First and Second Language Acquisition Commons^™

A Feedback Loop Of Exclusion: The Treatment Of Bilingualism In The Courtroom, Simone Stover

Northwestern University Law Review

In the 1991 case Hernandez v. New York, the United States Supreme Court characterized bilingualism as a race-neutral trait that can be used to exclude individuals from jury service. This Note proceeds by demonstrating how the current state of the law undermines the interests of bilingual individuals and then proposes a solution. Focusing specifically on Hispanic bilingual Spanish speakers, this Note first employs Professor Jennifer Lackey’s multi-directional credibility model to show that bilingual Spanish speakers suffer injustice in the courtroom due to both credibility deficits and excesses. Following this analysis, it proposes a possible solution to this issue: an …

When Would You Feel Like A Writer? Exploring Writing With Newcomer Students, Sinélia Peixoto, Thea Williamson

English Faculty Publications

The authors share a story of a middle school writer's experience navigating across languages in an English for Speakers of Other Languages support classroom.

Out Of The Mouths Of Babes: Children And The Formation Of The Rio De La Plata Spanish Address System, Israel Sanz-Sánchez, María Irene Moyna

Languages & Cultures Faculty Publications

This paper analyzes the effects of child language acquisition as a critical factor in a morphological change, namely, the replacement of the etymologically singular second person paradigm (tuteo) by its plural counterpart (voseo) in 19th century Rio de la Plata Spanish. The account applies a sociohistorical model which proposes that young children can function as language change agents in environments characterized by unpredictable input variation, lack of normative mechanisms, and the emergence of peer networks among young learners. The model is then applied to explain the rapid generalization of voseo in the late 1800s, a well-documented but poorly understood process. …

¿Cómo Se Dice...? The Spanish Use Of Hispanic College Students, Christopher Castaneda

Honors Theses

The Spanish language is very prominent in the United States. Millions of Spanishspeakers live there, and the use of the language in their day to day lives has augmented the presence of it in an otherwise Anglophone country. However, there are certain factors that may influence how often Spanish speakers actually use their language in this country. This study sought to analyze two: the existing anti-Hispanic attitudes in the United States and the parental/caretaker level of education of Spanish-speaking people. This study aimed to conduct an analysis of college-aged Hispanic students in order to conclude the extent to which those …

A Survey To Highlight Areas Of Focus For Patient Care In Settings Utilizing Medical Interpretation, Azayzel Deregis

Undergraduate Honors Theses

This thesis recounts my personal experience working as a volunteer medical interpreter for the Language and Culture Resource Center at East Tennessee State University. The result of my time spent volunteering as a medical interpreter, shadowing professional medical interpreters, and witnessing patient-provider interactions during interpreted sessions was an inspiration to study medical interpretation further and delve into the challenges faced by patients who require medical interpreters. During my time researching this topic, I found that the United States is severely lacking in Spanish medical interpreters—with some healthcare facilities employing no medical interpreters—even though the size of the Hispanic population is …

Aviation English In A Bilingual Context: Bilingual Spanish-English Pilots, Seneca Doty

Honors Projects

The purpose of this study is to investigate the use of English and Spanish in the applied context of aviation by researching pilot experiences in the cockpit within the register of aviation English. This study investigates pilot’s in-flight experiences in relation to language proficiency in the hopes of improving future standards of communication. Expounding on previous research with a focus on native Spanish speaking pilots, this research utilizes a Likert scale survey and demographic assessment to evaluate proficiencies inside the cockpit of bilingual Spanish-English participants. By determining each pilot´s use of English outside of the workplace as well as how …

Emotion Disclosure In Spanish And English Bilinguals, Maya Cohrssen-Hernandez

Scripps Senior Theses

Previous literature has identified a difference in emotion comprehension and production of bilinguals. This study aimed to explore differences in emotion expression in the first language (L1) and the second language (L2) among Spanish and English bilinguals. The bilingual participants were interviewed and asked to recount two frustrating events, one in their L1 and one in their L2. These interviews were analyzed for the occurrence of four semantic categories: emotion words (with a subcategory of negative emotion words), emotion-laden words, expressive interjections, and intensifiers that strengthen content words. The data indicated that Spanish and English bilinguals both used more emotion …

