October 2022 – Page 2 – Educational Sociolinguistics

Linguistic experiences in Montreal

Chuanmei Lin

I came to Montreal at the end of August and has been living here for a month. Before that I’ve never been to the French-speaking province of Quebec. Not sure if it’s the one-month “honey moon phase” in the culture shock model but it hasn’t faded away, I have been liking it here since I arrived. When I decided to come to McGill, I joked to my friend that I plan to speak English and Chinese in Montreal, and he joked that I will probably be speaking French and Chinese in Quebec, or at least need to have an A1/A2 level of French to live there. I didn’t understand what he meant, because I heard that in Montreal “everyone is bilingual”. I figured, if I speak English I can easily navigate my everyday life. After I arrived, I realized maybe he was right. In a grocery store downtown, an older staff didn’t understand me when I was looking for “noodles”, I was thinking “did I pronounce it wrong?”. Then a younger staff said something in French to the older staff so that he could show me the location of noodles. Another time I walked to an ice cream shop and realized that the menu was in French, so I had to point to the picture to get an ice cream because I couldn’t read it. Like the elderly women participants described their illiteracy in English under the increasingly globalized Korea, “illiteracy in English is the new illiteracy” (Lee, 2016, p.333). In Quebec, illiteracy in French is the new illiteracy, even though I’m living in Montreal where about 80% of Anglophones in Quebec live (Gérin- Lajoie, 2011, 2016, 2019). Although I learnt French at Alliance francaise Calgary https://www.afcalgary.ca for half a year (1-2 classes per week), I didn’t really take in much. It was supposed to be an immersion program but I was trying to get the teacher to explain the grammar in English. Using English (my L2) to learn French confuses me all the time and I wonder if the teacher explained French in Mandarin Chinese (my L1), might I learn better?

References

Gérin-Lajoie, D. (2011). Youth, language and identity: Portraits of students from English-language high schools in the Montreal area. Canadian Scholars’ Press.

Gérin-Lajoie, D. (2016). Negotiating identities: Anglophones teaching and living in Quebec. University of Toronto Press.

Gérin-Lajoie, D. (2019). Le rapport à l’identité des jeunes des écoles de langue anglaise au Québec. Presses de l’Université Laval, Collection Langues officielles et sociétés.

Lee, J. S. (2016). “Everywhere you go, you see English!”: Elderly women’s perspectives on globalization and English. Critical Inquiry in Language Studies, 13(4), 319-350.

Mastering French in 6 months: a realistic expectation or a mission impossible?

Sam Lyn

The new language law in Quebec, Bill 96, stipulates that newly arriving residents of Quebec “will be allowed to get services in English or another language for the six months after their arrival. After that, all government services will be exclusively in French” (Marchand, 2022).

Not only does the span of six months seem insufficient for mastering a language according to virtually every language learning theory known to date, it is also questionable, provided that even if such a method existed (some polyglots have made such claims, but the evidence is anecdotal), whether or not it would be feasible to at least gain a foothold on the basics of French by making use of the learning resources Quebec government provides for learning French.

Allen (2006) problematizes the acceuil program for immigrant school children, many of whom, failed after a year of intensive study, let alone six months. But what about grownups? What kinds of programs are available to adult migrants to Quebec?

Le Ministère de l‘Immigration, de laFrancisationetde l‘Intégration du Québec (MIFI) advertises two programs for adult immigrants on its website, https://www.quebec.ca/en/education/learn-french/ , a part-time program and a full-time program.

What follows is my own phenomenological study of the experience of enrolment into both of these programs.

