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Communicative relevance: Color references in bilingual and trilingual speakers
Resource type
Authors/contributors
- Pavlenko, Aneta (Author)
- Jarvis, Scott (Author)
- Melnyk, Svitlana (Author)
- Sorokina, Anastasia (Author)
Title
Communicative relevance: Color references in bilingual and trilingual speakers
Abstract
The study examined granularity of lexical partitioning of the blue area in speakers of English, which encodes the term blue; Russian, which encodes two terms, sinij [dark/navy blue] and goluboj [light/sky blue]; and Ukrainian, which encodes the terms synij [dark/navy blue] and blakytnyj and golubyj [light/sky blue]. Five groups of participants took part in the study: (1) 30 L1 speakers of English, (2) 30 L1 speakers of Russian, (3) 30 Russian–English bilinguals, (4) 30 English–Russian bilinguals, and (5) 25 Ukrainian–Russian–English trilinguals. Quantitative and qualitative analyses revealed that L1 Russian speakers referred to different types of blue significantly more frequently than all other groups, while bilinguals patterned with L1 English speakers. These findings suggest that classroom exposure to L2 Russian does not make the distinction between sinij and goluboj communicatively relevant for L1 English speakers and that everyday use of L2 English may trigger attrition of the contrast in L1 Russian.
Publication
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition
Date
2017/08
Volume
20
Issue
4
Pages
853-866
Citation Key
pavlenkoCommunicativeRelevanceColor2017
Accessed
3/27/25, 1:40 PM
ISSN
1366-7289, 1469-1841
Short Title
Communicative relevance
Language
en
Library Catalog
Cambridge University Press
Citation
Pavlenko, A., Jarvis, S., Melnyk, S., & Sorokina, A. (2017). Communicative relevance: Color references in bilingual and trilingual speakers. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 20(4), 853–866. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728916000535
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