Student Perceptions Regarding The Use Of Purposive English In A Spanish As A Foreign Language Classroom, Kacey Booth

Dissertations

In modern American society, diversity is both challenged and celebrated, and inclusion is imperative. This ideology begins in the classroom. Oftentimes, this celebration of diversity, more specifically linguistic diversity, is most visible in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) classes and similar bilingual educational programs. In TESOL programs, students’ international identities are highlighted and students are often instructed using multilingual educational resources to scaffold their acquisition of English. Historically, foreign language teaching also utilized dual-language instructional methodologies. Such archaic teaching methodologies have since been replaced by more modern and immersive sociopsycholinguistic approaches such as Communicative Language Teaching. Such …

Acquiring Native-Like Norms Of Making A Request In Spanish During Short-Term Study Abroad In Argentina And Spain, Christine H. Song

LSU Master's Theses

The current study examines if L2 learners of Spanish acquire native-like norms of making a request during short-term study abroad in Argentina and Spain via Discourse Completion Tasks (DCT). The investigation included 3 groups of the participants: an experimental group of 15 U.S. students who studied in Argentina or Spain; a control group of 12 U.S. students who had not studied abroad; and a control group of 7 native speakers of Spanish. The results show that students in the study abroad group became more native-like in making a request to a certain extent. Firstly, the students in the experimental group …

The Processing Of Input With Differential Objectmarking By Heritage Spanish Speakers, Jill Jegerski, Irina A. Sekerina

Publications and Research

Heritage Spanish speakers and adult immigrant bilinguals listened to wh-questions with the differential object marker a (quién/a quién ‘who/whoACC’) while their eye movements across four referent pictures were tracked. The heritage speakers were less accurate than the adult immigrants in their verbal responses to the questions, leaving objects unmarked for case at a rate of 18%, but eye movement data suggested that the two groups were similar in their comprehension, with both starting to look at the target picture at the same point in the question and identifying the target sooner with a quién ‘whoACC’ than with quién ‘who’ questions.

Variable Neutralization Of The Tap/Trill Contrast In A Bilingual Spanish-Creole Community, Falcon Restrepo-Ramos

World Languages & Cultures Department Publications

No abstract provided.

Effects Of An Elementary Immersion Program On Academic Achievement In Core Subject Areas, Marlee Schmidt

Dissertations, Theses, and Projects

This study sought to find out if students who became bilingual score

higher, lower, or the same on standardized tests as their monolingual peers across

multiple disciplines. An answer was obtained by comparing the Minnesota

Comprehensive Assessment scores of Spanish language immersion students to

scores of non-immersion students for the following subject areas: reading in

grades 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 10; math in grades 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 11; and science

in 5, 8, and high school. The scores used came from a graduating class of 2018

with approximately 342 students. Data was analyzed …

Context Of Learning And Second Language Development Of Spanish Vowels, Avizia Long, Megan Solon, Silvina Bongiovanni

Faculty Publications

The present study explored development in Spanish vowel production during a short-term study abroad program. The production patterns of a group of learners studying abroad in a 4-week program in the Dominican Republic were compared in terms of overall vowel quality, tendency to diphthongize /e/ and /o/, and vowel duration to those of a similar group of learners studying in the at-home context. Results revealed no significant changes or differences between groups in vowel quality or diphthongization, but a significant improvement (i.e., reduction) in vowel duration for /a/, /o/, and /u/ for the at-home group only. Findings are discussed in …

Perception Of American–English Vowels By Early And Late Spanish–English Bilinguals, Miriam Baigorri, Luca Campanelli, Erika S. Levy

Publications and Research

Increasing numbers of Hispanic immigrants are entering the US and learning American–English (AE) as a second–language (L2). Previous studies investigating the relationship between AE and Spanish vowels have revealed an advantage for early L2 learners for their accuracy of L2 vowel perception. Replicating and extending such previous research, this study examined the patterns with which early and late Spanish–English bilingual adults assimilated naturally-produced AE vowels to their native vowel-inventory and the accuracy with which they discriminated the vowels. Twelve early Spanish–English bilingual, 12 late Spanish–English bilingual, and 10 monolingual listeners performed perceptual-assimilation and categorical-discrimination tasks involving AE /i,ɪ,ɛ,ʌ,æ,ɑ,o/. Early bilinguals …