The part-time program

To enroll into a part-time program, the applicant has two options available: MIFI partner institutions, and specially designated schools. The former are the aid centers for immigrants, like CLAM ( https://www.leclam.ca/francisation ). Although in theory one can apply for a French course there online, they never responded my email. So, after having waited for several weeks, I paid a visit to them in person. The French course secretary was very polite and helpful and assisted me with my application right away. But the problem is, the partner institution courses start every three months, so if you are not lucky and arrive in Quebec when a course just started, you won’t be able to begin your classes for up to three months. In the worst case scenario, this would leave our poor immigrant applicant 3 months only to “master the language.” The public French schools for immigrants have 2-month terms, so in that sense, an unlucky applicant would have 4 months to learn the language. Plus, to enroll in a school, like Centre William Hingston, for example ( https://centre-william-hingston.cssdm.gouv.qc.ca/english/ ) one has to pay 55$ application fee. Partner institutions are free. Financial aid of up to 400$ is available via MIFI.

The full-time program

The 30-hour/week full-time program might seem like a better choice for someone who wishes to learn French fast. But is is in no way straightforward. The first pitfall is that although the application is done online via the MIFI website ( https://www.quebec.ca/en/education/learn-french/full-time-courses/#c83994 ), the applicants need to send in photocopies of their immigration/citizenship documents by mail. So I did, too. I waited for over a month for my file to get processed. Then it took another month until I had my evaluation interview phone call. They call you in random times during the day, and if you are on the bus or at work, they leave you a message, but you cannot call them back. After you miss your phone call twice, they stop calling you, which means you are not getting in. Luckily, I was able to pick up the call the second time and had my interview. After the interview it took me another two weeks to get enrolled in a MIFI recommended school. That being said, again, courses run ever 2 or 3 months so just like the part-time time lag it might take you a while to get into the next available course. So all in all you might wait for 4-5 months to get in. So much for learning French the official way in Quebec.

To be continued . . .

References

Allen, D. (2006). Who’s in and who’s out? Language and the integration of new immigrant youth in
Quebec. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 10(2-3), 251–263.
https://mcgill.on.worldcat.org/oclc/425548504

Marchand, L. (2022, May 21). What’s in Quebec’s new law to protect the French Language. CBC
News. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/bill-96-explained-1.6460764

English and globalization: a double-edged sword

Jundong Ma

Just as Lee (2016) described in the paper “Everywhere You Go, You See English!”: Elderly Women’s Perspectives on Globalization and English, as an Asian country, China also faces the same dilemma as Korea. In the 1990s, globalization began to sweep the whole world. Here is a short video that explains the procedure.

Countries started collaborating with one another during the globalization movement in both the technical and commercial spheres. Language also began to expand at the same time. English became a lingua franca since the United States and Great Britain dominated the global economy and English is their native tongue. English has been made a required course in Chinese classrooms in order to keep up with the globalization trend, and those who speak the language fluently may be considered “well-educated” individuals. Although globalization and the English learning boom brought many advantages, they also gave rise to numerous social issues.

On the one hand, Chinese people accept that globalization is necessary and that it can benefit China in many ways (job possibilities, technological advancement, capital inflow, etc.); on the other hand, many underprivileged Chinese people are left behind during the process. Elderly persons, members of the working class with low incomes, and youngsters with limited access to English instruction may find it difficult to keep up with the changes in the world because they are unable to grasp anything written in English. Sometimes they can even question why they are required to study a foreign language in their own nation. When I worked as an intern teacher during my undergraduate program, I saw that some students lacked the drive to learn English, but due to globalization’s quick expansion, they were forced to do so in order to keep up with the times and enrol in a reputable university. Therefore, to some extent, globalization disrupted the social ecology of several developing nations, and the English language started to cause problems for the locals.

In the end, I want to say that this is of great educational significance to us for it reminds us that, as a researcher, you cannot only pay attention to privileged groups, you have to think of those underprivileged people at the same time.

Questions:

What can we do to strike a balance between English learning boom and the safeguarding of local languages in developing nations?

