This study examines knowledge of grammar by receptive bilinguals (RBs) - heritage speakers who describe themselves as capable of fluent comprehension in Labrador Inuttitut (an endangered dialect of Inuktitut), but of little or no speech production in it. Despite the growing research on incomplete acquisition, RBs have yet to be studied as a specific population. Participants (8 fluent bilinguals, 17 RBs, 3 low-proficiency RBs) performed a morpheme comprehension task and a grammaticality judgment task. General measures of their comprehension and production abilities included a story retelling task as an overall assessment of comprehension, a vocabulary test, an elicited imitation task, and a production task. This data was complemented by language behaviour interviews. The results showed that RBs have good, though not perfect, comprehension and basic vocabulary, but speech production is very difficult for them. They have grammatical knowledge, but it is incomplete: Knowledge of some structures is robust, and their comprehension is fluent (past vs. future contrast, aspectual morphemes); others are missing (temporal remoteness degrees); and yet for others (case and agreement), RBs have the category and know its position in the word structure, but have difficulty connecting the features with the morphemes expressing them. These findings explain the significant asymmetry between comprehension and production in RBs: In comprehension, incomplete knowledge may result in loss of some aspects of meaning, but in many cases it can be compensated for by pragmatic knowledge and extralinguistic context, while in production, it can result in the selection of an incorrect morpheme or inability to select a morpheme. Low-proficiency RBs have partial comprehension, small vocabulary, and almost no production. They do not understand most functional morphemes; however, they show knowledge of the basic properties such as the position of the obligatory agreement marker on the verb. This study provides data on an understudied language and an understudied population at the extreme end of unbalanced bilingualism. The findings have implications both for the psycholinguistics of bilingualism and for language revitalization, especially in the context of a language shift in indigenous language communities, where RBs are often the last generation to have competence in the indigenous language.

This study examines knowledge of grammar by receptive bilinguals (RBs) - heritage speakers who describe themselves as capable of fluent comprehension in Labrador Inuttitut (an endangered dialect of Inuktitut), but of little or no speech production in it. Despite the growing research on incomplete acquisition, RBs have yet to be studied as a specific population. Participants (8 fluent bilinguals, 17 RBs, 3 low-proficiency RBs) performed a morpheme comprehension task and a grammaticality judgment task. General measures of their comprehension and production abilities included a story retelling task as an overall assessment of comprehension, a vocabulary test, an elicited imitation task, and a production task. This data was complemented by language behaviour interviews. The results showed that RBs have good, though not perfect, comprehension and basic vocabulary, but speech production is very difficult for them. They have grammatical knowledge, but it is incomplete: Knowledge of some structures is robust, and their comprehension is fluent (past vs. future contrast, aspectual morphemes); others are missing (temporal remoteness degrees); and yet for others (case and agreement), RBs have the category and know its position in the word structure, but have difficulty connecting the features with the morphemes expressing them. These findings explain the significant asymmetry between comprehension and production in RBs: In comprehension, incomplete knowledge may result in loss of some aspects of meaning, but in many cases it can be compensated for by pragmatic knowledge and extralinguistic context, while in production, it can result in the selection of an incorrect morpheme or inability to select a morpheme. Low-proficiency RBs have partial comprehension, small vocabulary, and almost no production. They do not understand most functional morphemes; however, they show knowledge of the basic properties such as the position of the obligatory agreement marker on the verb. This study provides data on an understudied language and an understudied population at the extreme end of unbalanced bilingualism. The findings have implications both for the psycholinguistics of bilingualism and for language revitalization, especially in the context of a language shift in indigenous language communities, where RBs are often the last generation to have competence in the indigenous language.

<div><div><div><p>The present study contributes to our understanding of the effects of age and type of linguistic input in the acquisition of Spanish as a second language in adulthood. I examine the Spanish syntax (word order) of three groups of speakers, monolingual Spanish speakers from Mexico and two bilingual English-Spanish speakers born and raised in the United States (N = 53) to measure the effects of an early, oral-based versus a late, written-based exposure to the target language. Results from a sentence completion task show comparable behavior across all groups in the four verb conditions, with a strong tendency to favor the no climbing (enclisis) option, and a proficiency effect among the experimental groups. Results of an acceptability judgment task show comparable behavior across all groups, accepting grammatical proclitic placement and rejecting ungrammatical sentences with climbing. Neither proficiency or group effects were found in this task, although the judgments of the experimental groups were less categorical compared to the native speakers’. The combined results of these two tasks point to an absence of age or input effects in the L2 acquisition of this syntactic phenomenon in Spanish. </p></div></div></div>

<p>This dissertation explores motivation in Japanese American learners of their heritage language. This area of study is significant because existing research primarily looks at heritage language learners as “balanced bilinguals” and limits their learning purpose to professional motivations. Also, research on “passive” or “receptive” bilinguals and the impact of history and ethnicity on motivation builds new knowledge in the field from which other scholars can construct their own studies. Through my interview-based case studies and autoethnography, I found that historical, social, and ethnic identity factors contribute considerably to the motivation to maintain or reject the heritage language. My findings reveal that the traumatic events of WWII such as the forced incarceration of over 110,000 people of Japanese descent led to the loss of the heritage language and a denial of the heritage culture. I also discovered that third generation Japanese Americans are motivated to learn Japanese for professional reasons whereas fourth generation Japanese Americans study Japanese to gain a stronger sense of ethnic identity.</p><p><br></p>

No description available.

