Spanish Sentences Research Articles

The Cambridge handbook of linguistic code-switching (review)

Reviewed by: The Cambridge handbook of linguistic code-switching Margaret Deuchar The Cambridge handbook of linguistic code-switching. Ed. by Barbara E. Bullock and Almeida Jacqueline Toribio. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Pp. xv, 422. ISBN 9780521875912. $135 (Hb). [End Page 702] This edited collection contains contributions from an impressive number of leading code-switching (CS) researchers. It is divided into five parts: Part 1, ‘Conceptual and methodological considerations in code-switching research’; Part 2, ‘Social aspects of code-switching’; Part 3, ‘The structural implications of code-switching’; Part 4, ‘Psycholinguistics and code-switching’; and Part 5, ‘Formal models of code-switching’. One of its many strengths is that it includes chapters on a wide range of methodological approaches, including the use of experimental techniques in studying CS, CS and the internet, CS between sign languages, CS and language disorders, and CS and the brain. The contributors represent not only a wide variety of approaches to CS but also the diversity of terminology used. The editors provide a persuasive argument for the study of CS in their introductory chapter, ‘Themes in the study of code-switching’ (1–17), but could have better highlighted the different uses of terminology by contributors, and might have made a few recommendations leading to increased uniformity in the future. For example, Bullock and Toribio describe the famous sentence from Poplack 1980, Sometimes I’ll start a sentence in Spanish y termino en español, in three different ways, as involving (i) classic CS, (ii) alternation, and (iii) intra-sentential CS. Only the second description is uncontroversial. The term intra-sentential is contrasted with inter-sentential in a fairly standard way, in that the latter is described as involving alternation at clause boundaries. Under this definition, however, the sentence by Poplack would be inter-sentential because there is a clause boundary between Sometimes I’ll start a sentence in Spanish and termino en español. There is in fact considerable confusion in the literature in the use of the term ‘intra-sentential’: some investigators (including Poplack 1980:589) use the term to mean ‘intra-clausal’, while others (like Dorlein and Nortier in Ch. 8) use it as Bullock and Toribio do to include switching within a complex sentence that is made up of more than one clause. In the editors’ shoes I might have used the introductory chapter to draw attention to this multiple usage, and perhaps recommend to future researchers replacement of these terms with the clearer ‘intra-clausal’ and ‘inter-clausal’. Another issue regarding terminology arises from Bullock and Toribio’s suggested equation of Muysken’s notion of congruent lexicalization with Myers-Scotton’s notion of a composite matrix language. As Myers-Scotton (2002:100) makes clear, she disagrees with Muysken’s (2000:132) view of congruent lexicalization as involving bidirectional code-mixing. Furthermore, while congruent lexicalization occurs where the two languages are closely related (as in the Dutch-Sranan example given by Bullock and Toribio), the notion of a composite matrix language is most clearly illustrated by CS between two languages that differ in word order and morphology. But leaving aside issues in terminology, the volume includes work with original findings that have considerable theoretical implications. For example, Ghada Khattab, in ‘Phonetic accommodation in children’s code-switching’ (142–59), provides evidence that should lead us to modify the accepted view on the unimportance of nonnative as opposed to peer input. Another chapter that presents new findings is Barbara E. Bullock’s ‘Phonetic reflexes of code-switching’ (163–81). In a research context in which little is known about the phonetic aspects of CS, Bullock demonstrates how CS had an effect on the production of the voiceless stops that English-Spanish bilinguals use when speaking English only. In ‘Code-switching between typologically distinct languages’ (182–98), Brian Hok-Shing Chan accounts for the lack of agreement on a universal model of CS by appealing to processing strategies and sociolinguistic factors. Processing strategies may include considerations of economy and isomorphism, which he suggests may account for the commonly found uniformity of the matrix language in the matrix language frame (MLF) model. He suggests that this should...