References:

Lee, J. S. (2016). “Everywhere you go, you see English!”: Elderly women’s perspectives on globalization and English. Critical Inquiry in Language Studies, 13(4), 1–32. https://doi-org.proxy3.library.mcgill.ca/10.1080/15427587.2016.1190654

Explainitychannel. (2013, July 11). Globalization explained (explainity® explainer video) [Video]. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ0nFD19eT8

Standard Bangla: A Sociolinguistic Perspective in Bangladesh

Nishat Sharmin

Bangladesh, situated in the South Asian region is a monolingual country where the national and official language is ‘Bangla’ according to the constitution. Though there are regional varieties or dialects, standard Bangla has a significant role to play as it is associated with nationalism, prestige, class, education, identity, and socio-economic position. Mashaekh Hassan, in his article ‘Standardized Bangla: A different social ladder to climb’ has defined the standardized Bangla as the ‘superordinate’ or ‘correct’ form of language whereas dialects are considered as ‘subordinate’. Now, questions might arise as how a language form or variety can be nominated as the standard form, what might be the criteria. To search the answer, one needs to trace back the 1952 language movement, where Bangla was accredited as the official language of East Bengal, a dominion of the then Pakistan. As part of preserving the sense of nationalism, there has always been a deliberate attempt to sustain the standard Bangla or ‘pure Bangla’ by the government agencies, educational institutes, and non-government organizations. Moreover, speaking in proper Bangla or ‘Promito Bangla’ as passed on from the repetitive endorsement of nationalistic narratives and also spoken by the educated, upper-class elite people is associated with prestige, power, individual identity, and socio-economic benefits.

Therefore, people in Bangladesh feel a certain urge to speak in the formal Bangla as they are afraid of revealing their educational and socio-economic background which is identical to their spoken language. As mentioned in the article, parents also feel concerned about their child’s speaking in standard Bangla as they do not want their child to be ridiculed, stigmatized, and discriminated due to speaking in a “not prestigious” and “unacceptable” form of the language. In the present time, the constant fear of losing face, revealing their regional dialect and geographical location, being tagged as someone with lower status or family and thus losing socio-economic benefits make people more active and desperate to ‘sound proper’. However, in the process of preserving and maintaining the standard form of language, people are disregarding their local and regional dialects that might cause the death of those dialects, identity, and culture of certain communities in Bangladesh.

The Chameleon Effect

Victoria Ky-Khim

The title of this blog post must have intrigued you. The chameleon effect. How is this related to sociolinguistics, you may ask? Fear not, we are getting there. Let us start with a definition of sociolinguistics. What exactly is sociolinguistics? Well, it is hard to say. It depends on who you ask. According to Van Herk (2018), it is a “scientific study of the relationship(s) between language and society” (p. 2). This is quite a broad definition and sure enough, it encompasses the chameleon effect which deals with language and interaction.

Nowadays, many of us are second or even additional language learners. As language learners, we refer to a model, oftentimes a teacher or tutor, and we end up imitating them. Just like how children imitate their parents, learners imitate their teachers. Time and again, the teacher’s pronunciation or accent will rub off on the learner. Indeed, just last year, one of my international classmates, who is Chinese, happened to have a British accent, which we (other students, local and international alike) were quick to notice. The reason behind her accent was that she had an English teacher with a British accent.

Apart from teacher-student interactions, you might have noticed that your accent changes depending on who you are talking to. Many factors affect language, these include but are not restricted to education, society, place, social status, etc. In this case, the interaction with an interlocutor can certainly affect how we speak. It might feel like we are adjusting to their accent, but really, we are imitating or mimicking their accent. Did I know this phenomenon was called the chameleon effect? Certainly not. But a quick Google search (why does my accent change depending on who I talk to?) informed me of that. In their abstract, Chartrand & Bargh (1999) defined the chameleon effect as “nonconscious mimicry of the postures, mannerisms, facial expressions, and other behaviors of one’s interaction partners, such that one’s behavior passively and unintentionally changes to match that of others in one’s current social environment”. Now I know, and so do you. For more information about the chameleon effect, I invite you to watch this YouTube video.

Although the chameleon effect seems mostly associated with the field of psychology, it would certainly be interesting to investigate its relation to sociolinguistics since it concerns both language and interaction. Most of all, the chameleon effect touches upon accent which remains a controversial topic in the field of sociolinguistics.

