forms disfavor overt lexical subjects.
The variable PERSON presents interesting contrasts. While third persons favor overt lexical subjects, first person singular favors overt pronominal subjects and first person plural favors null subjects across the groups, the second persons exhibit some divergence. Second person singular favors an overt pronominal subject in the monolinguals, neither favor nor disfavors in the Spanish L1 and disfavors in the Catalan L1 and the Catalan data. This person constitutes a distribution that could be explained by language contact, where a bilingual continuum is observed. Second person plural is less clear and the results are not so reliable, given the small number of tokens. The trend observed is that monolinguals display no favoring of null vs. overt pronominal subjects, bilingual Spanish favor the null form and the Catalan data favor the overt pronominal form.
172 The variable SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE shows that transitive and copulative verbs favor the null and the pronominal options equally, unergatives do not favor either form, although lexical subjects are preferred over pronominal subjects. Unaccusative predicates disfavor the overt pronominal form. This variable is only significant in all alternations for the Spanish L1 group. For the Catalan L1 group and the Catalan data, it is only significant in the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects. The disfavoring of pronominal subjects with unaccusatives is attested in these groups as well.
The variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE is not significant for the Spanish L1 group. Copulative verbs favor null subjects or lexical subjects. Other verbs have values near .50 (i.e., no clear preference). The rest of the verbs present varying preferences across the groups. Psychological verbs disfavor overt pronominal subjects in monolingual speech, favor overt lexical subjects in the Catalan L1 group and overt pronominal subjects in the Catalan data. Speech verbs favor null subjects in monolingual Spanish and overt pronominal subjects in Catalan L1 and the Catalan data. Movement verbs favor overt NPs in the monolingual data. In the other two groups, however, the weight of this type of verb hovers around .50.
The variable TAM is only returned as significant in the alternation between null and overt lexical subjects in the Catalan L1 group. Unexpectedly, same tense slightly favors overt lexical subjects while different tense slightly disfavors null subjects. In any case the weights for both are near .50.
For all groups, the variable ANIMACY is tied to the alternation between null and pronominal subjects. In the alternation between null and overt lexical subjects, this variable is not significant with weights indicating that neither animates nor inanimates favor null or overt lexical subjects. Inanimates, however, almost categorically disfavor overt pronominal subjects.
The variable CLAUSE TYPE was not found to be significant in any of the groups.
This section has explained the distribution between null and overt subjects in Spanish and Catalan.
Some differences are found across the groups, namely the constraint rankings of SEMANTIC VERB TYPE,
PERSON, DISTANCE, and CO-REFERENCE. While some of these differences point to a bilingual continuum, with respect to the variable PERSON, in particular, it is difficult to stipulate in other cases. A bilingual
173 continuum is attested, however, in the pairwise comparisons discussed at the beginning of §6.2. The following section offers a succinct summary of the results reported here.
7. Summary
This chapter offers results relative to patterns of distribution of null vs. two types of overt subjects
(lexical and pronominal) in two sister languages, Spanish and Catalan, and in the naturalistic speech samples collected from monolingual and bilingual speakers. While general trends are observed across the groups, for instance, inanimate referents disfavor overt pronominal subjects, some differences are observed.
These differences indicate that contact effects prevail in bilingual Spanish. The next chapter discusses these results in light of the research questions presented in Chapter 4.
174 Chapter 6
Discussion:
Internal and External Factors in Subject Expression in Minorcan
Spanish
The results from the previous chapter can elucidate the broad questions posed in this project: Is
Minorcan bilingual Spanish different from Valladolid monolingual Spanish with respect to rates and patterns of subject expression? If so, what factors are implicated in the emergence of contact-induced patterns of subject expression in Minorcan Spanish? And how are such patterns to be interpreted?, i.e. do they reflect convergence or simplification? As explained in Chapter 4, embedded within this broad inquiry are a number of research questions regarding the language-internal and language-external factors that may be involved in subject expression in monolingual and bilingual speech patterns. This chapter returns to respond to each of the research questions outlined in Chapter 4, thereby synthesizing and interpreting the results presented in the previous chapter, and ends with answers to the larger questions that have guided the overall project.
1. Language-internal factors: Variation in subject expression
Several research questions probed the role of language-internal factors in subject expression; these questions are repeated here for convenience and are addressed in turn below:
(1) a. Research Question 1: What language-internal variables are implicated in subject expression in
Catalan and in monolingual and bilingual Spanish? What differences emerge?
b. Research Question 2: What are the variable hierarchies in Catalan and monolingual and
bilingual Spanish? What differences emerge?
c. Research Question 3: What are the constraint hierarchies in Catalan and monolingual and
bilingual Spanish? What differences emerge? 1.1. Variables implicated in subject expression
Following Otheguy et al. (2007) it was hypothesized that differences would be attested in the variables
(factor groups) that are implicated in different language varieties. This is confirmed in the analysis. In fact, there is no clearly identifiable pattern in the variation manifested throughout the Catalan, Spanish, and bilingual corpora, surpassing the variability attested in Otheguy et al.’s analysis of varieties of New York
Spanish. Crucially, the factor groups significant in one variety may not be returned as significant in another variety. However, PERSON and DISTANCE were important variables across the varieties and across monolingual and bilingual speakers. That DISTANCE should prove significant is surprising given that it not generally examined in studies of subject expression, unless it is used to measure priming. The other variables implicated in subject expression, although not in all distributions and not in all the groups of speakers, are TOPIC CONTINUITY, FOCUS, CO-REFERENCE, CONNECT, SEMANTIC and SYNTACTIC VERB TYPE,
VERB FORM AMBIGUITY, ANIMACY, and TAM CONTINUITY.
1.2. Variable hierarchies implicated in subject expression
Also following Otheguy et al. (2007), it was hypothesized that differences would be attested in the variable hierarchies across language varieties. This is confirmed in the analysis. Each group displays different hierarchies, indicating that the most determining variables in one data group may not be so determining in another group. Different rankings also emerge across alternations (null vs. overt, null vs. overt pronominal, null vs. overt lexical, and overt pronominal vs. overt lexical subjects) in each group.
Contrary to the findings of Otheguy et al. (2007), variable hierarchies do not present a discernible paradigm to compare the groups. As Taglimonte (2006) explains, variable hierarchies are highly dependent on the particular data set and do not permit comparisons across groups. More reliable comparisons, however, can be obtained examining constraints and their direction (favoring vs. non-favoring).
1.3. Constraint hierarchies in subject expression
As per Otheguy et al. (2007), too, it was hypothesized that differences would be attested in the constraint hierarchies that are implicated in subject expression in different language varieties. This is confirmed in the analysis. Variation is found for CO-REFERENCE, where Spanish monolinguals favor overt
176 lexical subjects over pronouns in co-referential contexts in the alternation of overt pronominal vs. lexical subjects (i.e. when the null option is omitted from the analysis) and the rest of the groups favor overt pronominal subjects. Variation is also attested in the factor DISTANCE, in particular, the point at which a distance favors overt subjects varies across the groups. While the factor VERB FORM AMBIGUITY favors overt pronominal subjects in ambiguous contexts, in the Catalan data, overt lexical subjects are disfavored in this condition. The constraint second person singular in the variable PERSON favors overt pronominal subjects in the monolingual data, neither favors nor disfavors them in Spanish L1 data, and disfavors the form in the Catalan L1 bilingual and the Catalan data. The variable SEMANTIC VERB FORM also displays contrasts across the groups. Psychological verbs disfavor overt pronominal subjects in monolingual speech, favor overt lexical subjects in the Catalan L1 group, and favor overt pronominal subjects in the Catalan data. Speech verbs favor null subjects in monolingual Spanish and overt pronominal subjects in the Catalan
L1 and the Catalan data. Movement verbs favor overt NPs in the monolingual data, while the weight for the other two groups is close to .50 (i.e. no clear favoring or disfavoring).
Some generalizations, however, held across groups. With respect to the factors TOPIC CONTINUITY and
FOCUS, the findings reveal that no form is favored in topic continuation and broad focus contexts, but overt lexical topics are favored in topic shift and narrow focus, and overt pronominal subjects are favored in emphasis and contrastive focus contexts. The factor group DISTANCE FROM REFERENT reveals that new topics favor overt lexical subjects, small distances favor null forms, intermediate distances favor overt pronominal subjects, and larger distances favor overt lexical subjects, as if they were new topics. Recall, however, that the specific number of intervening subjects at which the overt form is favored varies across groups. The variable CONNECT favors overt subjects when the referent is less connected, i.e. non-co- referential, than when it is more connected, i.e. co-referential and same TAM as previous clause. The factor
VERB FORM AMBIGUITY favors overt subjects. The variable PERSON favors overt pronominal forms in the first and second person and lexical forms in the third person. The variable SYNTACTIC VERB FORM shows that while unergative and unaccusative predicates favor overt lexical subjects, transitive and copulative verbs equally favor the null and pronominal form. SEMANTIC VERB FORMS exhibits significant variation across the groups. The only constant behavior is that of copulative verbs, which favor null subjects or
177 lexical subjects. The variable ANIMACY indicates that inanimates almost categorically disfavor overt pronominal subjects across the groups, as a reflection of the lack of a pronoun for inanimates.
In sum, the three research questions in (1) are confirmed: variation in subject expression is present in the language-internal variables selected as significant, their ranking, and the ranking of their constraints.
The following section discusses the effect of language-external factors in variation in subject expression.
2. Language-external factors: Variation in subject expression
Several research questions probed the role of language-external factors in subject expression; these questions are repeated immediately below and the response to each is presented in turn.
(2) a. Research Question 4: Can place of birth determine the presence of contact-induced Spanish
language forms among Spanish-Catalan bilinguals currently residing in Minorca?
b. Research Question 5: Are there observable differences in the presence of contact effects in
subject expression across age groups?
c. Research Question 6: Do bilingual native speakers of Catalan demonstrate more contact-
influenced Spanish language forms than native speakers of Spanish?
d. Research Question 7a: What is the role of proficiency in determining contact outcomes? Does
increased Spanish proficiency among native speakers of Catalan correlate with a more
impermeable Spanish grammar?
e. Research Question 7b: Does increased Catalan proficiency among native speakers of Spanish
correlate with greater permeability in Spanish?
f. Research Question 8: Does language usage determine contact outcomes? Does language
usage determine contact outcomes?
2.1. Place of birth
Since place of birth has been shown to correlate with knowledge and use of Catalan, we expected to find differences in the presence of contact-induced forms between those born in Minorca and those born elsewhere. This prediction is partly confirmed. Recall that all the Catalan L1 speakers were born in
178 Minorca, whereas the Spanish L1 speakers were born in both Minorca and various places on the mainland.
The variable place of birth was not returned as significant for the Spanish L1 bilinguals. Note, however, that there is a strong correlation between place of birth and first language: Those born in Minorca who are
Spanish L1 speakers are born to Spanish speaking parents born in mainland Spain. Since Spanish L1 bilinguals differ from Catalan L1 bilinguals, in that Catalan L1 bilingual Spanish data was not significantly different from the Catalan data with respect to subject expression, first language is a better indicator of contact outcomes than place of birth per se. Among the Catalan L1 bilinguals, place of birth (same as place of residence for all) was returned as significant, with those more in contact with Spanish, i.e., those residing in Maó, the capital, producing more overt subjects. In sum, place of birth correlates with first language and degree of contact with the other language. As such, differences are found between Catalan speakers in the capital and elsewhere in the island, and between some of the Minorca-born and mainland Spain-born participants.
2.2. Age
Recall that different age groups exhibit varying degrees of knowledge and use of Catalan and Spanish: the older group grew up with Spanish as a second language and used it rarely, while the middle age groups exhibited an increase in the knowledge and use of Spanish, in detriment of Catalan, and the younger group exhibited high proficiency in Catalan without diglossia. Therefore, subject expression was hypothesized to vary as a function of age, with those 65 and above predicted to display more non-target-like Spanish language forms. (Note that the effects of schooling in both languages can also be reflected in this variable.)
These predictions were not borne out. Specifically, age was not a significant factor in the subject expression behavior of Spanish L1 or Catalan L1 bilinguals. Thus, the differences in proficiencies found across generations is not reflected in patters of subject expression in Spanish. Some differences emerge, nonetheless, in the Spanish L1 group, where younger generations have a more active knowledge and literacy in Catalan.