Real-time processing of gender-marked articles by native and non-native Spanish speakers

Three experiments using online-processing measures explored whether native and non-native Spanish-speaking adults use gender-marked articles to identify referents of target nouns more rapidly, as shown previously with 3-year-old children learning Spanish as L1 ( Lew-Williams & Fernald, 2007). In Experiment 1, participants viewed familiar objects with names of either the same or different grammatical gender while listening to Spanish sentences referring to one object. L1 adults, like L1 children, oriented to the target more rapidly on different-gender trials, when the article was informative about noun identity; however, L2 adults did not. Experiments 2 and 3 controlled for frequency of exposure to article–noun pairs by using novel nouns. L2 adults could not exploit gender information when different article–noun pairs were used in teaching and testing. Experience-related factors may influence how L1 adults and children and L2 adults—who learned Spanish at different ages and in different settings—use grammatical gender in real-time processing.

Die Negationsdistribution im spanischen Satz und ihre Konsequenzen für die Phraseografie des Spanischen

AbstractA Spanish negative sentence contains items and structures that create a suitable syntactic environment for items and item groups showing an inherent negative meaning. A large number of Spanish phraseologisms can only be used if a negation had been triggered in the same sentence or the same syntagma. The goal of this article is to analyse different cases and rules linked to the triggering of negation in the Spanish language in order to provide a basis for drawing conclusions about their systematic use in Spanish phraseography. This article will show entries taken out of the Diccionario español-alemán de locuciones del español de España, a work which is currently being elaborated by a team of students, linguists and translators, and evaluate their significance as an alternative to present phraseographic solutions.

Differences in continuity of force dynamics and emotional valence in sentences with causal and adversative connectives

This research analyses the semantics of Spanish sentences with causal or adversative connectives using force dynamics, emotional valence and subjectivity parameters. Participants were given stimulus sentences, each followed by a connective, and were asked to generate meaningful continuation sentences. For each stimulus sentence, four versions were offered, differing only in the connective (two causal and two adversative). Participants' responses were encoded using a set of variables related to force dynamics, emotional valence, subjectivity, complexity and continuity. A discriminant analysis of the data found two main statistical functions. The Continuity-Discontinuity function (polarity) discriminated between causal and adversative sentences: force dynamics and emotional valences tended to be continuous in sentences linked by a causal connective and discontinuous in sentences with an adversative connective. The Internal-External function, orthogonal to continuity, discriminated between specific connectives: sentences with “porque” (because) and “aunque” (although) usually expressed internal or volitional events, and sentences with “puesto que” (given that) and “a pesar de que” (in spite of) were associated with external or factual social events.

Cross-linguistic syntactic priming in bilingual children

Previous research has used cross-linguistic priming methodology with bilingual adults to explore the nature of their syntactic representations. The present paper extends the use of this methodology to bilingual children to investigate the relation between the syntactic structures of their two languages. Specifically, we examined whether the use of passives by the experimenter in one language primed the subsequent use of passives by the child in the other language. Results showed evidence of syntactic priming from Spanish to English: hearing a Spanish sentence containing a passive led to the increase in children's production of the parallel structure in English. However, there was no priming in the other direction: hearing an English sentence containing a passive did not increase children's use of the parallel structure in Spanish. These results provide evidence for both the integration of syntactic representations in bilingual children and the asymmetry of the relation between their two languages.

Spoken Spanish generation from sign language

This paper describes the development of a Spoken Spanish generator from sign-writing. The sign language considered was the Spanish sign language (LSE: Lengua de Signos Española). This system consists of an advanced visual interface (where a deaf person can specify a sequence of signs in sign-writing), a language translator (for generating the sequence of words in Spanish), and finally, a text to speech converter. The visual interface allows a sign sequence to be defined using several sign-writing alternatives. The paper details the process for designing the visual interface proposing solutions for HCI-specific challenges when working with the Deaf (i.e. important difficulties in writing Spanish or limited sign coverage for describing abstract or conceptual ideas). Three strategies were developed and combined for language translation to implement the final version of the language translator module. The summative evaluation, carried out with Deaf from Madrid and Toledo, includes objective measurements from the system and subjective information from questionnaires. The paper also describes the first Spanish-LSE parallel corpus for language processing research focused on specific domains. This corpus includes more than 4000 Spanish sentences translated into LSE. These sentences focused on two restricted domains: the renewal of the identity document and driver’s license. This corpus also contains all sign descriptions in several sign-writing specifications generated with a new version of the eSign Editor. This new version includes a grapheme to phoneme system for Spanish and a SEA-HamNoSys converter.

