Bilingual Language Study Callout
Interested in participating in a Bilingual Language study ? The research is being conducted by the University of Valladolid, with representatives visiting Gibraltar at the end of the month. The study requires participants aged 18 and over who are available for a couple of hours on either the 25th, 26th or 27th of January. To sign up, please email gir.uvalal@uva.es
Their study is concerned with the contact between English and Spanish and, more specifically, with the phenomenon referred to as code-switching, a very common practice in Gibraltar. UVALAL believe this bilingual behaviour is not arbitrary but is governed by rather specific linguistic principles and it is well-proven that a dense code-switcher is an extremely proficient speaker in both languages. UVA’s study involves the use of research techniques which are presently used in experimental psychology, linguistics, and psycholinguistics.
The research team UVALAL conducts research on (English/Spanish) bilingual acquisition. They make use of linguistic theory as well as spontaneous and experimental data in order to account for different linguistic phenomena that are related to language contact situations (e.g., language separation and language mixing, crosslinguistic influence).
The team is being hosted by Gibraltar Cultural Services and the University of Gibraltar.
In addition, Raquel Fernández Fuertes from the Universidad of Valladolid, will deliver a talk, ‘What Does It Mean To Be Bilingual? Myth and Science’, on Tuesday 25th January 2022 at 6.30pm. Tickets are currently on sale via www.buytickets.gi
For more information on the work carried out by the UVA team see their website http://uvalal.uva.es/