2.3. Native language
Given that native speakers of Catalan use Catalan more often than native speakers of Spanish, more evidence of contact was expected in the Spanish language forms of the former group. Similarly, bilingual
179 native speakers of Spanish were not expected to perform similarly to Spanish monolinguals; some signs of contact are predicted, given their contact with Catalan and with speakers who model contact-induced patterns of subject expression. These hypotheses are confirmed. Although Catalan L1 and Spanish L1 bilinguals did not statistically differ from each other, Catalan L1 speakers are closer to the Catalan patterns in their Spanish than are the Spanish L1 speakers. In fact, the Spanish of Catalan speakers did not differ from their Catalan, which can be interpreted as the availability of a single converged grammar for both languages in that subject expression in Spanish converged toward their L1, Catalan. The Catalan L1 and
Spanish L1 bilingual data demonstrate greater rates of overt pronominal subjects in Spanish than do the
Spanish monolingual data and the Catalan data. Thus, native language is a determining factor only to a certain extent since the Spanish and the Catalan L1 bilinguals do not differ significantly from each other.
Importantly, contact-induced forms emerge in the L1, too, indicating the permeability of the L1.
2.4. Proficiency
More proficient Spanish speakers were predicted to show less evidence of non-target Spanish subject expression than less proficient speakers (hypothesis for Research Question 7a), but contact with bilingual speakers may be a better indicator of contact-induced patterns in their grammar than proficiency, i.e., proficiency in Catalan may boost the separation of the languages (hypothesis for Research Question 7b).
Both hypotheses are confirmed. Contact-induced forms correlate with proficiency. In particular, listening proficiency in the L2 was significant for the Spanish L1 bilinguals, who manifested three proficiency levels. The pattern, however, is unclear. In the alternation between null and overt pronominal subjects, the lowest proficiency level (proficiency 5) favors overt pronominal subjects. However, this pattern does not decrease linearly as proficiency increases: While the middle proficiency group disfavors overt pronominal subjects, the higher proficiency group shows no preference for either form. In the alternation between null and overt lexical subjects, the trend is the same (i.e., lower proficiency correlates with more contact- induced forms), but a linear decrease occurs; the highest proficiency group displays the lowest incidence of contact-induced forms, the lowest proficiency group exhibits the highest incidence and the intermediate proficiency group falls in between. And in the alternation between overt pronominal and overt lexical subjects the highest and the lowest proficiency groups use pronominal and lexical overt subjects
180 indifferently, but the middle proficiency group favors overt lexical subjects. It is possible, then, that the lack of linearity in the distribution of null vs. overt pronominal subjects is due to the preference for lexical subjects in the second group. If this is so, then, it appears to be that lower proficiency correlates with more overt subjects (both lexical and pronominal), intermediate proficiency disfavors overt pronominal subjects and the highest proficiency exhibits factor weights close to .50 (i.e., no preference). Speaking proficiency in the L2 was returned as significant for the Catalan L1 group. In this case, too, lowest proficiency correlated with a higher use of overt subjects.
In sum, Catalan L1 bilinguals with lower speaking proficiency in Spanish used more overt subjects.
Thus, higher proficiency is related to a more monolingual-like performance. Likewise, more proficient
Catalan speakers among the Spanish L1 bilinguals perform more monolingual-like. Thus, increased proficiency in the L2 boosts the separation of the languages. Although other factors intervene as well, it seems to be the case that more balanced configurations correlate with lower rates of overt subjects. This idea is consistent with Lambert’s (1990) definition of a balanced bilingual as one who exhibits little interlingual interference.
2.5. Language usage
It was hypothesized that in the Catalan L1 bilingual group, those speakers who use both languages with similar frequencies would show less evidence of contact in their speech; higher use could mean higher proficiency and, thus, a sharper separation of the languages. As a consequence, those speakers who mostly use Catalan were predicted to exhibit more non-target-like forms in Spanish. As for the Spanish L1 group, more contact with Catalan would result in more contact-induced forms. In the case of the Spanish L1 bilinguals, language use was not returned as significant, against our hypothesis. It could be that even speakers with lower use display evidence of contact (since they pattern differently from the monolinguals but similar to the Catalan L1 bilinguals). For the Catalan L1 speakers, use of L1 was found significant:
Less use of the L1 favored overt subjects more than more use of L1, against the hypothesis proposed. It could be argued then that language use does not correlate with proficiency, the more contact between the languages, as evidenced in the frequent use of the two languages, the more contact-induced forms emerge.
In any case, the range, which was used to rank variables, was small between the two degrees of language
181 use: 9 (compare, for instance, with the range in DISTANCE in the Spanish monolingual speakers’ alternation of null vs. overt subjects: 76). Recall that all speakers use Catalan everyday; the different degrees refer to the exclusivity of use of Catalan. Then, those speakers who use both languages daily favor overt subjects more than those who speak Catalan almost exclusively. This pattern is replicated in place of residence, where more contact-induced forms emerged in the speech of bilinguals in Maó (where there are greater numbers of Spanish speakers) than in the center of the island (where there are fewer Spanish speakers).
Catalan L1 and Spanish L1 speakers did not differ statistically from each other. Nonetheless, the patterns of
Spanish L1 speakers differ from those in the Catalan data. Thus, dominance in Catalan, a higher use of both languages and an unequal dominance of both languages correlate with higher usage of overt subjects, i.e., the emergence of contact-induced forms.
In brief, Catalan L1 speakers, those with unequal proficiencies, and reduced use of Spanish exhibit more evidence of language contact. Crucially, it seems that bilinguals, irrespective of L1, have converged toward Catalan. The next section interprets the evidence of language contact as instances of simplification or convergence.
3. Contact outcomes
The final set of research questions explored contact outcomes:
(3) a. Research Question 9: Are contact effects, instantiated in the overall rate of overt subjects in bilingual Spanish, indicative of convergence or simplification processes?
b. Research Question 10: Are there contact effects in the variables that are implicated in subject expression in bilingual Spanish? That is, are there differences in the relevant (read: significant) variables between Spanish and Catalan? If so, is there a bilingual continuum? Are Catalan-dominant bilinguals producing Spanish subjects following the variables that are significant in Catalan, while the Spanish-dominant bilinguals are more target-like in Spanish?
c. Research Question 11: Are there contact effects in the variable hierarchies in bilingual Spanish? That is, are there differences in variable hierarchies between Spanish and Catalan? If so, is there a bilingual continuum? Are Catalan-dominant bilinguals following a variable hierarchy closer to that in Catalan than the Spanish-dominant bilinguals?
d. Research question 12: Are there contact effects in the constraint hierarchies in bilingual Spanish? That is, are there differences in constraint hierarchies between Spanish and Catalan?
182 If so, is there a bilingual continuum? Are Catalan-dominant bilinguals following a constraint hierarchy closer to that in Catalan than the Spanish-dominant bilinguals?
3.1. Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence
Recall that Sorace (2004) proposes that contact outcomes reflect simplification, i.e., a strategy of cognitive economy that reduces the processing load of bilingualism through the suspension of pragmatic options. Overt pronominal subjects void of pragmatic content, like those in English, have been reported to be easier to process and, thus, easier to acquire (Grinstead 2004). Following Sorace, then, Spanish in contact with Catalan was predicted to register a higher overall rate of overt subjects. In contrast, Bullock &
Toribio (2004) and Toribio (2004) propose that languages in contact change to render the languages more similar. If this latter view is correct, then Spanish and Catalan in contact Spanish should converge towards each other with respect to overall rates and patterns of subject expression. The results offer confirmation of convergence.
The 3 (SUBJECT FORM) x 4 (DATA GROUP) repeated-measures ANOVA indicated that there were no significant differences across the groups in the overall rates, i.e., there was no increase in overt pronominal subjects in the bilinguals. This result indicates that the process underlying the increase in overt pronominal subjects in Spanish in contact with English is the U.S. is better explained as convergence (Bullock &
Toribio 2004, Toribio 2004).
The multivariate regressional analyses and posterior pairwise comparisons in the preceding chapter offer evidence of differences in patterns across data groups. Table 5.19 indicated that TYPE OF SPEAKER was among the factors that are significant in subject expression: patterns of variability of subject expression are significantly different between monolingual and bilingual groups and between Spanish and Catalan.
Tables 5.20-5.23 considered the corpora of specific groups: monolingual Spanish data, Spanish L1 bilingual data, Catalan L1 bilingual data, and Catalan data. Spanish bilingual varieties are significantly different from the monolingual Spanish data. Note that the bilingual Catalan data are not statistically different from the
Catalan data. More interestingly, within the bilingual corpora, the Spanish L1 and Catalan L1 bilingual
Spanish groups are not significantly different from each other, i.e., bilingual speakers show convergent forms with respect to patterns subject expression.
183 The individual alternations null vs. overt pronominal subject and overt pronominal vs. lexical subject further confirm these overall trends of convergence. The results returned for null vs. overt pronominal subjects show differences in patterns in bilingual speech (Table 5.21). The contrast overt pronominal vs. lexical subject is likewise constrained by DATA GROUP (Table 5.23). The distribution of null vs. overt lexical subject, in similar fashion, indicates differences across the data groups (Table 5.22). In summary, the data groups were not significantly different from each other in the overall rate, as predicted by convergence (Bullock & Toribio 2004, Toribio 2004). Differences were attested in the patterns across the groups. The following sections examine these patterns to determine whether the differences can be explained by simplification or convergence.
3.2. Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence in subject expression variables
It was hypothesized that if there were differences between Catalan and Spanish with respect to subject expression, a bilingual continuum, indicative of language contact effects, would be manifested with respect to the variables (factor groups) implicated in subject expression. This hypothesis is confirmed. Multivariate regressional analyses and posterior pairwise comparisons reported in Chapter 5 reveal significant differences among data groups in patterns of subject expression. Specifically, Spanish and Catalan differ significantly from each other (Table 5.9). The monolingual Spanish group differs from both bilingual groups (Tables 5.24 and 5.25). The two bilingual groups do not differ from each other (Table 5.26). The
Spanish of the Spanish L1 bilinguals differs from the Catalan data (Table 5.27). Finally, the Catalan L1 bilinguals do not differ from the Catalan data (Table 5.28). This pattern of results points to a bilingual continuum, where monolingual Spanish differs from the contact and non-contact varieties explored, and where within the bilingual corpora, the Catalan L1 bilingual data are not significantly different from the
Catalan monolingual data, while the Spanish L1 bilingual data are different from the Catalan data. Note that only the monolingual Spanish data are not from Minorca. Therefore, it could be posited that the differences are due to dialectal variation, which, in any event, could have emerged as a result of contact. However, dialectal variation cannot account for the difference between Spanish L1 bilinguals and the Catalan L1 bilinguals; only the Spanish L1 speakers are significantly different from the Catalan data. Spanish L1
184 speakers, however, are converging toward Catalan as well. Thus, it seems to be the emergence of a dialectal variety as the results of contact.
3.3. Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence in subject expression variables
hierarchies
It was also hypothesized that if there were differences between Catalan and Spanish with respect to subject expression, a bilingual continuum would be evidenced in variable hierarchies. Unfortunately, variable hierarchies did not permit the comparison of the groups, as they are largely dependent on the sample (see Tagliamonte 2006). Comparisons across the groups are best based on constraint ranking since it is more stable and does not vary with the sample.
