LLS Colloquium: When is a bilingual an attriter? – Bilingualism as a two-way street

On Wednesday 3 March 2021 Monika Schmid (University of Essex) will be presenting at the LLS Colloquium series, with a talk titled "When is a bilingual an attriter? – Bilingualism as a two-way street".

When is a bilingual an attriter? – Bilingualism as a two-way street

Despite increasing evidence from psycho- and neurolinguistic investigations that multilinguals use and process all of their languages – including the native one – differently from monolinguals, there remains a strong bias in research and theory towards L2 development and L1-to-L2 transfer. The prevalent assumption is (still) that the native language, once completely acquired, is immune to change. In this view, the process we refer to as 'language attrition' only takes place when underlying representations are affected, and is confined to relatively few extreme situations of very long-term disuse of the native language. This presentation will discuss to what extent first language attrition is part and parcel of the overall process of multilingual development, to what extent it is shaped and constrained by external factors (such as age at learning or frequency of use), and whether it is possible to distinguish attriters from non-attriters.

The talk will take place at 4pm on Zoom, and there will be an opportunity to ask questions at the end. To join: click on this link.

Event poster: When is a bilingual an attriter? – Bilingualism as a two-way street