Effects of a Supplemental Spanish Oral Language Program on Sentence Length, Complexity, and Grammaticality in Spanish-Speaking Children Attending English-Only Preschools

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a supplemental Spanish language instruction program for children who spoke Spanish as their native language and were attending English-only preschool programs. Specifically, the study evaluated the program's effects on the children's Spanish sentence length in words, subordination index, and grammaticality of sentences. Forty-five Spanish-speaking children attending English-only prekindergarten classrooms were selected for study. Of those, 15 children received 30 min of Spanish instruction 5 days a week for 16 weeks. The program targeted 5-10 vocabulary words a week, dialogic book reading, phonemic awareness, and letter knowledge. The remaining 30 children participated in regular preschool English instruction. Students were evaluated before intervention, immediately after intervention, and 4 months following intervention. Repeated measures analyses of variance indicated that the children who received the small-group supplemental Spanish language instruction made significant gains in their Spanish sentence length in words and subordination index when compared to those receiving regular English-only classroom instruction. There were no differences in the children's grammaticality of sentences. The findings demonstrate that a daily short native language program has significant effects on sentence length in words and subordination index in English language learners who are attending English-only preschool programs.

Asymmetrical Mixing Patterns of Spanish and English in a New Immigrant Community

Analysis of Spanish and English speech in a new immigrant community of Latinos in Georgia, USA, shows that Spanish and English pattern differently. There is a higher frequency of Spanish sentences containing English words than English sentences containing Spanish words. But the reverse is true of grammatical influence without mixing words. There is a higher frequency of English influenced grammatically by Spanish than Spanish influenced grammatically by English. This asymmetry of the two languages may be due to the asymmetrical status of each language in the social setting. Spanish is the first and dominant language of the Latino immigrant community, but English is their second language, the dominant language of the larger community.

Aural Rehabilitation Telepractice

Aural Rehabilitation Telepractice

Gestural drift in Spanish‐English speakers.

Voice onset times (VOTs) and second vowel formants (F2s) of native speakers of Spanish were examined to extend findings on perceptually guided changes in speech production [M. L. Sancier and C. A. Fowler, J. Phon. 25, 421–426 (1995)]. Participants were recorded producing English and Spanish sentences after stays in the U.S. and in Spanish‐speaking countries. Participants' English and Spanish VOTs were both significantly shorter after a stay in a Spanish‐speaking country than after a stay in the U.S., supporting previous findings. While S1’s F2s were significantly lower following exposure to Spanish, as expected based on earlier results [A.R. Bradlow, J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 97(3), 1916–1924 (1995)], S2’s F2s increased. We attribute this effect to gender, pending further data acquisition. We propose that not only inter‐gestural timing but also the gestural targets themselves are affected by ambient language. The systematic effect of language exposure on F2 is consistent with language‐specific articulatory sett...

Diseño de una nueva herramienta para la exploración auditiva

IntroductionMany presbycusic patients have difficulty in understanding certain words. This could be justified because certain sounds in Spanish are more difficult to perceive, particularly the sounds with energy in the high frequencies. We propose to use a sentence as a tool to check this theory. Materials and methodAll the Spanish sounds were analyzed, measuring the degree of acoustic energy in all the frequencies. The conclusions drawn from the comparison of the results allowed the design of the tool that is proposed here. ResultsWe established a gradient of perception difficulty, occlusive consonants being the least perceptible, followed by fricative, and finally all those segments with harmony and a clear formant structure. The Spanish sentence “Ana vio ese coche rojizo fino” is proposed as the tool for this study. This sentence has some as it comprises certain peculiarities that makes it particularly useful for this purpose. It will allow us to check whether understanding deteriorates as we move from beginning to end, helping evaluate the importance of high frequencies for intelligibility. ConclusionsA positive result could help in the design of amplification systems to improve speech intelligibility. In addition, the exploratory tool could allow neuro-acoustic exploration, useful in the central auditory pathology studies.