3.4. Contact outcomes: Simplification and convergence in subject expression constraint
hierarchies
It was further hypothesized that if there were differences between Catalan and Spanish with respect to subject expression, a bilingual continuum, indicative of language contact effects, would be expected with respect to constraint hierarchies. This is borne out, as was shown in Chapter 5 (Table 5.30). Recall that
Catalan and Spanish differ in a number of constraints. In particular, non-co-referential contexts favor overt lexical subjects in Spanish while they favor overt pronominal subjects in Catalan. Bilingual speakers exhibit convergent outcomes, where both Spanish L1 and Catalan L1 bilinguals display a preference for overt pronominal subjects, converging with Catalan. Regarding the distance at which overt subjects are favored, Spanish favors overt subjects at a distance of 5 intervening subjects or more, while Catalan favors overt subjects at distances of 10 intervening subjects or more. The Spanish L1 bilinguals display monolingual-like behavior and favor overt subjects at distances of 5 intervening subjects. Catalan L1 bilinguals, on the other hand, manifest a potentially simplified outcome, where a distance of only 2 intervening subjects or more triggers a preference for overt subjects. This outcome might constitute a simplification because the constraint 2 intervening subjects does not fall in between Spanish (5 or more intervening subjects) and Catalan (10 or more intervening subjects) and producing overt subjects at shorter distances may relieve the processing cost of holding a referent in memory longer, which merits further study. The constraint second person singular favors overt pronominal subjects in monolingual Spanish,
185 while it favors null subjects in Catalan. The Catalan L1 bilingual data exhibit the same preference as
Catalan: the null option is preferred. Spanish L1 speakers display an equal preference for null and overt pronominal subjects, an example of indeterminacy in the grammar that can be interpreted as a convergence toward Catalan in that Spanish bilinguals equally accept null subjects. The last three differentiating constraints are within the variable SEMANTIC VERB TYPE. For Spanish L1 bilinguals this variable was not returned as significant, thus, their constraint ranking cannot be discussed. The constraint speech verb favors null subjects in Spanish and overt pronominal subjects in Catalan. The Catalan L1 bilingual data pattern like the Catalan data in favoring overt pronominal subjects. The constraint psychological verb disfavors overt pronominal subjects in Spanish while it favors overt pronominal subjects in Catalan. Catalan L1 bilinguals exhibit a convergent outcome in that they prefer an overt form. However, they favor overt lexical subjects instead of overt pronominal subjects. Lastly, movement verbs favor overt lexical subjects in
Spanish, while they neither favor nor disfavor overt forms in Catalan. Catalan L1 speakers manifest a
Catalan-like outcome, in that no preference is shown. In brief, convergence preponderates in pattern outcomes although some inconclusive evidence of simplification is reported (the distance favoring overt subjects in the Catalan L1 group is smaller than in the other groups).
4. Summary and conclusions
Subject expression in Catalan and monolingual and bilingual and Spanish is a complex and variable phenomenon. Differences are attested across the groups in the language-internal factors that are significant, their ranking, and, most importantly, in the ranking of constraints, which allow for systematic and reliable comparisons across groups. Additionally, language-external factors are also implicated in variation in subject expression, especially when these factors are related to bilingualism, e.g., language use, dominance, etc. As noted above, bilingual varieties do not show increased rates statistically different from those manifested in monolingual varieties, which is interpreted as evidence for convergence. In addition, the
Catalan L1 and Spanish L1 bilingual data demonstrate similar patterns of subject expression, indicative of convergence. The patterns of distribution of subjects across the varieties under study further confirmed the trends towards convergence. In particular, some language-internal variables manifested different preference patterns in Spanish versus Catalan. In those cases, the Catalan L1 bilinguals mostly patterned as in Catalan,
186 except in the variable DISTANCE, where they exhibited a pattern distinct from all other groups. The Spanish
L1 bilinguals resemble Spanish monolinguals in the variable DISTANCE FROM REFERENT, they resemble
Catalan in the variables CO-REFERENTIALITY, and they exhibit a intermediate form in the variable PERSON.
Likewise, language-external variables representing different degrees of language contact, in particular, place of birth, age, native language, language usage and proficiency, correlated with the emergence of converged and simplified forms.
We now return to the broad questions posed at the outset: Is Minorcan bilingual Spanish different from
Valladolid monolingual Spanish with respect to rates and patterns of subject expression? And if so, what factors are implicated in the emergence of contact-induced patterns of subject expression in Minorcan
Spanish? And how are such patterns to be interpreted?
4.1. Minorcan Spanish is different from Valladolid monolingual Spanish
The monolingual Spanish corpus does not differ significantly in the overall rate of overt pronouns from the Catalan and Spanish bilingual corpora, as predicted by convergence. Interestingly, differences are found in patterns between Spanish and Catalan and monolingual and bilingual Spanish, also predicted by convergence. In fact, the two bilingual groups do not differ from each other in the patterns of subject expression, indicating that contact outcomes are present regardless of L1. Bilingual and monolingual
Spanish additionally differ in subject expression patterns as instantiated in constraint ranking. In cases where Spanish and Catalan differ, Catalan L1 bilinguals pattern in Spanish like they do in Catalan. Spanish
L1 bilinguals only pattern like Spanish monolinguals in the distance at which overt subjects are favored; in all the other cases, they display a converged pattern.
4.2. Dominant language, language use, and dominance patterns as central to the emergence of
contact-induced patterns
The emergence of contact-induced linguistic behaviors is predicted by some external factors, among these, proficiency, use, and language dominance. Perhaps most surprising is the fact that Spanish L1 bilinguals with low proficiency in Catalan display more contact-induced patterns than those with higher proficiency. Data from Catalan L1 and Spanish L1 bilinguals differ from each other in the fact that only the
187 latter is significantly different from the Catalan data with respect to patterns of subject expression. Subject expression among Catalan L1 bilinguals, too, patterns closer to that observed in Catalan than to that observed among Spanish L1 bilinguals in the constraint ranking. Thus, native language correlates with the emergence of converged forms. The fact that Catalan L1 bilinguals display patterns of subject expression that are not significantly different from Catalan implies that Catalan L1 bilinguals’ subject expression patterns are the same in Catalan and in Spanish (i.e., they display a common grammar for both languages or both languages have converged in these speakers). Speakers who use both languages frequently also display a higher rate of contact-induced patterns, however, as compelling as it may be, this effect is only found in the Catalan L1 bilinguals who reside in the capital, where more Spanish speakers live. Note that
Spanish L1 bilinguals with low proficiency in Catalan manifested more contact-induced forms than those with higher proficiency. If Spanish L1 bilinguals who used Catalan more frequently also displayed more contact-induced forms, these two results would be irreconcilable. It is not unexpected, though, that Catalan
L1 bilinguals with higher proficiency in Spanish display a more monolingual-like behavior than other speakers with lower proficiency. Language dominance patterns can account for these patterns. Catalan L1 bilinguals with higher proficiency of Spanish (i.e., those that are more monolingual-like) are more balanced bilinguals. Spanish L1 bilinguals with higher proficiency in Catalan (i.e., those found to be more monolingual-like) are more balanced bilinguals as well. It appears to be the case, then, that balanced bilinguals exhibit less converged forms (see Lambert 1990). Nonetheless, balanced bilinguals behave differently from monolinguals, i.e., contact-induced forms are still present.
Thus, with respect to the emergence of contact-induced forms, native language is not irrelevant. The
Catalan L1 speakers are closer to Catalan than the Spanish speakers, therefore, native language matters in the emergence of convergent features.
4.3. Contact outcomes as simplification and convergence
It goes without saying that the existence of both convergence and simplification in language contact outcomes is not debated here, the question relates specifically to subject expression outcomes. Recall that both simplification and convergence predict the increased use of overt pronominal subjects in Spanish in contact with a non null subject language such as English. But the predictions for two null subject languages
188 in contact differ. Simplification predicts an increase in rates of overt pronouns in bilingual speech, but convergence predicts rates intermediate between the contact languages. Note that convergence targets differences across languages, making them less divergent, not necessarily transferring a structure from one language into another. But simplification targets structures, rendering them simpler, easier to process, even though the contact languages may share that structure. The approaches are very similar in many respects.
They are concerned with the internal structure of the receiving language. Restrictions apply; only the interfaces are affected, indeterminacy in the monolingual grammar seems to be necessary and, consequently, contact outcomes are perceived as an accelerator of linguistic change. The difference between these two approaches is in the process underlying language contacts. Spanish and English differ in the availability of null subjects. English has the simpler form, in terms of processing cost. In Spanish in contact with English, the outcome renders Spanish closer to English. In addition, it constitutes a simplification. Therefore, these two approaches have interpreted the increase in overt pronominal subjects in Spanish in contact with English as a simplification or convergence. To determine which process takes place, it is necessary to examine contact outcomes of typologically similar languages, where their predictions differ. A simplification approach predicts an increase in overall rate of overt pronominal subjects, while a convergence approach would predict a rate in between the languages. Although this project examines the alternation between null and overt pronominal and lexical subjects, to determine whether convergence or simplification better accounts for bilingual subject expression the focus lies on pronominal subjects. A simplification approach does not predict an increase in overt lexical subjects because it is unclear how it would constitute a simplification. Recall that overt pronominal subjects are reported in the child acquisition literature to be harder to acquire in null subject languages than in non-null subject languages (Grinstead 2004). No parallel research exists for overt lexical subjects.
Examination of the overall use of overt subjects reveals evidence of convergence: no significant differences were found between monolingual and bilingual Spanish. Subsequent pairwise comparisons revealed that Spanish and Catalan patterns are significantly different. Bilinguals do not differ from each other and only differ significantly from Spanish. A posterior analysis demonstrates that Spanish L1 speakers pattern differently from Catalan. These trends are interpreted as evidence of a bilingual continuum, where Catalan L1 speakers are closer to Catalan than to Spanish, and where Spanish L1
189 speakers are more different from Catalan than Catalan L1 speakers. This bilingual continuum is consistent with the emergence of contact-induced forms.
More evidence of convergence is attested in the constraint ranking. Convergent outcomes emerge in cases where the two baselines differ and bilingual speech displays a pattern in between both baselines.
Consider, for instance, the variable person. In monolingual Spanish, second person singular favors the overt pronominal form, while Catalan favors the null form. Catalan L1 bilinguals favor the null form in Spanish, which could be interpreted as a calque from Catalan, while Spanish L1 bilinguals display indeterminacy in their grammars, where neither form is favored. This indeterminacy could be interpreted as convergence, where the constraints present in Spanish and Catalan are both used in bilingual Spanish.
Several ideas can be taken away from the preceding discussion. Evidence of a bilingual continuum is found in the constraint second person singular, although the bilinguals are closer to Catalan than to
Spanish. This generalization is also true in the pairwise comparisons discussed in §3.2 above. In fact, in all the constraints discussed in that section, Catalan L1 speakers either pattern with Catalan, as in variables
PERSON, CO-REFERENCE, and SEMANTIC VERB TYPE, or exhibit a different outcome, possibly a simplification, as in DISTANCE FROM REFERENT. However, they never pattern as Spanish monolinguals. The
Spanish L1 bilinguals, however, pattern like the Catalan data, as in CO-REFERENCE, or like the Spanish monolinguals, as in DISTANCE FROM REFERENT. Therefore, the bilinguals are closer to the Catalan data, i.e. exhibit Catalan-like patterns in their Spanish, the Catalan L1 bilinguals more so than the Spanish L1 bilinguals. In a brief, contact effects are persistent in the interface phenomenon of subject expression even in highly proficient bilinguals, in fact, even in Spanish-dominant speakers with only passive proficiency in
Catalan. The emergence of simplification in the overall rates, as instantiated in an increase in overt pronominal subjects in bilingual speech, is not attested in these data.
5. Summary
This chapter has revisited the results of the study (discussed in detail in Chapter 5) in light of the specific research questions presented in Chapter 4 and the broader questions posed in this project. Analysis of language-external factors indicate that contact effects, instantiated mainly in converged outcomes, are more persistent in unbalanced bilinguals, Catalan dominant bilinguals (as compared to Spanish dominant
190 bilinguals), and those who use both languages regularly. Crucially, L1 is not impermeable to alterations in the interface areas, where monolinguals show indeterminacy too. In fact, a contact variety, Minorcan
Spanish, seems to be emerging, patterning closer to Catalan than to Spanish. Findings from analyses of language-internal factors reveal that differences between typologically similar languages as well as bilingual and monolingual varieties of the same language are parallel to differences across different monolingual varieties of the same language. As in other variationist studies, then, comparisons are better drawn from constraint hierarchies. The constraint hierarchies examined in this project manifest differences between Spanish and Catalan, and between monolingual and bilingual Spanish. The latter differences are best characterized as being due to contact.
191 Chapter 7
Conclusion:
The fields of language variation, bilingualism, and sociolinguistics:
Contributions and directions for future research
This dissertation project has examined bilingual speech forms in Spanish in contact with Catalan in
Minorca. This situation was argued to lend the ideal venue for examining contact outcomes for several reasons. Minorca presents a situation of extensive and established bilingualism, with little immigration until recently, and with highly proficient bilinguals. In addition, Spanish and Catalan are typologically similar languages, both null subject languages, the phenomenon explored here. The examination of subject expression in bilingual Spanish in Minorca contributes to several subfields within linguistics. It elucidates patterns of variation in subject expression across varieties of Spanish, including bilingual Spanish, and between null subject, sister languages. It also contributes to bilingualism and language contact research, determining the processes underlying contact outcomes. Lastly, it describes an understudied bilingual community, Minorca.
