Folium: Can You Lose Your Native Language via BBCFuture
Folium: Can You Lose Your Native Language via BBCFuture
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“Bilingualism” is when someone speaks and understands two different languages. This could refer to an individual or an entire society. The proficiency level of the person needs to be that they both understand and speak at the level of a native speaker, or close to it, in both languages. Now, there have been many theories about bilingualism. One theory is called the “Balance Theory” that suggests that the two languages exist in balance. It is easier to explain this theory with an analogy of two balloons. Each balloon represents a language. A monolingual person has only one filled balloon while a bilingual person has two half-filled balloons. Now, the question is, while learning the second language, is it possible to lose the first language and only fill one balloon? Sophie says, “In fact, the science of why, when and how we lose our own language is complex and often counter-intuitive.” And you may have experienced this if you have ever spent an extensive amount of time speaking, reading, writing, and listening to your second language.
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Cultural (or linguistic) attrition is not a lost cause!
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“The minute you start learning another language, the two systems start to compete with each other,” says Monika Schmid, a linguist at the University of Essex. Don’t be alarmed, though. Your brain knows just how to handle things, so learning a second language won’t automatically mean you lose your native one. It simply means your brain is working overtime to keep up with the new input and jump back and forth in a language shift. Language shift, also known as language transfer or language replacement or language assimilation. This is the process where a speech community shifts to a different language. Monika Schmid is a leading researcher of language attrition, a growing field of research that looks at what makes us lose our mother tongue. Language attrition is the process of losing a native or first, language. This process is generally caused by both isolation from speakers of the first language and the acquisition and use of a second language.
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“It’s possible to forget your first language, even as an adult. But how, and why, this happens is complex and counter-intuitive.” – BBCFuture
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I experienced this first-hand with this while living a couple of years in South America, where I learned Spanish as a second language. After about a year or so of speaking mostly Spanish all day, every day, I was realizing that my thoughts began and ended with Spanish, or more of a… Spanglish. It was an interesting phenomenon. When I returned home from this trip, attempting to find the correct English word was difficult. I would often blank out for a moment until I could remember or asked what the word was in English. Has that ever happened to you?
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What Sophie experienced with loss of her first language has to do with the fact that she was so immersed with the second language acquisition, that she began to experience language attrition. She wasn’t able to exercise any language learning techniques, like code-switching, which just means she can easily switch effortlessly between different languages. Monika Schmid says, “The fundamental difference between a monolingual and bilingual brain is that when you become bilingual, you have to add some kind of control module that allows you to switch.” If this control mechanism is weak, the speaker may struggle to find the right word or keep slipping into their second language. This is the case of Sophie that struggled to understand the text that her brother sent her, unable to switch into their first language.
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“Attrition is not a bad thing. It’s just a natural process,” she says. “These people have made changes to their grammar that is consistent with their new reality… Whatever allows us to learn languages also allows us to make these changes.” – Prof. Laura Dominguez
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(Ed. “Go ahead! Say something in your native language. Right now. Do it!)
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Language attrition is just a natural process that occurs when learning a second language. It is reversible, and if you find yourself stuck in your second language, to remember your first is simple. Now, remember the question, have you studied languages long enough to lose parts of your first language?
Julie Thatcher
LEAF Contributor
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