Abstract
The acquisition of the Spanish 5-vowel system by speakers of the 3-vowel language Quechua (/I/-/a/-/&z.pupsil;/) seldom results in accurate approximation to Spanish vowel spaces when learning takes place informally in post-adolescence. The present study offers data from a minimal immersion environment in northern Ecuador. In a context in which few cues point to the existence of mid-high vocalic oppositions in Spanish (e.g. no literacy, no corrective feedback, almost no viable minimal pairs), these speakers reliably distinguish only three Spanish vowels in production. These Quechua-dominant bilinguals have amorphous front and back vowel spaces considerably broader than those defining Quechua /I/ and /&z.pupsil;/, but with no bimodal clustering. Left relatively unfettered, the hybrid system may contribute to an understanding of the relationship between vowel inventory and vowel space topology.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 91-121 |
Number of pages | 31 |
Journal | Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism |
Volume | 5 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jan 1 2015 |
All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- Language and Linguistics
- Linguistics and Language