This concluding chapter is organized in three subsections, mindful of the contributions to these three fields: language variation, bilingualism, and sociolinguistics. It connects the discussed results with antecedent literature explaining the goals achieved and the unresolved issues left for future research.
1. Language variation: Micro- and dialectal variation in subject expression in null subject
languages
Subject expression is probably one of the morphosyntactic features of Spanish that has received the most attention in language variation research. The present research employs a variable rule analysis, where the contribution of different variables is measured to obtain the group of variables that better fits the data.
This method is ideal for the study of subject expression since several variables are implicated in the distribution. In addition, it permits the ranking of the variables according to their effect. Antecedent literature struggled to reach a consensus on the variables implicated in subject expression. As soon as one project revealed a specific variable as significant, a different project returned it as non-significant. Given that subject expression is a variable phenomenon, it should come as no surprise that a variable significant in one variety may not be significant in a different variety, especially when the data are collected via sociolinguistic interviews. This should imply that variation in subject expression can be stated in terms of significant variables, however, variability in the data collection method makes comparisons across groups less reliable. Sociolinguistic interviews are ideal for the study of subject expression because subject frequency is very high and numerous different variables are implicated, which would be impossible to implement or explore simultaneously in an experimental design. However, this comes at the expense of variability in the data across speakers, since not all provide the same number of tokens of each combination of variables. This limitation makes comparisons across groups based on the variables that are significant as well as their ranking difficult. Future research will overcome this limitation by employing empirical designs to examine the significance of variables. These designs will manipulate one or two variables that were returned as significant in this project, while maintaining the rest of the variables constant. In this project, more insightful comparisons emerge from the examination of constraint rankings. These rankings reveal different patterning of null and overt subjects in Spanish and Catalan, thus, unveiling a new method of cross-linguistic examination of apparently very similar languages whereas other methodologies are not sensitive enough to reveal microvariation. Likewise, it provides a method of comparison between monolingual and bilingual varieties to trace contact effects in bilingual speech.
In sum, subject expression is a variable phenomenon constrained by several factors. To understand its nature, it it necessary to use a methodology that allows for the exploration of the contributing variables.
Accordingly, this project opted for naturalistic data collection and a variable rule analysis. Although the variables and their ranking did not allow for fertile comparisons across the groups, this study set the basis for future experimental work. In addition, constraint ranking was proven to provide fruitful comparisons across varieties of the same language, including bilingual vs. monolingual varieties, and across typologically similar languages.
193 2. Bilingualism: Pulling forces in language outcomes
Contact-induced forms are often present in the speech of bilinguals. For instance, in this project, the constraint ranking of Catalan L1 bilinguals resembled that of Catalan in some cases where Catalan and
Spanish diverged: second person singular, non-coreferential contexts, and SEMANTIC VERB TYPES psychological, speech and movement. Recent development in contact linguistics indicates that this influence is restricted to the areas where the syntax interfaces with other modules. In light of this restriction, this project considered the distribution of null and overt subjects in Spanish, at the syntax interface with the discourse-pragmatics. Additionally, apparent transfer from the contact language has been further refined as convergence, which renders the two languages more similar, not necessarily importing any feature from one language into the other. An example is the case of Spanish L1 bilinguals, who present an intermediate possibility in the second person singular. In sum, the preceding literature indicates that phenomena pertaining to the syntax interfaces are vulnerable to contact effects that render the languages more similar. In addition to convergence, it has also been posited that language contact may result in simplified outcomes. In this regard, overt pronominal subjects void of pragmatic weight are simpler than overt pronominal subjects that require pragmatic processing. Interestingly, in the expression of null and overt objects, the ‘simpler’ form is null objects (see Hulk & Muller 2001, Zyzik 2008). Why this difference exists between subjects and objects requires further attention.
Oftentimes, the direction of the effect has been linked to external factors, such as language prestige or language dominance. In Spanish in the U.S., for instance, Spanish, the minority language, exhibits contact- induced forms from the socially predominant language, English. However, this directionally may also be explained by internal factors. The fact that Spanish in the U.S. exhibits an increase in overt pronominal subjects, while Chicano English, or any other type of English of heritage Spanish speakers, does not display a decrease in overt pronominal subjects can be explained by language-internal factors. While an increase in overt subjects in Spanish pertains to the syntax interface with the pragmatics, resulting in a pragmatically odd usage, a decrease in overt pronominal subjects in English would affect the core or narrow syntax of
English, a non-null subject language, and would render an ungrammatical sentence. Thus, contact outcomes
194 are restrained by language-internal factors, which constrain the areas that are affected and the directionality of the effect.
Individual factors, researched mostly from a psycholinguistic point of view, indicate that when a bilingual is speaking in one language, the other language likely remains active. This simultaneous activation causes an increase in processing load (Colomé 2001, Costa et al. 1999, Kroll et al. 2006, among many others). With this in mind, proposals have been put forth as to how this increase in processing load affects the linguistic outcomes of bilingualism (Sorace 2004). In general, the idea of a simplification or a universal process, independent of the language pairing, is proposed as an alleviating device for the processing cost of simultaneous activation. Support for this was only marginally found in this project in the
Catalan L1 bilingual Spanish production of overt forms at a distance of only 2 or more intervening subjects.
Recall that monolingual and Spanish L1 bilingual Spanish favor overt subjects at distances of 5 or more intervening subjects and Catalan favors overt subjects at a distance of 10 or more intervening subjects. The relation between processing load and proficiency is not entirely well understood and is worthy of further study. It could be hypothesized that bilinguals with high proficiencies in both languages, from an acquisitional point of view, may be more monolingual-like in each. If higher use correlates with high proficiency, it could result in better inhibitory control (i.e. more monolingual-like behavior). On the other hand, more simultaneous activation could result in less monolingual-like behavior. Thus, individual factors, including language proficiency and use, are important to explain language contact. This project discloses that higher proficiency in Spanish in the Catalan L1 speakers correlates with better Spanish language performance, thus, proficiency boosts language separation, or improves inhibitory control, or proves acquirability (in line with Birdsong 2006, Golato 2002, Flege et al. 2002). However, at the same time, the
Spanish L1 bilinguals, then, would have been expected to behave more monolingual-like in Spanish with less contact with Catalan (i.e., lower proficiency and use). The results prove otherwise. In fact, the generalization that better explains both bilingual groups is that balanced bilingualism enhances linguistic separation or improves inhibitory control. The specific factors that correlate with processing load, or how processing load is increased requires further research. This project cannot contribute to this discussion since no online processing measures were used. Essential questions left for future research include (i) whether simplification correlates with processing load, where participants with larger working memories would be
195 expected to produce less converged outcomes, whether balanced bilingualism correlates with higher working memories or better inhibitory control (as measured in a Simon Task). Future research needs to examine subject expression in bilinguals using online processing methodologies.
External or social factors, too, play a role. If both languages overlap across social contexts, the languages are literally more in contact. Thus, the argument presented in this dissertation is that Minorca should, therefore, be a context where interlanguage effects are enhanced. The fact that Spanish L1 bilinguals with limited proficiency in Catalan exhibit contact effects is evidence in favor of this idea.
English speakers with limited proficiency of Spanish in the U. S., where Spanish is a minority language, do not display contact effects in their English.
In sum, contact outcomes are the result of a complicated, multifaceted process, where language- internal, individual, and social factors act as pulling forces. It seems that some of the language-internal factors outrank external factors; no matter what the social context is or the processing load, ungrammaticality does not emerge in bilingual speech. However, the outcome depends on other factors as well; simplification, for instance, emerges to compensate for an increased processing load. This research project is embedded in this tradition, examining the role of language-internal and individual factors in a constant social setting, Minorca. The conclusions, thus, are limited in scope, since predictions about different bilingual societies remain to be tested. This study expands on studies of Spanish in the U.S., where Spanish is in a diglossic relation with English, a typologically different language, and Spanish in
Minorca, where Spanish is in an equative relation with Catalan, a typologically similar language. To tease apart whether differences in the outcomes are due to the status of the language or typological similarity, it is necessary to study typologically similar language pairings in diglossic situations and typologically dissimilar language pairings in non-diglossic contexts. This study is also limited in that only one phenomenon is researched, subject expression, common across the languages in contact here. Other phenomena shared by the languages in contact may result in a different outcome, i.e. simplification.
Considering other phenomena, where languages share a feature is, thus, necessary. For instance, the study of subject position across predicate types in Spanish in contact with Catalan may reveal a different outcome. If subject position exhibited evidence of simplification, what is different between subject
196 expression and subject position in the monolingual grammar? Likewise, comparison with phenomena in the lexico-semantics interface with syntax may reveal interesting contrasts in outcomes.
3. Sociolinguistics: Minorca, extensive and established bilingualism
Minorca’s unique history in Spain renders it the ideal venue for the study of bilingualism. As in the rest of the Catalan Countries, Catalan was banned during Franco’s regime, which facilitated the expansion of
Spanish. Being the only official language, it was enforced in schools to a certain degree (during recess, they normally could speak Catalan). Nonetheless, most of the people worked in the fields or in shoemaking, where the locals worked and, therefore, they did not need to use Spanish. The extent of Spanish used was motivated by the prestige the language had in many contexts, by the strong military presence on the island, and by the migratory waves of the 1950s and 1960s. This was a period of bilingualism and diglossia
(Fishman 1980), Catalan and Spanish were compartmentalized. Even though Minorca had been bilingual since the merger of the Crowns of Castille and Aragon, most participants in the older generations remember their childhood as mostly monolingual in Catalan. The situation right now, with protective Catalan language policies and regained prestige, is better described as bilingualism without diglossia. Even the generations that grew up during Franco’s regime and, therefore, had more exposure to Spanish, have learned to read and write in Catalan in adulthood and use Catalan almost exclusively now. Since younger generations now have education almost exclusively in Catalan or bilingual education, a comparison among these two language of instruction paradigms would prove useful in future research. Of special interest is the effect of language policies on the acquisition of Catalan by Spanish L1 speakers. There has been a change; while all Spanish L1 bilinguals in Minorca are passive bilinguals, the only ones who speak it are those who attended classes in Catalan. Before the Catalan system was implemented, there was a period when Spanish
L1 speakers did not have classes in Catalan until they were in high-school. In fact, this encouraged Spanish
L1 speakers to pursue secondary education in the Peninsula instead of in Minorca. For the Spanish L1 speakers, it is difficult to start to speak Catalan, even though they understand it perfectly. Even for the younger generations, who attend classes almost entirely in Catalan, starting to use the language is complicated. While all Catalan L1 speakers wished the Spanish L1 speakers spoke Catalan, when a Spanish
L1 speaker arrives in Minorca, s/he is identified as a Spanish speaker and everyone addresses her/him in
197 Spanish. Speakers claim that they only speak to a person in one language, meaning that they do not shift between languages with a single speaker. As a consequence, people are identified with a single language, normally established when they meet. The difference between these speakers who can actually speak the language and have been exposed to it frequently through education, and those that started to be exposed to it in high-school or later has gone largely unexamined here. A general impression from their speech is that while those who cannot speak Catalan lose some traits of their original Spanish dialect even though they do not exhibit Catalan features, those who speak Catalan exhibit some Catalan features in their speech. For example, one of the Spanish L1 females from age group 1 applies a dissimilation rule of Balearic Catalan in
Spanish, where las siete is produced as /lat siete/. Future research will target Spanish L1 speakers to examine whether proficiency in Catalan results in more or less contact-induced forms, both phonological and syntactic, examining different groups of Spanish L1 speakers, to see whether it is education, place of birth, or the language used with friends that determines the emergence of contact induced forms in their L1.
In addition, since this group can speak Catalan, their Catalan L2 could also be examined and provide a larger picture of contact subject expression. The differences attested between Spanish L1 speakers and
Catalan L1 speakers demonstrate that while Catalan L1 speakers of Spanish patterns are closer to Catalan,
Spanish L1 speakers too exhibited contact-induced effects and they, too, patterned closer to Catalan than to
Spanish. These results speak to language development and language recession in an area of the grammar permeable to interlanguage influence and of the development of a contact-induced variety. These two groups are becoming more and more similar in their speech patterns. After all, the groups are not significantly different from each other. Nonetheless, the separation of speakers by L1 is largely felt in the society. In fact, Spanish-speaking immigrants as well as their families are considered outsiders, as evidenced by the term charnego, which started to be used with the migratory waves of the 50s and 60s to refer to this type of immigrant. Maybe now that Spanish L1 speakers born in Minorca are starting to speak
Catalan, this separation of speakers will not include Minorca-born Spanish L1 speakers, as it does now.