Designing a new tool for hearing exploration

IntroductionMany presbycusic patients have difficulty in understanding certain words. This could be justified because certain sounds in Spanish are more difficult to perceive, particularly the sounds with energy in the high frequencies. We propose to use a sentence as a tool to check this theory. Materials and methodAll the Spanish sounds were analyzed, measuring the degree of acoustic energy in all the frequencies. The conclusions drawn from the comparison of the results allowed the design of the tool that is proposed here. ResultsWe established a gradient of perception difficulty, occlusive consonants being the least perceptible, followed by fricative, and finally all those segments with harmony and a clear formant structure. The Spanish sentence “Ana vio ese coche rojizo fino” is proposed as the tool for this study. This sentence comprises certain peculiarities that make it particularly useful for this purpose. It will allow us to check whether understanding deteriorates as we move from beginning to end, helping evaluate the importance of high frequencies for intelligibility. ConclusionsA positive result could help in the design of amplification systems to improve speech intelligibility. In addition, the exploratory tool could allow neuro-acoustic exploration, useful in the central auditory pathology studies.

Re(de)fining the orthographic neighborhood: The role of addition and deletion neighbors in lexical decision and reading.

The influence of addition and deletion neighbors on visual word identification was investigated in four experiments. Experiments 1 and 2 used Spanish stimuli. In Experiment 1, lexical decision latencies were slower and less accurate for words and nonwords with higher-frequency deletion neighbors (e.g., jugar in juzgar), relative to control stimuli. Experiment 2 showed a similar interference effect for words and nonwords with higher-frequency addition neighbors (e.g., conejo, which has the addition neighbor consejo), relative to control stimuli. Experiment 3 replicated this addition neighbor interference effect in a lexical decision experiment with English stimuli. Across all three experiments, interference effects were always evident for addition/deletion neighbors with word-outer overlap, usually present for those with word-initial overlap, but never present for those with word-final overlap. Experiment 4 replicated the addition/deletion neighbor inhibitory effects in a Spanish sentence reading task in which the participants' eye movements were monitored. These findings suggest that conventional orthographic neighborhood metrics should be redefined. In addition to its methodological implications, this conclusion has significant theoretical implications for input coding schemes and the mechanisms underlying word recognition.

REEXAMINING THE ROLE OF EXPLICIT INFORMATION IN PROCESSING INSTRUCTION

The present study sought to observe, through online treatments, whether explicit information assists acquisition in a way that has not been measured in previous processing instruction (PI) studies. Two experiments examined learners' behavior while they processed Spanish sentences with object-verb-subject (OVS) word order and Spanish subjunctive under two treatments: with explicit information (the PI group) and without explicit information (the structured input [SI] group). Participants in both groups worked individually with a computer and processed a series of 30 SI items. They received feedback right after each response, and both accuracy and response time were recorded. It was expected that learners in the PI group would start to process both of the linguistic targets sooner in the sequence of input items and would submit their responses faster than learners in the SI group, because explicit information in the PI treatment would help learners notice the target items early in the series. The results showed no difference between the SI group and the PI group when processing OVS sentences, but the PI group processed subjunctive forms sooner and faster than the SI group. The results suggest that the benefits of explicit information might depend on the nature of the task and the processing problem.

First Noun Principle or L1 Transfer Principle in SLA?

English LI students learning Romance Languages have been found to process the first noun or pronoun of a sentence as the agent. However, because all the evidence is based on learners with English as an L1, it is not clear whether this is due to a universal strategy or is a result of L1 transfer. According to one model of input processing (VanPatten 2007), L2 learners would initially assign agent status to the first noun and object status to the second noun (First Noun Principle) or it might be that the L1 parser is transferred into the L2 input processing procedures (L1 Transfer Principle). The present study addresses whether the L1 parsing procedures are transferred or whether there is a universal First Noun Principle. L1 Italian and L1 English speakers enrolled in beginning Spanish classes interpreted Spanish sentences they heard. The results indicated that the L1 Italian learners interpreted OVS and OOVS sentences better than the L1 English learners. Data from this study suggest that the transfer position is plausible.