Language use patterns and parent-child relationship quality in immigrant families are both subject to change over time, and past research on the impact of immigrant children's heritage language use on various measures of well-being yields mixed results. Extending scholarship on heritage language use and immigrant family dynamics, I examine the association between different language patterns in U.S. immigrant families and mother's reports of parent-child closeness. I analyze data from 1,142 mothers when their children are in kindergarten, third grade, and fifth grade using the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study "“ Kindergarten Cohort of 2010-2011. I find little variation in perceived maternal closeness across early childhood regardless of language pattern. Results show no significant difference between mother-child dyads who frequently speak the heritage language to one another and those who use only English; however, at fifth grade, infrequently speaking the heritage language was associated with a 0.11 unit higher score on the perceived maternal closeness scale compared to monolingual English use. These results suggest heritage language use has the potential to positively impact mother-child relationship quality. Thus, it is necessary to support both English and heritage language development in U.S. immigrant families, as opening pathways for proficiency in both can strengthen parent-child relationships.

No description available.

No description available.

This dissertation describes the language and identity trajectories of twelve purposefully selected heritage Spanish adolescents who were currently studying in a heritage language program within an urban high school in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. These twelve students represented six sibling groups and five different nationalities, specifically Dominican, Ecuadorian, Puerto Rican, Salvadorian, and Venezuelan,. The research questions were: 1) How do Hispanic heritage students negotiate their bicultural/bilingual identities?; 2) What is the role of the heritage language in those negotiated identities?; 3) Do these negotiated identities influence their investment to maintain the heritage language?; 4) What are the linguistic manifestations of the Spanish spoken by these bilingual students? Findings of the study revealed that 1) the study participants negotiate their bicultural/bilingual identities in a variety of ways, 2) for some of these students, the heritage language is part of their `out of school' identities, 3) the dominant language ideologies of the school system have had a significant impact on the heritage students' investment in HL practice, and 4) although each participant's identity and linguistic trajectories are distinct, they each have maintained, to a greater or lesser degree, the aspectual preterit/imperfect contrast, and, at the same time have displayed some level of incomplete acquisition of the subjunctive mood. The implications of these findings as they relate to the fields of bilingualism, languages in contact and the developing theory of Heritage Language Acquisition are addressed in the concluding remarks. / Spanish

Many researchers have explored teachers’ beliefs in literacy and found that teachers’ literacy beliefs affect their instructional practices in foreign language (FL) or second language (SL) classrooms. Researchers have demonstrated that teachers’ literacy beliefs and instructional practices are generally consistent. There have been many studies regarding teachers’ literacy beliefs and classroom instruction in the context of FL/SL and more recent studies on teachers’ literacy beliefs presenting an increasing interest in heritage language (HL) such as Spanish and Chinese. However, less is known about Korean language teachers’ literacy beliefs and practices in the mixed classroom of heritage and non-­‐heritage learners. This present study had two main purposes. First, it examined and described the literacy beliefs and instructional practices of a novice Korean language instructor, who struggled primarily with heritage learners in his teaching career. The second purpose was to seek an in-­‐depth view of a novice teacher’s literacy beliefs and practices toward two different student subgroups of heritage and non-­‐heritage learners in the same classroom. In addition, this study investigated incongruences between literacy beliefs and practices toward heritage and non-­‐heritage learners. In order to examine a novice Korean instructor’s literacy beliefs and practices toward Korean heritage learners and non-­‐heritage learners, this research employed a qualitative case study and collected data through a combination of a survey, semi-­‐structured interviews, and videotaped classroom observations. The Literacy Orientation Survey (LOS) and Taxonomy Of Techniques were adopted for a survey and classroom observation, respectively. The results of the current study indicated that the novice teacher of Korean has general literacy beliefs compatible with a constructivist orientation, which is a whole-­‐ language approach and one that promotes transformative learning. For most of the instructor’s literacy instruction in the classroom, his literacy beliefs appeared to be congruent with his practices toward KHLLs. The novice teacher promoted differentiated literacy instruction by giving separate, more challenging, or instruction more connected to everyday life in an effort to meet each individual learner’s needs in literacy. Acknowledging heritage learners as mediators and community builders who could potentially promote literacy skills, the participant presented a broader understanding of literacy and multiliteracies, such as cultural and digital literacy, beyond traditional skill-­‐ focused reading and writing. However, his overall literacy beliefs were incongruent with his instructional practices toward KFLLs because of frequent accommodations for less proficient learners through more traditional or eclectic activities. This incongruence and distinctive literacy instruction toward two different learner subgroups were explained by several factors: university policy on teaching and learning, his educational background and teaching experiences, and the low proficiency of the Korean language learners. This study of a novice teacher’s literacy beliefs toward different learner groups suggests that the embracing of comprehensive and constructivist approaches to literacy instruction and curriculum is only possible when pre-­‐ and in-­‐service teachers are aware of their own premises or propositions about literacy beliefs and instructions. The findings generated by this study can serve as a good starting point to guide FL/HL teachers to professional growth and expand the field of HL literacy studies in the future.