Therefore, it appears that some of the factors that are heartily felt in the society do not affect the presence of contact-induced bilingual subject expression in Minorca. Age and L1 did not return significantly different groups, although it is true that, regarding the latter, only Spanish L1 speakers are significantly different from Catalan. The Sociolinguistic Survey discussed in Chapter 2 refers to knowledge of Catalan.
198 It would be informative to have a parallel survey examining what external factors correlate with proficiency in Spanish. An external factor that correlated with contact-induced forms was place of residence. Those
Catalan speakers living in the capital, where the most Spanish is spoken, exhibited a higher rate of overt pronominal subjects. It can be concluded, then, that the emergence of contact-induced forms is favored in societies where both languages are used to a similar extent. Note that these type of societies are unstable or transitional (Fishman 1980), which promote language shift or loss. In this case, it is difficult to predict what the future holds. Catalan is now gaining territory and Spanish is in recession, however, the usefulness of the country’s language is a strong force contributing to its maintenance. It seems more probable that a reverse diglossia occurs, where Catalan is the high language and Spanish the low language. After all, it is immigrants who use it.
Overall, participants exhibited high proficiency in Spanish, granted by the extensive bilingualism of
Minorca, while they manifested different active proficiencies in Catalan. In any case, contact with converged forms may have been enough to promote contact-induced forms in Spanish L1 speakers’
Spanish. This is an important difference from bilingual areas where one of the languages is a minority language; the effect of the minority language on the larger society language is minimal. In Minorca, contact seems to be creating its own variety.
199 Appendix A
Immigration by Autonomous Communities from 2000 to 2006
Source: INE
% Foreign Immigration by Autonomous Communities from 2000 to 2006
Year 2000 2006 TOTALITY OF SPAIN 228 927 Andalucía 176 613 Aragón 101 825 Asturias (Principado) 73 281 Balearic (Illes) 647 1676 Canarias 450 1170 Cantabria 80 420 Castilla y León 74 421 Castilla-La Mancha 80 687 Cataluña 290 1281 Comunidad Valenciana 379 1390 Extremadura 81 253 Galicia 94 267 Madrid (Comunidad de) 318 1332 Murcia (Regíón de) 228 1380 Navarra (C. Floral de) 169 921 País Vasco 101 401 La Rioja 166 1144 Ceuta 405 406 Melilla 725 595
200 Appendix B
Foreign population in the Balearic Islands in 2000 and 2006
Residence Total population Born in a foreign country %
Balearic Islands 2000 845,630 52,547 6.21 2006 1,001,062 160,589 16.04 Majorca 2000 677,014 39,897 5.89 2006 790,763 123,785 15.65 Minorca 2000 72,716 3,065 4.22 2006 88,434 12,166 13.76 Ibiza 2000 89,611 8,359 9.33 2006 113,908 22,628 19.87 Formentera 2000 6,289 1,226 19.49 2006 7,957 2,010 25.26
201 Appendix C
Language of Instruction in the academic year 2003-2004
% Academic year 2003-2004
Spanish as instruction Catalan as instruction Spanish only language and Catalan Bilingual education language and Spanish as a course as a course All Schools 0.00 0.00 49.30 50.70 PUBLIC SCHOOLS 0.00 0.00 35.80 64.20 PRIVATE SCHOOLS 0.00 0.00 70.10 29.90
202 Appendix D
Percentage of knowledge of Catalan
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
% Knowledge of Catalan.
Listening Speaking Reading Writing
Balearic Islands 93.1 74.6 79.6 46.9
Place of birth Born in the linguistic 99.6 96.8 91.8 64.5 area Born elsewhere 83.4 41.6 61.4 20.7 Place of residence Badía de Palma 91.3 68.9 77.8 45.1 Rest of Majorca 94.8 82.5 83 48.7 Minorca 97.1 82.1 87 52.6 Ibiza and Formentera 92.4 70.8 72.1 44.8 Age 15-29 93.2 80.1 89.8 77.4 30-44 94.8 72.3 82.9 49.5 45-64 92 69.1 73.7 27.3 65 and over 91.4 78.8 66.6 24.1 Gender Male 93.2 74.1 80.2 45.7 Female 92.9 75.2 79.1 48
203 Appendix E
Percentages of L1, native language and habitual language
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
% L1, native language and habitual language. 2003 Survey
Catalan Both Spanish Other No response
Balearic L1 42.6 1.8 47.7 7.5 0.4 Islands Own language 45.6 3.9 45.3 5.2 0.0 Habitual 45.0 5.3 46.1 3.4 0.2 language Place of birth
Born in the L1 69.8 2.8 25.5 1.4 0.5 linguistic area Own language 72.4 5.1 22.2 0.3 0.0 Habitual 70.8 6.8 21.5 0.7 0.2 language Born L1 2.2 0.2 80.8 16.6 0.3 elsewhere Own language 5.6 2.1 79.8 12.6 0.0 Habitual 6.7 2.9 82.7 7.6 0.2 language Place of residence Badía de L1 31.9 2.4 56.9 8.4 0.5 Palma Own language 35.0 4.5 55.0 5.4 0.0 Habitual 33.2 6.2 56.7 3.8 0.1 language Rest of L1 56.9 1.0 35.9 6.0 0.2 Majorca Own language 59.8 3.5 31.9 4.8 0.0 Habitual 60.9 4.4 31.2 3.1 0.4 language Minorca L1 58.2 1.8 34.0 5.1 0.9 Own language 65.1 3.5 28.2 3.2 0.0 Habitual 66.9 3.9 28.0 1.3 0.0 language Ibiza and L1 35.7 1.7 52.7 9.5 0.4 Formentera Own language 35.1 2.9 55.1 7.0 0.0 Habitual 33.6 4.7 56.9 4.5 0.3 language
204 % L1, native language and habitual language. 2003 Survey
Age
15-29 L1 34.2 3.0 55.1 7.4 0.3 Own language 36.5 3.2 56.0 4.4 0.0 Habitual 32.5 5.2 59.3 3.0 0.1 language 30-44 L1 38.2 1.3 52.9 7.2 0.4 Own language 43.0 3.3 49.3 4.4 0.0 Habitual 42.7 5.8 49.2 2.1 0.1 language 45-64 L1 42.2 1.6 47.2 8.6 0.4 Own language 45.6 4.6 42.5 7.2 0.0 Habitual 46.9 4.8 42.9 5.3 0.2 language 65 and over L1 65.1 0.8 27.0 6.3 0.6 Own language 64.8 5.1 25.1 4.9 0.0 Habitual 66.5 5.1 24.1 3.7 0.6 language Gender
Male L1 42.0 1.6 48.9 7.1 0.4 Own language 44.1 4.4 47.1 4.4 0.0 Habitual 44.2 5.4 47.2 3.1 0.1 language Female L1 43.3 2.0 46.5 7.8 0.5 Own language 47.0 3.4 43.5 6.0 0.0 Habitual 45.8 5.1 45.0 3.8 0.3 language
205 Appendix F
Percentages of language use in familial contexts
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
Language use within the family. 2003 Survey
Only More More Only Same Other N/A Catalan Catalan Spanish Spanish Balearic at home 37.6 4.8 6.3 8.6 36.7 6 Islands
with mother 42.8 0.9 0.9 1.1 46.1 7.4 0.7 with father 43.1 1.3 0.9 1.1 45.7 6.5 1.4 with couple 39.2 2.1 2.9 6 44.8 5 with kids 45.9 2.7 4.7 5.7 35.6 5.4 with brothers and/ 42.8 1.3 1.7 2.2 46.3 5.7 or sisters with grandparents 44.35 2 3.2 3.95 40.95 5.55 with other family 38.6 6.7 4.8 4.3 38.5 6.3 0.9 members
Place of birth
Born in the at home 59.7 6.5 7 7.4 17.7 1.6 linguistic area
with mother 69.9 1.2 1.4 1.7 23.6 1.3 0.8 with father 70.2 1.6 1.5 1.6 23.1 0.7 1.2 with couple 62.5 2.8 3.2 4.8 25.4 1.3
with kids 76.8 3.1 4.7 3.8 11 0.6 with brothers and/ 70.2 1.4 2 2.2 23.7 0.5 or sisters with grandparents 73.45 0.65 0.85 0.5 23.4 1.1 with other family 61.2 10.4 6 4.4 16.2 1.3 0.5 members Born at home 3.8 2.3 5.3 10.4 65.6 12.7 elsewhere with mother 2.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 79.7 16.4 0.6 with father 2.6 0.8 0 0.3 79.4 15.1 1.8
206 Language use within the family. 2003 Survey
with couple 5.9 1.2 2.5 7.7 72.4 10.3 with kids 5.8 2.2 4.7 8.2 67.5 11.6 with brothers and/ 2.8 1.1 1.1 2.3 79.3 13.4 or sisters with grandparents 3.1 0.7 0.1 0.05 80.5 15.6 with other family 4.8 1.1 3 4.3 71.8 13.6 1.4 members Place of residence
Badía de at home 26 4.7 7 10 45 7 Palma
with mother 32 1.2 1.3 1.4 55.1 8.3 0.8 with father 32.5 1.6 1.2 1.7 54.2 7.3 1.4 with couple 27.4 2.1 3.9 6.7 54.5 5.5 with kids 33.4 3.1 4.8 7.2 45.5 6.1 with brothers and/ 31.4 1.6 1.5 2.7 56.3 6.5 or sisters with grandparents 35.9 0.65 0.75 0.4 54.15 8.1 with other family 28 6.2 5.8 5.7 46.1 7 1.1 members Rest of at home 52.9 5.4 6.1 7.2 23.9 4.9 Majorca with mother 57 0.6 0.7 1 34.2 6.1 0.5 with father 57 0.8 0.9 0.4 34.4 5.2 1.3 with couple 55.9 2.8 2.2 5.2 29.4 4.5 with kids 60.9 2.8 4.8 3.6 23.1 4.7 with brothers and/ 58 1 1.9 1.6 32.7 4.9 or sisters with grandparents 59.5 0.65 0.2 0.25 34.5 4.95 with other family 53.1 6.3 4.5 2.8 28.2 4.7 0.5 members Minorca at home 59.4 3.7 5 5.2 23.2 3.5 with mother 59.8 0.8 0.2 1.2 33.3 3.8 0.9 with father 60.4 0.8 0.3 0.8 32.7 4.3 0.7 with couple 59.5 1.3 2.6 4.6 27.8 4.1 with kids 67.7 1.3 4.1 5.1 18.7 3 with brothers and/ 60.1 1.5 2.9 1.5 30.9 3.1 or sisters with grandparents 61.65 1 0.8 0.2 32.1 4.25
207 Language use within the family. 2003 Survey