Las cláusulas relativas en francés y su traducción al español: un estudio en la Facultad de Lenguas de la UAEM

L’article suivant rend partiellement compte des résultats d’une étude réalisée à la Faculté de Langues de l’Université Autonome de l’État de Mexico (UAEM) sur la description des propositions relatives en français et en espagnol et faisant état de quelques concepts de traduction. L’article s’appuie sur l’hypothèse selon laquelle plus les connaissances en langue et en technique de traduction sont élevées, plus il y a de probabilité de traduire correctement un corpus donné. Pour ce faire, des élèves appartenant à trois niveaux différents de français ont traduit en espagnol un corpus de 15 phrases contenant des propositions relatives en langue cible, en l’occurrence en français.

Design of short Spanish sentences for measuring reading performance: Radner-Vissum test

To develop 24 short Spanish optotype sentences for the construction of a test based on the Radner reading test to simultaneously measure near visual acuity and reading speed. Department of Refractive Surgery, Vissum-Instituto de Oftalmológico de Alicante, Alicante, Spain. Thirty-one sentences were constructed in Spanish following the procedure defined by Radner to obtain sentence optotypes with comparable structure and the same lexical and grammatical difficulty. Sentences were statistically selected and standardized in 60 patients divided into 2 groups by educational level. Group A (30 patients) had a university education and Group B (30 patients), a primary school education. The interval of reading time was defined as the overall mean +/-1.1 x SD. All sentences with a mean between 3.59 seconds and 4.04 seconds were selected for the reading charts. The mean age was 30.8 years +/- 6.2 (SD) in Group A and 37.3 +/- 10.7 years in Group B. The mean reading time was 3.8 +/- 0.9 seconds in all patients, 3.5 +/- 0.6 seconds in Group A, and 4.1 +/- 1.0 seconds in Group B. The 24 short single Spanish sentences were highly comparable in syntactical structure; number, position, and length of words; lexical difficulty; and reading length.

A 19th-century speaking machine

SummaryThe Tecnefón is a speaking machine developed in Spain in the 1860s by Severino Pérez y Vázquez. Pérez’s main book on the Tecnefón was published in 1868. Within the context of speaking machines designed from the 18th century onwards, the Tecnefón is built on an acoustical basis; hence it is different from W. von Kempelen’s device, which tried to ‘replicate’ the phonatory system. The Tecnefón has three main parts: a drum that generates sound (the source), an air chamber to hold such sound, and a set of tubes, chambers, and other artefacts propelled by a keyboard. Pérez created a prototype of a speaking machine that performed five vowels and six consonants, so it could ‘speak’ many sentences in Spanish. To this he added accent and intonation with a lever. However, the Tecnefón was never finished due to institutional circumstances that prevented Pérez from pursuing his research.

Speech comprehension assessed by electroencephalography with m-sequence technique

Electroencephalograms (EEGs) were recorded from eight Japanese speakers while they listened to Japanese and Spanish sentences (approximately 51 s each). The sentences were modulated in amplitude by a binary m-sequence and played forward or backward. A circular cross-correlation function was computed between the EEG signals and the m-sequence and averaged across subjects. Independent component analysis of the averaged function revealed a component source response which was obtained only for the comprehensible Japanese and not for the incomprehensible sentences. The present study has thus shown that a one-minute-long EEG signal is sufficient for the assessment of speech comprehension.

Discriminating languages by speech-reading

The goal of this study was to explore the ability to discriminate languages using the visual correlates of speech (i.e., speech-reading). Participants were presented with silent video clips of an actor pronouncing two sentences (in Catalan and/or Spanish) and were asked to judge whether the sentences were in the same language or in different languages. Our results established that Spanish-Catalan bilingual speakers could discriminate running speech from their two languages on the basis of visual cues alone (Experiment 1). However, we found that this ability was critically restricted by linguistic experience, since Italian and English speakers who were unfamiliar with the test languages could not successfully discriminate the stimuli (Experiment 2). A test of Spanish monolingual speakers revealed that knowledge of only one of the two test languages was sufficient to achieve the discrimination, although at a lower level of accuracy than that seen in bilingual speakers (Experiment 3). Finally, we evaluated the ability to identify the language by speech-reading particularly distinctive words (Experiment 4). The results obtained are in accord with recent proposals arguing that the visual speech signal is rich in informational content, above and beyond what traditional accounts based solely on visemic confusion matrices would predict.