Estas Rimas Son Para Ti: Exploring Learners Comprehension Of Spanish Language Music Containing Dialectical Features, Avizia Y. Long, Megan Harsh

Faculty Publications

This paper reports the findings of a study that examined native English‐speaking learners’ comprehension of Spanish language music containing Caribbean dialectal features. Twenty‐one learners enrolled in 300‐ and 400‐level Spanish content courses at a large, Midwestern public university in the US participated in this study. Each participant completed the following five tasks: (1) listening task, (2) listening task difficulty questionnaire, (3) vocabulary familiarity task, (4) Spanish language proficiency test, and (5) background questionnaire. The listening task contained short clips of Spanish language music, several of which contained dialectal features present in Caribbean speech and music. The results revealed that comprehension …

Effectively Teaching A Second Language: Principles And Practices, Alexander Gatica

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This portfolio is the amalgamation of the author’s research and experience during his time in the Master of Second Language Teaching program. The first section contains the Teaching Philosophy, which centers on applying effective teaching methods, increasing learner motivation, and incorporating technology into the classroom. The next section consists of three artifacts in which the author further investigates specific aspects of language teaching. The language paper focuses on the effect that identity has on motivation to learn a language. The literacy paper discusses how to increase vocabulary acquisition via a mobile-assisted language learning application called Duolingo. The culture paper addresses …

Native Language Adaptation To Novel Verb Argument Structures By Spanish-English Bilinguals: An Electrophysiological Investigation, Eve Higby

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Bilinguals have to learn two different grammatical systems. Some aspects of these grammars may be similar across the two languages (for example, the active-passive alternation) while others may exist in only one of the two grammars (for example, the distinction between recent and distant past). This dissertation investigates the degree to which grammar information specific to only one language is available when processing the other language. In particular, the current study focuses on the application of grammatical structures from the bilinguals’ second-learned language to their first-learned language, a direction of language transfer not often investigated. Based on a Shared Syntax …

Ideology, Access, And Status: Spanish-English Bilinguals In The Foreign-Language Classroom, Michael E. Rolland

Graduate Student Publications and Research

Spanish language teaching in US higher education is today generally divided between ‘foreign language’ courses for novice learners and ‘heritage language’ courses for Hispanic/Latinx students with some knowledge of the language. However, ‘heritage’ students are a linguistically diverse group, and are also often enrolled at institutions where heritage courses are not offered. Little research to date has studied ‘heritage’ speakers enrolled in ‘foreign’ language courses. For this study I conducted semi-structured interviews to explore the affective and ideological characteristics of bilingual students enrolled in elementary Spanish courses. As the literature suggests, I find that these students have a generally low …

Investigating The Effects Of A Parent-Mediated Intervention On Latino Parent-Child Verbal Interaction And Children's Receptive Vocabulary, Patricia G. Onorato

Theses and Dissertations

This study aimed to investigate parent-child verbal interactions in Spanish in a group of Latino preschoolers growing up in the United States through a parent-mediated program at home, and the effects of the program on their receptive vocabulary in Spanish. A single subject multiple baseline across participants design was used in the study. The participants were 3 Latino mothers and their sons, with low family income, living in the United States. The intervention taught the mothers strategies to enhance their children’s language through a sharing-book activity. The study lasted for 6 weeks during which baseline and intervention conditions data were …

What Predicts The Effectiveness Of Foreign Language Pronunciation Instruction?: Investigating The Role Of Perception And Other Individual Differences, Elizabeth M. Kissling

Latin American, Latino and Iberian Studies Faculty Publications

This study investigated second language (L2) learners’ perception of L2 sounds as an individual difference that predicted their improvement in pronunciation after receiving instruction. Learners were given explicit pronunciation instruction in a series of modules added to their Spanish as a foreign language curriculum and were then tested on their pronunciation accuracy. Their perception of the target sounds was measured with an AX discrimination task. Though the best predictor of pronunciation posttest score was pretest score, perception made a unique and significant contribution. The other factors associated with better pronunciation of some L2 sounds were time spent using Spanish outside …

L2 Perception Of Spanish Palatal Variants Across Different Tasks, Christine Shea, Jeffrey Renaud