with other family 55.9 9.7 3.1 2.8 24 3.5 0.9 members Ibiza and at home 25.9 4.7 5.5 8.9 47.2 7.7 Formentera with mother 35.2 0.4 0.6 0.5 52.1 9.9 1.3 with father 35 1.7 0.4 0.7 51.8 7.9 2.5 with couple 27.2 1.4 1.4 6.2 58.8 5.1 with kids 33.8 2.1 4.2 6.9 46.8 6.2 with brothers and/ 34.4 0.7 0.6 2.7 54.6 7 or sisters with grandparents 38.65 0.55 0.45 0.35 52.05 8.05 with other family 29.3 7.2 2.7 4.2 46.3 9.4 0.9 members
Age
15-29 at home 27.7 4.1 6.1 8.8 46.8 6.5 with mother 31.9 0.9 1.5 2.1 55.6 7.9 0.2 with father 33 1.9 1.6 1.9 55.4 5 1.2 with couple 24.8 2.6 4.2 6.4 58.6 3.4 with kids 25.9 0.8 5.4 18.1 41.7 8.1 with brothers and/ 31.3 0.7 2.3 4.1 56.4 5.2 or sisters with grandparents 35.1 0.95 1.05 0.75 55.65 6.45 with other family 26 6.6 6.6 6.4 46.9 7 0.4 members 30-44 at home 36.2 5.1 7.5 10.6 35.6 5 with mother 39.7 0.9 0.6 1.2 50.5 6.7 0.4 with father 40 1.1 0.9 1.3 49.3 6.1 1.2 with couple 36.5 2.1 2 7.7 48 3.7 with kids 42.3 3.3 5.7 7.6 37.5 3.6 with brothers and/ 39.1 1.9 1.2 1.8 51 5 or sisters with grandparents 43 0.6 0.4 0.25 49.1 6.7 with other family 35.8 6.9 5 5 42.1 4.6 0.6 members 45-64 at home 39.3 4.9 6.5 8.1 34.3 6.9 with mother 43.4 0.7 0.9 0.6 44.9 8.7 0.9 with father 43.5 1.1 0.4 0.6 44.5 8.6 1.3 with couple 39.7 1.8 3.2 6.1 42 7.3
208 Language use within the family. 2003 Survey
with kids 43.1 2.6 4.1 4.8 39.2 6.1 with brothers and/ 43.7 1.2 1.7 1.8 43.9 7.8 or sisters with grandparents 46.8 0.45 0.5 0.15 43.4 8.7 with other family 40.1 6.6 3.9 3.2 36.9 8.1 1.2 members 65 and over at home 61.1 5.8 3.6 3.9 20 5.5 with mother 65 1.1 0.7 0.4 25 5.8 2 with father 64.3 1 0.7 0.1 25.6 5.9 2.4 with couple 63.1 2.2 2.7 2.1 24.1 5.9
with kids 59.8 2.2 3.9 2.1 25.5 6.4 with brothers and/ 67 1.2 1.4 0.8 25.1 4.5 or sisters with grandparents 71.45 0.5 0 0 23.85 4.25 with other family 61.4 6.4 2.9 1.7 21.1 5.2 1.3 members
Gender
Male at home 37.4 4.5 5.8 8.6 36.9 6.7 with mother 41.7 0.8 0.8 1 48.2 7 0.5 with father 42.4 1.3 0.8 0.9 47.5 6.1 1 with couple 38.3 2 2.6 5.6 46.5 5 with kids 46 2.7 5.1 4.2 36.7 5.3 with brothers and/ 42.6 0.9 1.4 2.5 47.9 4.7 or sisters with grandparents 44.4 0.55 0.55 0.35 47.8 6.3 with other family 37.8 6.7 4.8 4.6 39.5 6.1 0.7 members Female at home 37.7 5.2 6.9 8.6 36.4 5.2 with mother 43.9 1 1 1.2 44.1 7.8 1 with father 43.8 1.3 1.1 1.2 44 6.8 1.8 with couple 40 2.3 3.2 6.4 43.1 5 with kids 45.9 2.7 4.3 7.1 34.6 5.4 with brothers and/ 43.1 1.7 1.9 2 44.6 6.7 or sisters with grandparents 47.8 0.8 0.5 0.3 43.4 7.15 with other family 39.4 6.7 4.8 4.1 37.5 6.5 1.1 members
209 Language use within the family. 2003 Survey
Own language
Catalan at home 78.3 8.1 6.1 3.6 2.7 1.2 with mother 87.7 1.4 1 0.8 7.4 0.8 0.9 with father 87.7 1.4 0.9 0.9 7.8 0.4 1 with couple 78.1 3.3 2.4 3.5 11.3 1.4 with kids 87.5 3.4 2.8 2.6 3 0.8 with brothers and/ 88.8 1.7 1.8 1.4 5.8 0.5 or sisters with grandparents 89.55 0.6 0.6 0.2 8.5 0.5 with other family 77.8 12.4 4.7 1.7 2.1 0.7 0.5 members Spanish at home 2.4 1.7 5 13.6 73.1 4.2 with mother 3 0.3 0.7 0.9 90.5 4.2 0.4 with father 3.4 1 0.9 1.2 89.3 2.7 1.5 with couple 4.5 0.9 3 8.5 80 2.4 with kids 4.4 2.2 5.2 9.4 75.8 3 with brothers and/ 3.1 0.7 1.1 2.6 90.7 1.8 or sisters with grandparents 5 0.75 0.3 0.45 89.9 3.55 with other family 3.5 1.4 4 6.8 80.5 3 0.8 members Both at home 28 9.9 31.7 13.7 15.7 1 with mother 36.2 1.9 3.7 9.3 43.8 2.7 2.2 with father 34.8 5.1 3.8 3.3 42.3 1.9 5.3 with couple 36.4 6.2 9.6 7.7 39.5 0.6 with kids 39.5 3.2 25.1 9.7 22.5 0 with brothers and/ 37 4.1 8.7 10.7 38.6 1 or sisters with grandparents 51.1 1.25 2.55 0.45 42.25 2.5 with other family 36.8 9.4 19.6 12.5 17.9 1.7 2.1 members Other at home 0 0 1.1 2.5 20.5 75.9 with mother 1.2 0 0 0 1.6 96.2 0.9 with father 1.7 0 0 0 1.2 95.1 2.1
with couple 1.4 0 2.1 4.2 29.3 63 with kids 2.1 0 1.4 1.7 14.2 80.6
210 Language use within the family. 2003 Survey with brothers and/ 0.7 0.5 0 0 1.7 97 or sisters with grandparents 2.3 0 0.45 0 2.45 94.85 with other family 1.7 0.2 0.7 0 7.2 86.6 3.6 members
211 Appendix G
Percentages of language use in other contexts
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
Language use in other contexts. 2003 Survey
Only More More Only Same Other N/A Catalan Catalan Spanish Spanish Balearic classmates 23.1 9.8 10.6 6.7 41.8 5.6 2.4 Islands co-workers 19.7 12.0 13.8 8.7 30.7 5.2 9.9 stores 26.3 14.5 9.9 9.7 38.2 0.2 1.2 bank 36.4 9.6 6.8 5.1 39.0 0.1 3.0 doctor 27.6 8.9 9.0 6.8 46.6 0.2 0.8 Place of birth Born in the classmates 36.5 15.2 14.3 9.4 21.6 0.7 2.4 linguistic area co-workers 31.0 17.3 16.5 9.1 11.9 2.6 11.5 stores 39.6 21.9 12.1 9.8 14.8 0.1 1.7 bank 55.5 13.9 8.3 4.0 14.2 0.0 4.1 doctor 42.9 13.8 11.8 7.5 23.2 0.0 0.9 Born elsewhere classmates 3.2 1.6 5.1 2.7 72.0 13.0 2.4 co-workers 2.8 3.9 9.8 7.9 58.8 9.2 7.6 stores 6.6 3.3 6.5 9.4 73.3 0.5 0.4 bank 8.0 3.2 4.5 6.7 76.0 0.2 1.5 doctor 4.9 1.7 4.7 5.8 81.6 0.6 0.7 Place of residence Badía de Palma classmates 15.0 7.2 11.2 8.1 50.3 6.0 2.3 co-workers 13.2 9.3 14.0 10.2 37.4 5.9 9.9 stores 18.2 11.8 9.2 11.1 48.3 0.3 1.1 bank 27.7 8.2 6.4 6.2 48.3 0.1 3.1 doctor 21.2 6.6 8.5 7.5 55.2 0.2 0.8 Rest of classmates 34.6 12.2 9.7 4.9 31.3 5.0 2.3 Majorca co-workers 28.4 15.6 13.4 6.6 21.8 4.5 9.6 stores 39.0 17.0 9.6 8.2 24.3 0.3 1.7 bank 50.5 11.3 5.9 3.4 25.8 0.0 3.0 doctor 40.1 12.5 9.0 4.7 32.5 0.4 0.7 Minorca classmates 34.5 17.3 9.9 5.0 26.9 4.0 2.4 co-workers 34.3 19.4 10.7 4.9 18.9 3.3 8.6 stores 43.6 22.4 7.8 5.0 20.7 0.0 0.5 bank 51.3 12.8 7.1 2.6 23.7 0.0 2.6 doctor 39.4 14.6 9.7 6.9 28.6 0.0 0.8 Ibiza and classmates 16.1 7.9 11.1 7.7 47.4 6.9 3.1 Formentera co-workers 11.3 7.5 16.1 10.8 36.9 5.9 11.6 stores 12.1 12.5 14.8 11.2 48.6 0.3 0.5 bank 22.3 8.0 10.5 7.0 48.9 0.4 3.1
212 Language use in other contexts. 2003 Survey
doctor 11.2 4.2 10.0 9.8 63.4 0.3 1.2
Age
15-29 classmates 12.3 115.0 18.8 11.0 43.7 2.3 0.4 co-workers 9.6 6.5 9.2 7.1 25.7 22.2 19.7 stores 19.3 10.5 11.2 11.3 47.0 0.1 0.6 bank 25.9 7.7 6.1 6.4 46.3 0.2 7.4 doctor 20.3 5.7 7.5 8.7 56.7 0.0 0.9 30-44 classmates 20.4 11.0 10.7 7.4 44.3 5.8 0.5 co-workers 18.1 12.8 16.7 10.0 34.7 6.4 1.3 stores 22.5 15.5 10.9 12.1 37.8 0.4 0.8 bank 33.8 9.9 8.3 7.3 39.9 0.0 0.8 doctor 25.0 9.6 9.6 7.2 47.7 0.0 0.9 45-64 classmates 26.4 8.0 5.9 3.7 44.4 8.5 3.0 co-workers 19.0 14.3 13.1 8.1 29.7 11.2 4.7 stores 27.9 15.5 9.3 8.3 37.8 0.3 1.0 bank 38.0 11.5 6.8 3.0 39.1 0.2 1.5 doctor 28.4 10.1 9.7 5.7 44.3 0.7 1.1 65 and over classmates 40.2 7.4 4.6 3.4 30.0 6.1 8.1 co-workers 31.3 10.5 11.0 5.4 18.1 14.4 9.4 stores 42.1 17.2 6.8 4.8 25.7 0.2 3.1 bank 55.4 8.8 5.2 2.3 25.5 0.0 2.7 doctor 43.1 10.9 8.9 4.7 31.9 0.4 0.1
Gender
Male classmates 22.7 10.9 11.4 6.7 41.1 5.0 2.1 co-workers 17.5 13.6 15.3 8.7 31.9 5.3 7.7 stores 24.2 15.7 10.1 9.8 38.5 0.4 1.4 bank 35.0 10.0 7.7 5.3 39.0 0.2 2.8 doctor 26.4 9.0 9.3 7.3 46.3 0.2 1.5 Female classmates 23.5 8.6 9.7 6.7 42.6 6.2 2.7 co-workers 21.9 10.3 12.3 8.6 19.6 5.2 12.1 stores 28.4 13.3 9.7 9.6 38.0 0.1 1.0 bank 37.8 9.1 5.9 4.9 39.1 0.0 3.3 doctor 28.9 8.8 8.6 6.3 46.9 0.3 0.2
Own language
Catalan classmates 46.3 18.9 13.2 7.2 10.4 0.7 3.2 co-workers 39.2 20.9 16.8 7.7 3.5 2.4 9.5 stores 51.0 26.0 11.2 7.1 3.3 0.1 1.4 bank 69.5 16.5 6.7 1.6 2.2 0.0 3.5 doctor 54.0 17.0 12.1 6.0 10.1 0.0 0.8 Spanish classmates 2.4 1.3 7.2 6.7 78.2 2.2 2.0 co-workers 3.0 3.4 10.2 10.2 59.7 3.3 10.2 stores 4.7 3.3 7.9 12.7 70.3 0.1 1.0 bank 6.4 3.0 5.9 8.9 72.8 0.1 2.9 doctor 4.0 1.6 5.1 7.8 80.7 0.0 0.9 Catalan and classmates 21.5 13.4 30.8 9.9 21.1 2.7 0.6 Spanish co-workers 10.9 19.1 35.5 7.5 12.3 3.2 11.5 stores 24.4 26.2 24.9 8.7 13.1 0.4 2.4
213 Language use in other contexts. 2003 Survey
bank 41.0 15.2 24.5 5.2 11.1 0.0 2.9 doctor 28.6 8.7 26.6 12.6 22.0 0.0 1.5 Other classmates 1.2 0.7 1.5 0.0 15.4 80.8 0.3 co-workers 0.0 2.7 2.7 3.9 31.0 49.1 10.6 stores 0.9 1.5 5.1 6.0 84.0 2.6 0.0 bank 4.2 2.0 2.5 1.7 88.5 0.8 0.2 doctor 2.0 1.0 2.4 1.0 88.3 4.7 0.6
214 Appendix H
Percentages of reactions to someone replying in a language other than
the one they use (Minorca)
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
% Reactions to replying in another language
Ask if they can Continue in the Continue in the Stop the continue in the N/A No response same language other language conversation same language Ask in Catalan and answer in 12.9 73.1 0.2 8.3 4.4 1.1 Spanish Ask in Spanish and answer in 17.2 67.7 0.1 6.6 7.3 1.1 Catalan
215 Appendix I
Percentages of use of Catalan rate
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
Use of Catalan
