Notice Board

One of the fundamental questions in second language (L2) acquisition is the role of input as it relates to L2 social status.  In this talk, I will present a series of studies that systematically explore the effect of L2 input as exemplified by the speech production development of French immersion students in Alberta.  Specifically, French immersion students' speech production were compared across ages/grades, as well as with adult French-English bilingual speakers in the Prairies, and with Francophone children enrolled in French mother tongue school. 

In these studies, acoustic measurements of adult and children's consonants and vowels will be reported.  The results of my research indicate that while children are able to learn French in a minority setting, their French production is heavily influenced by English, the dominat language of society. 

Moreover, children experience a "phonetic fossilization", a cessation of phonetic learning despite increased experience, which speaks to their unique learning setting and the social status of the French language.