Questions

Have you noticed instances where you imitate your interlocutor’s accent? If yes, when does it happen most? In which languages?
Does the interlocutor notice you have adapted their way of speech? If yes, how do you think it makes them feel?

References

Chartrand, T. L., & Bargh, J. A. (1999). The chameleon effect: the perception-behavior link and social interaction. Journal of personality and social psychology, 76(6), 893–910. https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.76.6.893

Van Herk, Gerard. (2018). What is sociolinguistics? 2e Chichester, West Sussex, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.

Foreigner talk in Montreal? The story of an ear infection

Ali El Mahmoud

Language barriers can be frustrating when you visit a country and you do not speak its language. Most of us have experienced being lost in translation during trips to nations whose people do not share features of our linguistic repertoires. For our communications, we memorized a few basic phrases; invested in a reliable digital translator; exaggerated the use of our body language; and/or we demonstrated our show-but-not-tell skills. For example, we pointed out items, landscapes, or locations on the pictures we had on our phones or our maps.

On the other side of the conversation, there was (ideally) a person who answered our questions with short sentences, simplified grammar and vocabulary, a lot of repetitions, and a slow and loud delivery. This speech register is often referred to as foreigner talk.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2qdxyd3ix4l3dcx/GettyImages-5503828911-5ad8e65fa474be0036ebd245.jpg?dl=0

According to Dela Rosa and Arguelles (2016), foreigner talk occurs when native speakers make linguistic and conversational adjustments to the conversation to accommodate non-native speakers and help them participate in the oral interaction. Linguistic adjustments require a change in phonology and grammar, whereas conversational adjustments consist of modifications of the content of the message (p. 47). The aim of foreigner talk is to facilitate communication (Ellis, 2009, p.45).

I had recently a medical condition that helped me notice that foreigner talk is almost nonexistent in Montreal.

I am trilingual. In addition to Levantine Arabic, I am fluent in both English and French, so in Quebec, I roughly experienced a communication breakdown because I feel at ease speaking the two Canadian official languages. However, in the last few months, I suffered from an ear infection that reduced my hearing ability. According to my doctor, I was hearing 20% less in my left ear, which often caused me discomfort. I had to ask people to repeat what they said, not because I did not understand, but rather because I could not hear a part of their speech. This usually happened in retail stores when I went shopping or when I ordered or received service over the phone.

What I noticed though was funny and interesting. The moment that I requested a repetition and said, ‘Pardon?’ (English or French), the interlocutor switched instantly from English to French (if the conversation was in English), and the opposite, from French to English (if the conversation was in French). To my surprise, foreigner talk never occurred, and there was no scaffolding of any sort. Neither francophones nor anglophones adjusted their interactions. Instead, they code-switched.

The significant linguistic context in Quebec and language laws that were applied from the late 1960s until today had a great impact on the lives of everyone (Gérin-Lajoie, 2022, p. 307). A simple request in a conversation (Could you repeat please?) reveals an indirect implication of the laws in my opinion. For instance, both francophones and anglophones took me as an immigrant, but from two different angles. I know that I am not white, so for French speakers, even though I was trying to speak French, my English is stronger because English is global, and most immigrants speak English. Whereas from an anglophone point of view, a newcomer to Quebec took francisation classes, and therefore, French is their dominant second language.

In both ways, Montrealers avoided the foreigner talk and assumed that I know another language, a quality that is rarely found elsewhere, perhaps. What about you? Have you ever experienced something similar?

References

Dela Rosa, J. P. O., & Arguelles, D. C. (2016). Do modification and interaction work? A critical review of literature on the role of foreigner talk in second language acquisition. Journal on English Language Teaching, 6(3), 46–60.

Ellis, R. (2008). The study of second language acquisition. Oxford University Press.

Gerin-Lajoie, D. (2021). Bill 101 and English minority language education in Quebec. In L. O’Donnell, P. Donovan & B. Lewis (Eds.), La Charte: La loi 101 et les Quebecois d’expression anglaise (pp. 303-321). Presses de l’Université Laval.