Two competing theories of "both ways" (dominant culture access and minority culture maintenance) education are examined: Harris' culture domain separation theory and Kemmis'"negotiated meaning" approach. Analysis along three dimensions (view of culture, language, and epistomology/ontology) suggests Harris' theory is based on a…

Examines the role of grammatical prerequisites in code switching in young bilingual children. Grammatical constraints are not violated in the earliest uses of mixing. Code switching occurs early in life within these constraints when a certain kind of grammatical knowledge is accessible and functional categories are implemented in the child's…

Looks at factors that contribute to the international status of a language, reviews the economic relations between the United States and German-speaking countries, and finds a confluence of factors that contributes to the reemerging utility of German-language skills for Americans. Discusses enrollment patterns in German-language courses and how…

Findings are reported from a series of literacy assessments in which four classes of bilingual Grade 3 and Grade 5 students from an indigenous community in Central Mexico participated. Subjects who completed the battery of tests of reading and writing in Spanish and Nahuatl range from balanced bilinguals to Spanish-dominant speakers with at least…

Examines concerns and fears that were expressed recently about the influx of English loanwords in Cypriot Greek and in general the influence of English in Cyprus and reviews papers presented at a conference held in 1992 that dealt with the dominance of English and the suppression of Cypriot Greek. (Author/VWL)

These case studies describe and compare the language characteristics of two bilingual children (age 7), one with specific language impairment (SLI). Results found the child with SLI produced significantly more morphosyntactic errors and less variety of grammatical forms and sentence types in both languages, and demonstrated significant…

Language ecology, a term developed by Haugen (2001), describes the relationship between languages and the environment in which they exist; that is, how they grow, change, interact and adapt in a Darwinian-like quest for survival. Of the 6000 or so languages in existence today, some are spoken by vast numbers of people, but others are used by very…

Problems related to the study of second language learners are described, and the factors affecting language development are discussed. Factors influential in second language learning include psychological, sociological, and affective aspects. Similarly, the measurement of language has been influenced by linguistic, psychological, and social…

In New York City ghetto schools eighty-five percent of the students are reading below grade level. This points to failure, not of the students but of the school system. In District One, although seventy-three percent of the children are Puerto Rican and eight percent are Chinese, only six of the district's nearly 900 teachers are bilingual. If…

A study was conducted to compare the communication apprehension levels of Puerto Rican college students with those of United States college students. The Puerto Rican students were considered bilingual, having received instruction in English as a second language for most of their school years. In the first phase of the study, 341 students who…

A survey of day and evening students enrolled at Los Angeles City College (LACC) during Fall 1980 was conducted to gather information concerning students': (1) educational objectives; (2) college choice; (3) curricular interests; (4) educational background; (5) academic aspirations and plans; (6) interest in child care; (7) means of…

The French gender usage of grade two and grade five Franco-Ontarian children was compared with that of English-speaking children enrolled in French immersion programs, and monolingual French-speaking children in Quebec. While some of the Franco-Ontarian children are similar to the Quebec children with respect to the gender "rules" they…

Over the last four generations, the language patterns in Maine's bilingual Franco-American communities have undergone a shift characterized by a widespread adoption of English and a decline of the ethnic language. The younger generations generally are unable or unwilling to use the French language and they express negative attitudes towards that…

Project Aprende is an Elementary and Secondary Education Act Title VII bilingual-bicultural program established in three junior high schools in New York City. The program is intended to supplement and enrich basic tax levy bilingual instructional programs. The program includes five components: bilingual-bicultural instruction in reading, language…

Describes the language development of two children, now aged 5 and 8, who acquired two languages--Spanish and German--simultaneously from birth and a third--English--when very young. Focuses on the following factors: patterns of interference, code switching, language dominance, the role of parents, the social environment, and the child's…