https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/30162 Wed, 29 Apr 2026 09:30:37 GMT 2026-04-29T09:30:37Z https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/45576 Formal approaches to complexity in heritage language grammars Polinsky, Maria; Putnam, Michael T. Synopsis: This collective volume breaks new ground in studies of linguistic complexity by addressing this phenomenon in heritage languages. It dismisses with the conception that heritage languages are less complex than their baseline or homeland counterparts and shows complexity trade-offs at various levels of linguistic representation. The authors consider defining properties of complexity as a phenomenon, diagnostics of complexity, and the ways complexity is modeled, measured, or operationalized in language sciences. The chapters showcase several bilingual dyads and offer new empirical data on heritage language production and use. Mon, 01 Jan 2024 00:00:00 GMT https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/45576 2024-01-01T00:00:00Z https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/37738 Language assessment in multilingual settings Rodríguez González, Eva; Rivera, Rosita L. Synopsis: This volume explores and addresses questions related to equitable access for assessment. It seeks to initiate a conversation among scholars about inclusive practices in language assessments. Whether the student is a second language learner, a heritage language learner, a multilingual language speaker, a community member, the authors in the present volume provide examples of assessment that do not follow a single universal or standardized design but an applicable one based on the needs and context of a given community. The contributors in this volume are scholars from different disciplines and contexts in Higher Education. They have created and proposed multiple lower-stakes assignments and accommodated learning by being flexible and open without assuming that learners know how to do specific tasks. Each chapter provides different examples on Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) assessment practices based on observation, examination, and integrative notions of diverse language scenarios. It may be of interest to researchers and practitioners in the fields of curriculum and instruction, language learning, and applied linguistics as well as those in the field of language teaching in general. Thus this volume broadens the scope of research in the area of multilingual assessment. Sun, 01 Jan 2023 00:00:00 GMT https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/37738 2023-01-01T00:00:00Z https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/48732 Linguistic dynamics in heritage speakers: Insights from the RUEG group Allen, Shanley E. M.; Keller, Mareike; Alexiadou, Artemis; Wiese, Heike Synopsis: This collective volume investigates linguistic dynamics in language contact, focusing on heritage speakers. The chapters provide new insights into the role of speaker repertoires and the distinction between contact-induced change and language-internal variation by reporting on corpus-linguistic studies across different communicative situations in heritage and majority languages. Conducted in the context of the DFG Research Unit “Emerging Grammars in Language Contact Situations” (FOR 2537), the studies focus on bilingual adolescent and adult speakers of German, Greek, Russian and Turkish as heritage languages, and of English and German as majority languages, and on monolingually raised adolescent and adult speakers of all five languages. Crucially, they are not restricted to standard language, but target broader speaker repertoires that cover informal as well as formal settings in both spoken and written modes. The contributions are united by their positive perspective on language contact and multilingual speakers, a comparative approach across several heritage and majority languages, and a shared methodology that captures variation within repertoires for both heritage speakers and monolinguals. The chapters take various theoretical standpoints, highlighting different facets of the data as well as its potential for enhancing our understanding of language contact and language variation. Wed, 01 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/48732 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/30163 OV and VO variation in code-switching Shim, Ji Young This monograph is intended as a contribution to the field of bilingualism from a generative syntax perspective at a variety of levels. It investigates code-switching between Korean and English and also between Japanese and English, which exhibit several interesting features. Due to their canonical word order differences, Korean and Japanese being SOV (Subject-Object-Verb) and English SVO (Subject-Verb-Object), a code-switched sentence between Korean/Japanese and English can take, in principle, either OV or VO order, to which little attention has been paid in the literature. On the contrary, word order is one of the most extensively discussed topics in generative syntax, especially in the Principles and Parameter’s approach (P&P) where various proposals have been made to account of various order patterns of different languages. By taking the generative view that linguistic variation is due to variation in the domain of functional categories rather than lexical roots (e.g. Borer 1984; Chomsky 1995), this monograph investigates word order variation in Korean-English and Japanese-English code-switching, with particular attention to the relative placement of the predicate (verb) and its complement (object) in two contrasting word orders, OV and VO, which was tested against Korean-English and Japanese-English bilingual speakers’ introspective judgments. The results provide strong evidence indicating that the distinction between functional and lexical verbs plays a major role in deriving different word orders (OV and VO, respectively) in Korean-English and Japanese-English code-switching, which supports the hypothesis that parametric variation is attributed to differences in the features of a functional category in the lexicon, as assumed in minimalist syntax. In particular, the explanation pursued in this monograph is based on feature inheritance, a syntactic derivational process, which was proposed in recent developments the Minimalist Program. The monograph shows that by studying diverse and creative word order patterns of code-switching, we are at a better disposal to understand how languages are parameterized similarly or differently in a given domain, which is the very topic that generative linguists have pursued for a long time. Fri, 01 Jan 2021 00:00:00 GMT https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/30163 2021-01-01T00:00:00Z