“I no longer count in German.” On dominance shift in returnee heritage speakers

Abstract

This study analyzes the degree of language balance in three groups of bilingual speakers of Portuguese and German: a group of Portuguese heritage speakers (HSs) living in Germany, another who returned to Portugal, and Portuguese late learners of German L2. Based on the DIALANG vocabulary size placement test, applied in German and in Portuguese, and on extralinguistic variables extracted from a background questionnaire, the results confirm high degrees of unbalanced language dominance favoring the societal language (SL) in HSs without the experience of return, and a leveling of language dominance in returnees. Language balance in returnees is the consequence of some loss of proficiency in the former SL (German) and reactivation of the heritage language (Portuguese). Current relative amount of contact with the two languages is correlated with language dominance only in the HSs and the late L2 speaker groups, whereas age of return and length of residence in Portugal explain language dominance in returnees. Self-reported proficiency is also predictive of language dominance and may be taken as complementary indicator.

Language balance rather than age of acquisition: A study on the cross-linguistic gender congruency effect in Portuguese–German bilinguals

“…Again, negative values indicate higher self-estimated proficiency in Portuguese and positive values in German (e.g., Portuguese speaking: 7 + Portuguese writing: 6 = 13; German speaking: 5 + German writing: 5 = 10, dif: -3). A positive strong correlation between the language balance score obtained through the DIALANG VSPT and the selfassessment scores will further support the reliability of the DIALANG VSPT as a proficiency test (for more detail, check footnote 6 in the Results section; see also Flores et al, 2022).…”

Heritage language use in the country of residence matters for language maintenance, but short visits to the homeland can boost heritage language outcomes

“…The second line of research comes from studies on returnee children and adults, namely heritage speakers who returned from the country of residence to the country of origin as children and adolescents (Flores et al, 2017(Flores et al, , 2022Flores, 2019;Kubota et al, 2020Kubota et al, , 2021 or as adults (Genevska-Hanke, 2017;Köpke and Genevska-Hanke, 2018). This line of research examines whether heritage language reversal is possible after re-immersion to the country of origin and how long it takes (Flores and Snape, 2021;Montrul, 2023).…”

“…Studies targeting HL vocabulary re-activation with long-term returnees have shown that they have improved vocabulary skills compared to heritage speakers (Treffers-Daller et al, 2016;Flores et al, 2022) even within 1 year after return to the country of origin. What is more, a study by Kubota et al (2021) showed that Japanese-English bilingual returnee children who were more dominant in their L2 (English) and less dominant in their heritage language (Japanese) benefited the most in their lexical diversity from the shift in language environment after a year of immersion in Japanese and were able to catch up to their peers who were already dominant in Japanese or balanced in their two languages after 1 year of re-immersion (Kubota et al, 2021).…”

Moving to continuous classifications of bilingualism through machine learning trained on language production

“…Moreover, strict classifications disregard that individuals can also change their "label" during their lifetime. The most notable examples are expatriates to foreign countries who exhibit quick changes in their native language after immersion in the dominant language of the host country (so-called attriters, with attrition phenomena starting just a few years of immersion, Ecke & Hall, 2013), or early bilinguals who experience expatriation to the family homeland (so-called returnees, Flores et al, 2022).…”