Translation universals in the oral production of bilingual children

Abstract

This paper investigates two of the most widely analysed universals in translation research, namely simplification and explicitation. We examine the oral production of bilingual children with different language pairs as available in the CHILDES project (MacWhinney 2000) (i.e. the FerFuLice, Ticio, Deuchar, Vila, Genesee and Pérez-Bazán corpora) as well as in other compilation forms (i.e. Ronjat 1913; Leopold 1939–1949; Swain 1972; Lanza 1988, 1997, 2001; Cossato 2008). We address two main issues: whether instances of simplification and explicitation appear in the production of non-instructed interpreters and, if so, how their occurrence relates to the type of data (i.e. spontaneous or experimental) and the language pair involved. The results show that children acquiring two first languages often translate and use simplification and explicitation at varying degrees irrespective of the language pair. We conclude that the analysis of acquisition data can contribute to shed light on the nature of these translation universals.

The acquisition of Spanish and English as two first languages through the analysis of natural interpreting in bilingual children

“…bilingües traducen entre sus dos L1s (Álvarez de la , 2015Cossato, 2008;Harris, 1980aHarris, , 1980bHarris & Sherwood, 1978), un fenómeno que se ha denominado interpretación natural (Harris, 1977(Harris, , 2003. En este sentido la interpretación natural se añade a otros fenómenos del contacto de lenguas, como la influencia interlingüística y la alternancia de códigos, como característica definitoria del proceso de adquisición de dos L1s.…”

“…Already studied in diverse works (e.g. Álvarez de la Fuente, 2008; Álvarez de la , 2015Bullock & Harris, 1997;Harris, 1980aHarris, , 1980bHarris & Sherwood, 1978;Lörscher, 1992;Malakoff, 1992;Reynolds & Orellana, 2009;Shannon, 1990;Valdés, 2003), this phenomenon has been attested in very young 2L1 bilinguals, as can be seen from Examples (4) and (5), where two Spanish-English bilingual children, Manuela from the Deuchar corpus and Simon from the FerFulice corpus, translate when their parents ask them to do so at early ages (1;09 and 1;10 years old respectively). (2012,2015) propose that NI is inherently linked to 2L1 bilingual acquisition and that it surfaces as a natural resource that young bilingual children use in order to communicate a message in their other L1, as evidenced by Examples (4) and (5).…”

“…In that respect, although some studies have shown that NI is recurrently used by 2L1 bilingual children with different language pairs as a communicative strategy in their everyday bilingual contexts, few studies have focused on this capacity as part of the 2L1 bilingual acquisition process (Álvarez de la Fuente, 2008; Álvarez de la , 2015Harris, 1980aHarris, , 1980bHarris & Sherwood, 1978;Lörscher, 1992;Malakoff, 1992). Actually, 2L1A literature contains several references to the use of translation equivalents (lexical pairs or pairings) in early 2L1 bilingual acquisition as a reflection of how children can differentiate both languages from the first stages of their linguistic development (e.g.…”

Myth or reality? Some directions on translation universals in recent corpus based case studies

“…In another study of translation universals, de la Fuente and Fuertes (2015) investigated the oral production of bilingual children. The concepts of simplification and explicitation, two of the most well studied universals in the field of translation research, are the focus of this investigation.…”

“…According to the findings, children who are learning two first languages frequently translate between the languages, in addition to employing simplification and explicitation to varying degrees depending on the language combination. de la Fuente and Fuertes (2015) concluded that the examination of acquisition data has the potential to help illuminate the characteristics of these translation universals.…”