Spanish: Faculty Scholarship & Creative Works

While considerable dialectal variation exists, almost all varieties of Spanish exhibit some sort of alternation in terms of the palatal obstruent segments. Typically, the palatal affricate [ɟʝ] tends to occur in word onset following a pause and in specific linear phonotactic environments. The palatal fricative [ʝ] tends to occur in syllable onset in other contexts. We show that listeners’ perceptual sensitivity to the palatal alternation depends upon the task and exposure to Spanish input. For native Spanish listeners, the palatal alternation boosts segmentation accuracy on an artificial speech segmentation task and also reduces latencies on a phonotactically-conditioned elision task. L2 …

Maternal Perceptions Of Agency In Intergenerational Transmission Of Spanish: The Case Of Latinos In The U.S. Midwest, Isabel Velázquez

Spanish Language and Literature Papers

This article examines the ways in which a group of first-generation Latino immigrants to the U.S. Midwest conceptualized their role in their children’s bilingual development. Respondents were asked to identify the individuals or institutions on which their children’s language and academic development depended, as well as household practices perceived as conducive to Spanish maintenance, and perceived obstacles to their children’s use of Spanish in the domains of home, school, and community. Discussion centers on maternal perceptions of agency because of the centrality of the mother in intergenerational minority language transmission. It is argued here that immigrant mothers’ perceptions of agency …

Teaching Pronunciation: Is Explicit Phonetics Instruction Beneficial For Fl Learners?, Elizabeth M. Kissling

Latin American, Latino and Iberian Studies Faculty Publications

Pronunciation instruction has been shown to improve learners’ L2 accent in some, though certainly not all, cases. A core component of traditional pronunciation instruction is explicit lessons in L2 phonetics. Studies suggest that Spanish FL learners improve their pronunciation after receiving instruction, but the effect of phonetics instruction has not been directly compared with other pedagogical alternatives. This study reports on the pronunciation gains that first, second, and third year learners (n = 95) made after receiving either explicit instruction in Spanish phonetics or a more implicit treatment with similar input, practice, and feedback. The target phones included a …

Phonological Facilitation Through Translation In A Bilingual Picture-Naming Task, Paul Amrhein, Aimee Knupsky

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

We present a critical examination of phonological effects in a picture-word interference task. Using a methodology minimizing stimulus repetition, English/Spanish and Spanish/English bilinguals named pictures in either L1 or L2 (blocked contexts) or in both (mixed contexts) while ignoring word distractors in L1 or L2. Distractors were either phonologically related to the picture name (direct; FISH–fist), or related through translation to the picture name (TT; LEG–milk–leche), or they were unrelated (bear–peach). Results demonstrate robust activation of phonological representations by translation equivalents of word distractors. Although both direct and TT distractors facilitated naming, TT facilitation was more consistent in L2 naming …

A Basic Survival English Course For Adult Spanish Speaking Migrant Workers, Elizabeth Ward Tannenbaum

MA TESOL Collection

This is a collection of basic survival English instructional materials for adult Spanish speaking migrant workers. The materials were developed under a U.S. Office of Education Right to read Grant through the Mid-Columbia regional Library in Kennewick, Washington from 1973-74 and were used in teaching migrant workers in the agricultural area of Eastern Washington.

The materials consist of an explanation of the program and 19 lessons, each based around a grammatical point. Each lesson includes dialogues relevant to the needs of adult migrants, picture and written handouts related to migrant needs, and an explanation of each lesson. All materials are …

Report On Six Week Summer Experience Teaching Puerto Rican Migrant Children In Springfield, Massachusetts, Amy Lepon

MA TESOL Collection

No abstract provided.

Teaching Language In-Country: A Report On The Use Of The Environment While Teaching Spanish At The Language Camp In Oaxtepec, Mexico, Jesus Burgos Marin

MA TESOL Collection

No abstract provided.

Materials In The Billingual Kindergarten: Student Teaching At The Carew Street School, Diane Wunderlich

MA TESOL Collection

No abstract provided.

A Report On Teaching Level One Esl To Children And Adults In Orizaba, Mexico, Katherine Bowen Riggs

MA TESOL Collection

No abstract provided.

Report On A Student Teaching Experience: Planning And Implementing An Individualized Spanish Program, Christine Lynn Maccormack

MA TESOL Collection

No abstract provided.