Psychology 2134A/B Chapter Notes - Chapter 9: Second-Language Acquisition, Heritage Language, Mutual Intelligibility

• School: Western University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: Psychology 2134A/B
• Professor: Sarah Smits- Bandstra

Document Summary

Balanced bilingual a person who grows up speaking two languages and can communicate equally well in either language. Linguists avoid the language dialect conundrum altogether by assessing mutual intelligibility the degree to which speakers of two different languages or dialects can understand each other: danes and swedes interchangeable one way but not both ways. The first generation speaks the heritage language the language spoken in an immigrant"s country of origin: english rarely becomes their dominant language. The second generation generally grows up bilingual: because of strong economic and social pressure, english usually becomes the dominant language, strong preference for english and frequently marries outside of the heritage group. The third generation as a result, usually grow up as monolingual english speakers. In many areas of the world, multiple ethnic groups with different languages live side by side and then bilingualism becomes the norm with each new generation growing up bilingual.