0% 1%-25% 26%-49% 50% 51%-75% 76%-99% 100% No answer TOTAL
Balearic 21.8 19.2 8.1 9.1 11.5 23.7 5.6 0.9 100 Islands Place of birth Born in the linguistic 4.3 11.9 8.6 11.3 16.8 37.3 8.4 1.3 100 area Born 47.9 30.2 7.4 5.9 3.6 3.4 1.3 0.3 100 elsewhere Place of residence Badía de 27.7 22.9 9.4 9.8 10.6 15.6 3.5 0.6 100 Palma Rest of 13.9 13.8 5.3 9.2 13 34.2 9.1 1.7 100 Majorca Minorca 13.8 10.9 6.4 5.9 14 41.2 7.4 0.5 100 Ibiza and 25.9 25.1 11.9 8.8 9.7 14.9 3.1 0.5 100 Formentera Age 15-29 18.8 31.5 12.8 7.2 12.9 15.9 0.9 0 100 30-44 21.8 21.2 8 10.1 13.2 22.6 2.7 0.4 100 45-64 26.6 13.6 6.6 10.6 9.8 16.3 5.8 0.7 100 65 and over 19.2 4.7 3.3 8 9 34.1 18 3.9 100 Gender Male 20 21.5 9.5 8.1 13.2 22.9 4 0.7 100 Female 23.6 16.9 6.8 10.1 9.9 24.4 7.1 1.1 100 Own language Catalan 0.2 1.8 4.6 10.4 21.3 49 10.9 1.7 100 Spanish 40.8 36.4 11.4 6.3 2.4 1.4 1.2 0.1 100 Catalan and 0.6 8.3 17.1 36 17.3 17.8 1.9 0.9 100 Spanish Other 61.7 30.5 3.2 1.8 1.3 0.6 0 0.9 100
216 Appendix J
Percentages of opinions of the presence of the languages compulsory
education
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
Opinion on languages in education
Catalan only Mostly Catalan Both equally Mostly Spanish Spanish only
Balearic Islands 8.5 18.5 51.2 14.8 7
Place of birth Born in the 12.2 24.6 47.9 10.4 5 linguistic area Born elsewhere 3 9.5 56.2 21.4 9.9 Place of residence Badía de Palma 6.8 15.8 55.1 14.8 7.5 Rest of Majorca 13.1 23.3 44.8 12.9 5.8 Minorca 6.3 24 53.8 11.3 4.5 Ibiza and 4.2 12.6 51.2 22.2 9.7 Formentera Age 15-29 7.7 23.9 48.8 14.2 5.3 30-44 8.3 19.4 53.1 14.3 4.9 45-64 9.3 15.2 51.7 16.3 7.6 65 and over 8.7 13.1 50.8 14.3 13.1 Gender Male 8.5 18.9 50.6 14.7 7.2 Female 8.4 18.2 51.8 14.9 6.8 Own language Catalan 14.9 29.2 44.2 8 3.8 Spanish 3.5 10 58.4 18.8 9.3 Catalan and 3.5 14.2 62 16.5 3.8 Spanish Other 0.4 4.3 40.9 37.3 17.1
217 Appendix K
Percentages of agreement with the statement: “In the Balearic Islands,
everyone should know Catalan/Spanish”
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
% Opinion on knowledge of Catalan/Spanish in the Balearic Islands
Disagree Agree completely Mostly agree Mostly disagree completely Balearic Islands Catalan 55.8 27.6 10.5 6.1 Spanish 66.1 22.9 8.2 2.8 Place of birth Born in the Catalan 62.9 26.6 7.2 3.3 linguistic area Spanish 62.6 26.4 8.5 2.6 Born elsewhere Catalan 45.2 29.0 15.4 10.3 Spanish 71.3 17.8 7.7 3.2 Place of residence Badía de Palma Catalan 52.8 28.1 12.2 6.9 Spanish 67.3 21.9 7.7 3.1 Rest of Majorca Catalan 62.6 24.6 7.7 5.2 Spanish 63.4 24.8 9.0 2.8 Minorca Catalan 58.7 29.0 8.9 3.4 Spanish 66.3 24.0 7.2 2.5 Ibiza and Catalan 48.0 32.4 12.2 7.4 Formentera Spanish 68.0 21.3 8.4 2.3 Age 15-29 Catalan 43.3 37.5 12.2 7.0 Spanish 56.9 29.9 9.8 3.4 30-44 Catalan 50.9 30.1 12.2 6.8 Spanish 62.7 24.2 10.0 3.1 45-64 Catalan 62.7 22.2 9.9 5.2 Spanish 71.2 20.3 6.6 2.0 65 and over Catalan 75.2 14.7 5.4 4.6 Spanish 79.0 13.4 4.8 2.8 Gender Male Catalan 53.0 28.2 10.6 8.2 Spanish 63.4 24.6 8.5 3.5 Female Catalan 58.7 26.9 10.4 4.0 Spanish 68.7 21.3 7.8 2.1
218 % Opinion on knowledge of Catalan/Spanish in the Balearic Islands
Own language Catalan Catalan 71.5 22.6 4.4 1.6 Spanish 62.0 26.8 8.6 2.6 Spanish Catalan 42.8 31.6 15.7 9.9 Spanish 68.7 19.8 8.0 3.5 Catalan and Catalan 51.3 34.6 10.7 3.4 Spanish Spanish 65.5 24.0 8.4 2.1 Other Catalan 34.5 31.8 18.9 14.7 Spanish 78.7 15.2 6.1 0.0
219 Appendix L
Percentages of agreement with the statement: “Only those that can
speak the language of the Balearic Islands are fully from Majorca,
Minorca, Ibiza and Formentera”
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
% Opinion on the need to know the language to be Balearic. 2003 Survey
Agree completely Mostly agree Mostly disagree Disagree completely
Balearic Islands 22.8 15.2 22.8 39.2
Place of birth Born in the linguistic 25.6 16.4 23.9 34.2 area Born elsewhere 18.5 13.6 21.2 46.7 Place of residence Badía de Palma 20 13.1 22.6 44.3 Rest of Majorca 26.8 17.3 22.8 33.1 Minorca 22.8 16.6 26.9 33.8 Ibiza and Formentera 23.1 17.3 20.8 38.7 Age 15-29 17 18.5 26.7 37.8 30-44 15 13.8 24.6 46.6 45-64 24.1 14.5 21 40.4 65 and over 47.6 13.5 15 23.9 Gender Male 23 15.1 21.8 40 Female 22.5 15.4 23.8 38.3 Own language Catalan 30.1 18.1 24.8 27 Spanish 15.9 11.5 21 51.6 Catalan and Spanish 17.6 9.4 27.2 45.8 Other 23.3 28.1 18.6 30
220 Appendix M
Percentages of opinions about the need to extend the use of Catalan or
Spanish
Source: 2003 Sociolinguistic Survey
Opinion on the use of the languages. 2003 Survey
More Catalan More Spanish No change
Balearic Islands 43.2 9.5 47.3
Place of birth
Born in the linguistic area 56 5.4 38.6 Born elsewhere 23.6 15.8 60.5 Place of residence Badía de Palma 42.9 9 48.1 Rest of Majorca 49.8 9.8 40.4 Minorca 36.3 7.7 56 Ibiza and Formentera 31.9 12.1 55.9 Age 15-29 43.7 8.5 47.9 30-44 45.1 9.8 45.1 45-64 45 9.6 45.4 65 and over 35.7 10.7 53.6 Gender Male 44 9 47 Female 42.5 10 47.5 Own language Catalan 64.4 3.4 32.2 Spanish 25.3 13.3 61.4 Catalan and Spanish 37.6 8.5 53.9 Other 13.9 31.6 54.5
221 Appendix N
Peninsular Immigration to Minorca during 2007
Source: Institut Balear d’Estadística
Peninsular Immigration to Minorca during 2007
Autonomic Community Migrated population Andalusia 551 Aragon 66 Asturias 63 Canary Islands 149 Cantabria 10 Castilla y León 143 Castilla la Mancha 92 Catalonia 1308 Valencian Community 330 Extremadura 68 Galicia 191 Madrid 401 Murcia 112 Navarra 16 Basque Country 56 Rioja 8 Ceuta and Melilla 15 Own language Catalan 64.4 Spanish 25.3 Catalan and Spanish 37.6 Other 13.9
222 Appendix O
Part I of the interview: Language history
EL INVESTIGADOR LO ADMINISTRARÁ DE FORMA ORAL
Número de Participante: ______
Historia Personal Fecha de nacimiento ¿Dónde has nacido? ¿Cuántos años has pasado en zonas de habla menorquina? ¿Cuántos años has pasado en zonas de habla castellana? Escriba una lista de los lugares en los que ha vivido y cuantos años.
2) ¿Como prefieres llamar a la lengua que hablas normalmente “catalán o menorquín”? ¿Por qué?
Historia de Lenguas
√Marque todas las que son aplicables Castellano Menorquín
¿Cuál es tu primera legua(s)?
¿Qué lengua(s) consideras tu lengua nativa?
¿Qué lenguas se hablaban en tu casa cuando eras pequeño (de los 0 a los 8 años)? En qué lenguas se impartían las clases en PRIMARIA?
… y en el INSTITUTO?
… y en la UNIVERSIDAD?
¿A qué edad empezaste a aprender tu segunda lengua? ¿En qué contexto?
223 Usa la escala en (1) para contestar a las siguientes preguntas sobre el uso de las lenguas. 9. Todos los días, casi todo el día 10. Todos los días, esporándicamente a lo largo del día 11. Pocas veces a la semana 12. Una vez a la semana 13. Una o dos veces al mes 14. Una o dos veces al año 15. Cada unos años 16. Nunca
¿En castellano? ¿En menorquín?
Con qué frecuencia escribes Con qué frecuencia hablas Con que frecuencia escuchas música Con qué frecuencia lees periódicos, revistas o libros
Con qué frecuencia ves programas de televisión y películas Con qué frecuencia visitas zonas de habla castellana sólo?
Utiliza la escala (2 de la tarjeta) para contestar a las siguientes preguntas sobre el uso de lenguas.
1.Todo Menorquín 2.Más Menorquín que Castellano 3.La misma cantidad 4.Más Castellano que Menorquín 5.Todo Castellano 6.Otra (especifica) Número de respuesta En tu residencia actual, ¿qué lengua se usa más? ¿En qué lengua hablas más con tus amigos más cercanos? ¿En qué lengua hablas más con tus compañeros de clase? ¿En qué lengua hablas más con tus compañeros de trabajo? Escribe una lista de tu familia más cercana e indica la lengua en la que hablas a cada persona, y la lengua en la que cada uno te habla, refiriéndote a escala (2 en la tarjeta).
1.Todo Menorquín 2.Más Menorquín que Castellano 3.La misma cantidad 4.Más Castellano que Menorquín 5.Todo Castellano 6.Otra (especifica) ¿Quién? Lengua en la que hablas con esta Lengua en la que esta persona te Di: Relación y edad persona habla. Escribe: el número de respuesta Escribe: El número de respuesta
224 Usa la escala (mostrar tarjeta) para estimar tu habilidad lingüística en castellano y menorquín (1 es mínima, 4 es moderada, 7 es habilidad comparable a la de un nativo).
En Castellano En Menorquín Tu habilidad para HABLAR …ENTENDER … ESCRIBIR … LEER … PRONUNCIAR … GRAMÁTICA … HABILIDAD TOTAL
2) ¿Te sientes satisfecho con tu habilidad en cada lengua o te gustaría mejorar una? cuál? en qué?
