Investigating language contact and shift through experimentally-oriented documentation

University Of Chicago, Chicago IL

Investigators

Abstract

It is well-known that when speakers of different languages are in contact with one another, the structures of these languages can and do change. Words and even grammatical structures can be borrowed from one language into another, and the structures of the languages can also converge into something new. One potential outcome of contact is language shift: when speakers cease to speak their ancestral language in favor of a new (generally more economically or politically advantageous) one. Language shift is known to be a major driver behind language endangerment and loss, but the transition from language contact (sustained bi- or multilingualism) to language loss (the abandonment of one of the languages) is not well-understood. The current project aims to document language contact in progress by combining traditional documentation methods with new questions and approaches borrowed from laboratory psycholinguistics, in order to better understand the social and cognitive factors that drive shift. Qualitative methodology, including interviews and elicitation, are combined with quantitative and experimental methods for a systematic investigation of the factors that influence language contact and shift. This project helps understand the linguistic and psycholinguistic processes at work in language loss and can aid in developing strategies to promote healthy language contact. This is of enormous value especially to marginalized communities experiencing and attempting to forestall linguistic and, in turn, cultural loss. This project studies the changes that are currently taking place in urban versus village settings for a set of endangered languages spoken in the northeastern part of Russia. The region provides an excellent testing ground because of the variety of languages and different contact ecologies found in the Sakha Republic and the Chukotka Autonomous Region. Urbanization, a known factor in language shift, is occurring rapidly here, and the capital Yakutsk is the fastest growing northern city. The region provides excellent conditions to study the varying roles of cognitive and social factors because it has two majority languages, one national (Russian) and one regional (Sakha, a Turkic language) used in education, government and all local domains. The study focuses on language contact between Russian, Sakha and three minority endangered languages: Even and Evenki (both Tungusic), Chukchi (Chukotko-Kamchatkan) and Yukaghir (possibly Uralic), which are structurally different and can illustrate how linguistic patterns affect change. Although these languages are endangered and in need of urgent documentation, their speaker populations are still robust enough to provide a sufficient sample for rigorous statistical analysis, and to document different stages of shift. Well-controlled production and comprehension experiments will be conducted, focusing on three linguistic parameters: word order (and its interaction with case marking), case marking and alignment, and subordination strategies, with particular attention to the linguistic encoding of spatial relations. To complement data collected from controlled experiments, data will be collected from spontaneous conversation in order to document the dynamic multilingual practices in these contact ecologies. All data will be subject to rigorous statistical modeling. The project includes yearly training workshops and in-field experience to prepare local students and linguists in language documentation and psycholinguistics. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.