Language Contact

Language Sciences, 2004

This paper focuses on some of the theoretical assumptions presented in Enfield, 2003 (Review of ÔEnfield, N.J., 2003. Linguistic Epidemiology: Semantics and grammar of language contact in mainland Southeast Asia. Routledge Curzon, London and New York, pp. xv + 397Õ) and their consequences for contemporary linguistic theory. In particular, I revisit three fundamental dimensions underlying language contact: multilingual practices of speech communities, modes of transmission and typological diversity. These three dimensions, I argue, are not only the reasons for contact to occur but the fundamental driving forces behind language change (and variation) at large. In this view, the dichotomy typically presented as Ôcontact-inducedÕ or ÔexternalÕ vs. ÔnormalÕ or ÔinternalÕ change needs to be significantly revised, if not dissolved, since a non-idealized view of language change as the one advocated by Enfield presents us with a reality in which the role of contact can hardly ever be overlooked.

2008

Manual of Catalan Linguistics

Over the course of history, Catalan has come into contact with a number of Semitic and Indo-European languages. This chapter addresses the sociocultural dimension of language contact in the Catalan-speaking area. I adopt an ecological approach based on qualitative, ethnography-oriented, rather than quantitative methods. The effects of language contact can be seen in language patterns (e.g. interference), psychosocial patterns (e.g. language attitudes), and, sociocultural patterns (the community's "language economy"). Salient topics in this latter field are the social use of language (individual language choices as well as social patterns of functional distribution); interactional communicative practices (e.g. codeswitching); long-term sociocultural changes (e.g. language shift); technologies of language in the media. Nowadays the range of languages in contact has dramatically increased due to global demographic trends and immediate non-face-to-face, technology-based communication.

2008

Studies of contact have revealed that all kinds of language material can, in the right circumstances, be borrowed from one language to another. Detecting, describing, and analyzing such situations typically involve the detailed study of at least two languages. An alternative involves detecting contact situations through database analysis. This cannot supplant the detailed work that requires detailed descriptive work in particular fields, but can allow us to examine large enough samples of languages that we can start to better understand, through calibration against known histories and other non-linguistic data types, likelihoods of different ‘social contact’ scenarios resulting in different kinds of linguistic traces, and also allow for the more targeted investigation of specific areas and language-to-language interactions. I shall describe the method, and illustrate its application in a number of case studies in regions for which we have good samples of language data.

2014

Studies of contact have revealed that all kinds of language material can, in the right circumstances, be borrowed from one language to another. Detecting, describing, and analyzing such situations typically involve the detailed study of at least two languages. An alternative involves detecting contact situations through database analysis. This cannot supplant the detailed work that requires detailed descriptive work in particular fields, but can allow us to examine large enough samples of languages that we can start to better understand, through calibration against known histories and other non-linguistic data types, likelihoods of different 'social contact' scenarios resulting in different kinds of linguistic traces, and also allow for the more targeted investigation of specific areas and language-to-language interactions. I shall describe the method, and illustrate its application in a number of case studies in regions for which we have good samples of language data.

The Handbook of Language Contact, 2010

Handbücher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft / Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science (HSK)

Language and Linguistics Compass, 2019

The field of contact linguistics has long argued for the paramount importance of social factors in understanding the outcomes of linguistic contact. In contrast, linguistic ideologies have not played a central role in theories of language contact, though this has begun to change in recent decades. This article provides an account of early theorizations of linguistic ideologies and their increasingly important applications to the study of contact phenomena. A brief survey of more recent theoretical advancements with respect to ideologies and contact phenomena follows, paying special attention to studies in linguistic anthropology and variationist sociolinguistics. While recognizing the challenges inherent in the study of linguistic ideologies, this article argues that they should be at the foreground of contact linguistics. To this end, methodological tools for such study are presented, along with theoretical considerations and future directions.

John Benjamins, 2008

This new volume on language contact and contact languages presents cutting-edge research by distinguished scholars in the field as well as by highly talented newcomers. It has two principal aims: to analyze language contact from different perspectives – notably those of language typology, diachronic linguistics, language acquisition and translation studies; and to describe, explain, and elaborate on universal constraints on language contact. The individual chapters offer systematic comparisons of a wealth of contact situations and the book as a whole makes a valuable contribution to deepening our understanding of contact-induced language change. With its broad approach, this work will be welcomed by scholars of many different persuasions.

The Cambridge Handbook of Heritage Languages and Linguistics, 2021

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. ISBN: 978-1-107-00196-1, hardback only, xvi + 388 pp.

general discussion pertaining to the most important topics in the awesome study of sociolinguistics

Revista Alicantina de Estudios Inglesess

The aims of this volume are twofold: to contribute to the study of English as a contact language and its various manifestations in World Englishes, and to explore the causes and effects of the influence and diffusion of English in several languages, with particular reference to Spanish.As Schreier and Hundt (2013: 1) have noted, the English language “has been contact derived from its very beginnings” and to this we can add that due to its rapid and far reaching extension, leading to its current role as a global contact language (Görlach, 2002), it continues to be closely connected to a wide range of communities of speakers and languages across the world. In fact, as Onysko (2016: 192) claims, "the notion of language contact emerges as a valid candidate for being a unifying characteristic of all Englishes".