225 Appendix P
Part II of the interview: Ethnolinguistic Interview
1. Noticias recientes: medusas, fútbol, tiempo… Has oido en las noticias que xxx. ¿Qué opinas? 2. Demografía: ¿Dónde has nacido? ¿En qué fecha? ¿Cuánto tiempo has vivido ahí? ¿Has vivido en algún otro lugar? ¿A qué edad te mudaste? 3. Vecindario: Mucha gente dice que ha habido muchos cambios en la vida en los vecindarios en los últimos años. ¿Has notado cambios en el tiempo que llevas viviendo aquí? ¿Qué cambios? ¿Te gustan? Describe tu barrio ahora. ¿Cómo era antes? La gente suele querer cambios en su ciudad/barrio. ¿Qué te gustaría cambiar? Describe tu ciudad ahora. ¿Cómo ha cambiado? ¿Qué te gustaría q cambiara? 4. Estudios ¿Has tenido la oportunidad de ir a la escuela? ¿A qué edad? ¿Cuánto tiempo has asistido? ¿Dónde estaba la escuela? ¿Cómo ibas a clase, andando, en coche,…? ¿Cómo era un día normal en la escuela? ¿Tienes un profesor que te marcó positivamente? ¿Cómo era? ¿Y uno que no te gustara mucho? ¿Por qué? ¿Cómo era? 1) ¿Como prefiere llamar a la lengua que hablas normalmente “catalán o menorquín”? ¿Por qué? ¿En qué lengua eran las clases? ¿Tenías un grupo de amigos en la clase con los que jugaras en el recreo o por la tarde? ¿Cuántos erais? ¿Cómo eran tus amigos? ¿A qué jugabais? ¿Cómo se jugaba? A mi me encantaba jugar al escondite. ¿Cuánto tenías que contar cuando te la quedabas? ¿Tenías algún amigo que hiciera trampas? ¿Qué hacía? ¿Le dijiste algo alguna vez? ¿Qué? ¿En qué lengua hablabais? ¿Habéis hecho alguna travesura alguna vez? ¿Os pillaron? ¿Cómo os castigaron? ¿Alguna vez te han castigado o reñido por algo que no hubieras hecho? ¿Qué pasó? ¿Has ido al instituto? ¿Cómo era? ¿Notaste un cambio del colegio al instituto? ¿Cómo eran tus profesores? ¿En qué lengua eran las clases? ¿y tus compañeros, cómo eran? ¿En qué lengua hablas con tus compañeros? ¿Tenías un grupo de amigos ahí? ¿Qué hacíais después de clase? ¿Os metíais en líos? ¿Qué hacíais? ¿Os han pillado alguna vez? ¿Cómo fue? ¿Y a la universidad? ¿Dónde has ido? ¿Echabas de menos la isla? ¿Qué echabas más de menos? ¿Qué te gustaba más de xxxx? ¿Cómo eran las clases? ¿Te gustaban todas? ¿En qué lengua se impartían las clases? ¿Cómo eran los profesores? ¿Y los compañeros? ¿En qué lengua hablabas con ellos? ¿Con quién vivías? ¿Cómo encontraste casa? ¿Te gustaba? 5. Trabajo ¿Trabajas? ¿A qué te dedicas? ¿Cuánto llevas en este trabajo? ¿En qué consiste un día normal en tu trabajo? ¿Qué es lo que más te gusta de tu trabajo? ¿y lo qué menos? ¿Qué tal te llevas con tus compañeros? ¿Les conocías de antes? ¿En qué lengua habláis? ¿Has tenido alguna anécdota divertida en el trabajo? 6. Familia: ¿De dónde son tus padres? ¿Han vivido allí toda su vida?
226 ¿Dónde viven tus hermanos? ¿De dónde es tu marido/mujer? ¿Con q frecuencia os veís? describe tradiciones familiares. 7. Cumpleaños: ¿Cómo se celebran los cumpleaños aquí? ¿Celebran más los cumpleaños o los santos? ¿Cómo los celebran en su casa? 8. Comida ¿Cuál es tu plato favorito? ¿Lo sabes hacer? ¿Cómo se hace? ¿Cuál es tu plato estrella? ¿Qué platos típicos hay en Menorca? ¿Cómo son? ¿Cómo se hacen? 9. Tradiciones 10. Viajes 11. Aficiones/camping 12. Última película 13. Uso de lenguas
227 Appendix Q
Part III of the interview: Survey of language attitudes and ideologies
(1) Scalar items referencing language use and language loyalty a. ¿Le gustaría hablar más No Sí en castellano? 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ¿y en menorquín? 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 b. lk¿Qué importancia tienen las dos lenguas para usted? Muy poca Mucha castellano 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 menorquín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 c. lk¿En su opinión, qué importancia tienen las dos lenguas en Menorca? Muy poca Mucha castellano 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 menorquín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 d. ¿En su opinión, qué lengua es más bonita? Poco bonita Muy bonita castellano 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 menorquín 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 e. ¿Qué importancia tiene para usted poder hablar menorquín en todos los ámbitos? Muy poca Mucha 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 f. ¿Qué importancia tiene para sus hijos poder hablar menorquín (si tiene hijos)? Muy poca Mucha 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 g. ¿Qué importancia tiene para usted poder hablar castellano? Muy poca Mucha 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 h. ¿Qué importancia tiene para sus hijos poder hablar castellano (si tiene hijos)? Muy poca Mucha 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 i. Siento que un menorquín debe hablar catalán No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 j. Pienso que una persona que vive en Menorca debe hablar catalán No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ¿Cuántos años debe vivir para aprenderlo? ¿qué variedad del catalán debe hablar? ¿en qué situaciones debe hablarlo? ¿con quién? k. Me molesta que un menorquín me hable en castellano en lugar de menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
228 l. Me molesta que un castellano me hable en menorquín en vez de en castellano. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 m. Hablo con mucha gente que habla menorquín No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 n. Hablo con mucha gente que habla castellano No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 o. Hablo con mucha gente que habla otras lenguas. Cuáles? No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 p. Me gustaría hablar otras lenguas No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 q. Me molesta que la gente imite a los hablantes de catalán No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (2) Scalar items referencing language and identity a. ¿Se puede notar si alguien es menorquín por la forma en la que habla castellano? No Sí 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ¿Cuál consideras tu identidad: mahonés (o lo q sea), menorquín, balear, catalán, español, europeo? ¿xq? ¿cómo es un mahonés? y un menorquín? b. Hablar menorquín es un aspecto importante de mi identidad. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 c. La cultura menorquina es un aspecto importante de mi identidad. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 d. El castellano es un aspecto importante de mi identidad. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 e. La cultura española es un aspecto importante de mi identidad. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 f. Me ha alegrado mucho que la selección española haya ganado la copa de Europa No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 g. Me siento más menorquín que español. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 h. Me siento más catalán que español. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 i. Me siento más español que europeo No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ¿qué diferencias hay entre un menorquín y un mallorquín? ¿se notan las diferencias? ¿en qué? ¿y un catalán o valenciano? ¿y un peninsular?
229 j. Me molesta cuando un menorquín se case con un peninsular. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (3) Scalar items referencing language ‘mixing’ a. Me suena bien cuando alguien mezcla el castellano y el menorquín en la misma conversación. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 b. Me molesta que alguien hable castellano y menorquín en la misma conversación. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 c. En mi opinion, la mezcla de castellano y menorquín ayuda a mantener el menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 d. En mi opinion, la mezcla de castellano y menorquín contribuye a la pérdida del menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 e. A veces empiezo una frase en menorquín y la termino en castellano No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 f. A veces empiezo una frase en castellano y la termino en menorquín No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 g. Siempre hablo en la misma lengua con la misma persona No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 h. La mezcla de castellano y menorquín es una estrategia más a disposición de los bilingües No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (4) Scalar items referencing linguistic insecurity a. Prefiero que los niños pequeños me hablen en castellano. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 b. Prefiero que los niños pequeños me hablen en menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ¿En qué contextos prefieres que la gente te hable en castellano? ¿y en menorquín? banco, hospital, escuela, casa, tiendas,... c. Es difícil conocer y usar dos lenguas. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 d. Cuando hablo en mi segunda lengua, traduzco de la primera. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 e. Me siento más a gusto cuando hablo menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 f. Cuando hago una llamada, me siento incómodo si tengo que hablar en castellano. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 g. Cuando hago una llamada, me siento incómodo si tengo que hablar en menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
230 h. Cada vez que me encuentro con alguien que habla menorquín y le hablo en menorquín, me siento relajado. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 i. Me siento incómodo cuando alguien intenta hablarme en castellano. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 j. Me siento incómodo cuando alguien intenta hablarme en menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 k. En un restaurante, me siento cómodo cuando tengo que pedir la comida en castellano. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 l. En un restaurante, me siento cómodo cuando tengo que pedir la comida en menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (5) Scalar items referencing linguistic ideologies and languages policies a. Me encanta que las clases se den más en catalán que en castellano. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 b. Creo que los jóvenes no hablan bien en castellano. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 c. Creo que los jóvenes no hablan bien en menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 d. Creo q los jóvenes no hablan bien en catalán. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 e. Me molesta que los peninsulares que viven aquí no aprendan menorquín. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 f. El castellano de la Península es más correcto que el castellano que se habla aquí No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 g. El catalán de Cataluña es más correcto que el de aquí No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 h. La gente de aquí no hablan bien ni el catalán ni el castellano No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 i. Me gustaría que se usara más catalán en la tv, radio y prensa No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 j. Creo q el menorquín/catalán debería ser la única lengua oficial de Menorca No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 k. Me molesta que alguien hable en castellano con acento menorquín No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 l. Me molesta que alguien hable en menorquín con acento castellano No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
231 m. El menorquín es un dialecto del catalán No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 n. Me parece bien que se enseñe catalán en los colegios en vez de menorquín No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 o. Creo que el menorquín se va a perder porque se enseña catalán en los colegios. No estoy de acuerdo Totalmente de acuerdo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
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249 Ana de Prada Pérez ～ Vita
EDUCATION 2009 Ph.D. in Hispanic Linguistics, Minor in Linguistics Dissertation: Subject expression in Minorcan Spanish: Consequences of contact with Catalan Funding: National Science Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant 0746748 Committee: Almeida Jacqueline Toribio (chair), John Lipski, Barbara Bullock, J.-Marc Authier, and Nuria Sagarra 2005 M.A., Spanish Linguistics, The Pennsylvania State University 2003 B.A., English Philology, Universidad de Valladolid, Spain
PUBLICATIONS AND PRESENTATIONS 2009 Linguisitic Symposium of Romance Languages, University of Arizona “Variation in subject expression in Western Romance” 2008 Prada Pérez, Ana de. “The Intonation of Focused Negation and Affirmation in Spanish in Contact with Catalan.” In Selected Proceedings of the 10th Hispanic Linguistic Symposium, J. Bruhn de Garavito, M. Almazán, and E. Valenzuela (eds.). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press. 2008 Western Conference on Linguistics, UC Davis “Subject expression in monolingual Castilian Spanish” 2008 Boston University Conference on Language Development “The acquisition of subject expression in early Catalan-Spanish bilinguals: A case of convergence” 2008 Hispanic Linguistics Symposium, Laval University, Quebec, Canada “Subject expression in monolingual and bilingual Spanish” 2008 Linguisitic Symposium of Romance Languages, University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign “Contact Spanish word order patterns” 2007 International Symposium on Bilingualism, Hamburg University, Hamburg, Germany “Prosody and language contact: Evidence from Insular Iberian Romance” (With M. Simonet) “Intonation patterns in Spanish-English code-switching” (With B. Bullock, A. Roggia, and A.J. Toribio) 2006 The Hispanic Linguistics Symposium, University of Western Ontario, Canada “The intonation of focused negation and affirmation in Spanish in contact with Catalan” 2006 Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages, Rutgers University “Evidence for the continuum from narrow to peripheral syntax among monolinguals and bilingual speakers of Spanish” 2005 The Hispanic Linguistics Symposium & The Conference on Spanish and Portuguese as First and Second Languages, The Pennsylvania State University “The core versus peripheral grammars of heritage speakers of Spanish” (With G. Zapata, A.J. Toribio, and E. Suárez Büdenbender)
GRANTS AND AWARDS 2008 National Science Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Research [0746748] Minorcan Spanish: The Structural Consequences of Contact with Catalan 2008 Sparks Fellowship for Academic Excellence Department of Spanish, Italian and Portuguese; The Pennsylvania State University 2006 Teaching Excellence Award Department of Spanish, Italian and Portuguese; The Pennsylvania State University 2006 Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Department The Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese Graduate Student Organization; The Pennsylvania State University
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