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Title: Glottalizing at word junctures: Exploring bidirectional transfer in child and adult Spanish heritage speakers
Abstract While research in heritage language phonology has found that transfer from the majority language can lead to divergent attainment in adult heritage language grammars, the extent to which language transfer develops during a heritage speaker's lifespan is understudied. To explore such cross-linguistic transfer, I examine the rate of glottalization between consonant-to-vowel sequences at word junctures produced by child and adult Spanish heritage speakers (i.e., HSs) in both languages. My results show that, in Spanish, child HSs produce greater rates of vowel-initial glottal phonation than their age-matched monolingually-raised Spanish counterparts, suggesting that the Spanish child HSs’ grammars are more permeable to transfer than those of the adult HSs. In English, child and adult HSs show similarly low rates of glottal phonation when compared to their age-matched monolingually-raised English speakers’ counterparts. The findings for English can be explained by either an account of transfer at the individual level or the community level.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
2116801
PAR ID:
10441623
Author(s) / Creator(s):
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition
ISSN:
1366-7289
Page Range / eLocation ID:
1 to 13
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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