BILINGUALISM AND ITS EFFECT ON FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNING

Аннотация

В данной статье исследуется взаимосвязь между билингвизмом и успехами в изучении иностранного языка. Особое внимание уделяется факторам, влияющим на эту взаимосвязь, а именно: фоновые факторы, различные профили билингвизма и различные модели развития билингвов и монолингвов. Key words: Bilingual education, language, discuss, transitional, maintenance and enrichment models. Kalit so‘zlar: Ikki tilli ta’lim, til, muhokama, o‘tish, saqlash va boyitish modellari. Ключевые слова: билингвальное образование, язык, обсуждение, модели перехода, сохранения и обогащения. Bilingualism is a range of different patterns and combinations of acquiring and knowing multiple languages. Despite the wide breadth of bilingualism – worldwide bilinguals make up roughly 60% of the world’s population– and the numerous studies investigating this phenomenon, there is little agreement on what exactly a bilingual person is, and definitions are derived from various theoretical and methodological perspectives with specific problems and contexts in mind[1, p 282]. However, there is consensus that bilingualism is psychologically and sociologically unique from monolingualism, the state of knowing and using a single language. Definitions of bilingualism tend to take several approaches, but most incorporate either a competency or a functional approach. Many have stressed the importance of competency, like Bloomfield who argues that a bilingual person has native-like control of two languages”. Steiner takes competency one step further by suggesting that a bilingual person is one that does not proceed laterally when translating but rather reaching inward to the “symbiotic core”[7, p.125]. Considering the variety of characteristics and contexts associated with bilingualism, theorists have proposed different categories of bilingualism. Hamers and Blanc in their discussion of bilingualism distinguish between six psychological and sociological dimensions of bilingualism, while Edwards identifies eight interacting psychological, cognitive, linguistic and cultural dimensions. These subcategories can influence the development of a bilingual’s linguistic, neuropsychological, cognitive and sociocultural language profile and, consequentially, should be taken into account when comparing findings as well as in generalizing about the greater phenomenon of bilingualism[2,p 25]. A central subdivision of bilingualism is the age at which both language are acquired, as in the case of simultaneous and sequential bilingualism. Simultaneous bilingualism begins from the 25 onset of language acquisition (August & Hakuta, 2005). A simultaneous bilingual learns two linguistic systems that can serve the same social function and therefore develops discrimination as well as perceptual skills early on[3, p 342]. In contrast, sequential bilinguals learn one language after another. The exact age boundary between simultaneous and sequential bilinguals is rather arbitrary, although August and Hakuta (2005) suggest age five as a possible onset of sequential bilingualism when it is argued the basic components of language are already in place. Proposed distinctions between the groups include maturation and acquisition differences as well as attainment and proficiency differences. Another category which may overlap with the simultaneous/sequential typology is that of balanced and dominant bilingualism. Balanced bilingualism refers to bilinguals who have similar proficiencies in both languages, while dominant bilingualism is when an individual has a higher proficiency in one language over the other. This dichotomy is often related to functional differences as well as age of acquisition. This distinction plays a role in Cummins’ Interdependence Hypothesis and the construct of underlying proficiency, in which it is hypothesized that first and second language knowledge are linked, and that a first language needs to be sufficiently developed in order to transfer skills to the second language successfully. Another distinction is additive and subtractive bilingualism. First proposed by Lambert (1973) at a symposium entitled ‘cultural factors in learning,’ this dichotomy has been used widely across the literature to explain a variety of phenomena from cognitive to ethnolinguistic differences. In its original conception, additive bilingualism is when a second language is developed without the loss of the first. Juxtaposed to this is subtractive bilingualism, which is when the two languages are in competition with each other, resulting in one language being replaced by the other. The consequences of bilingualism Bilingualism as an individual and societal phenomenon has long been a topic of interest for researchers across a variety of disciplines such as psychology, linguistics, and education. For over fifty years, research has investigated the possibility that bilingualism may have facilitating effects on cognitive and metalinguistic outcomes. To frame this discussion, it is useful to begin w