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Overt and null subjects in Bulgarian: comparing monolingual adults and children to child heritage speakers in Germany in their use of Bulgarian.

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Title: Overt and null subjects in Bulgarian: comparing monolingual adults and children to child heritage speakers in Germany in their use of Bulgarian.
Authors: Genevska-Hanke, Dobrinka1 dobrinka.genevska.hanke@uni-oldenburg.de, Hamann, Cornelia1
Source: Language Learning Journal. Apr2024, Vol. 52 Issue 2, p159-171. 13p.
Subject Terms: *Bilingual education, Bulgarian language, German language
Abstract: This study investigates the use of overt and null subjects in Bulgarian in child heritage speakers with L2 German. The alternation of overt and null pronominal subjects in null-subject languages like Bulgarian depends on grammatical and discourse conditions and contrasts with German. Oral narratives were elicited in Bulgarian, comparing the performance of the heritage children to that of monolingual children and adults. Overall 68 Bulgarian narratives of 39 speakers were analysed as to the use of overt and null pronominal subjects in topic-continuity and topic-shift contexts. The results reveal similar subject realisation for all speakers, supporting early acquisition of null-subject grammars. Analyses of topic-continuity and -shift contexts showed similar overall patterns in children's and adults' subject use, with children producing somewhat more overt subjects in topic-continuity and ambiguous overt pronouns in topic-shift contexts than adults. However, the bilinguals used significantly more ambiguous null subjects than monolinguals. These results suggest that fine-grained discourse constraints of null-subject grammars are more difficult for bilinguals to acquire and maintain. The near adult-like performance of the bilinguals in some contexts can be attributed to the fact that most of them were Bulgarian-dominant and received non-attrited parental input. Differences are also attributable to cross-linguistic influence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Copyright of Language Learning Journal is the property of Taylor & Francis Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)
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  Data: Overt and null subjects in Bulgarian: comparing monolingual adults and children to child heritage speakers in Germany in their use of Bulgarian.
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  Data: <searchLink fieldCode="JN" term="%22Language+Learning+Journal%22">Language Learning Journal</searchLink>. Apr2024, Vol. 52 Issue 2, p159-171. 13p.
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  Data: *<searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Bilingual+education%22">Bilingual education</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Bulgarian+language%22">Bulgarian language</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22German+language%22">German language</searchLink>
– Name: Abstract
  Label: Abstract
  Group: Ab
  Data: This study investigates the use of overt and null subjects in Bulgarian in child heritage speakers with L2 German. The alternation of overt and null pronominal subjects in null-subject languages like Bulgarian depends on grammatical and discourse conditions and contrasts with German. Oral narratives were elicited in Bulgarian, comparing the performance of the heritage children to that of monolingual children and adults. Overall 68 Bulgarian narratives of 39 speakers were analysed as to the use of overt and null pronominal subjects in topic-continuity and topic-shift contexts. The results reveal similar subject realisation for all speakers, supporting early acquisition of null-subject grammars. Analyses of topic-continuity and -shift contexts showed similar overall patterns in children's and adults' subject use, with children producing somewhat more overt subjects in topic-continuity and ambiguous overt pronouns in topic-shift contexts than adults. However, the bilinguals used significantly more ambiguous null subjects than monolinguals. These results suggest that fine-grained discourse constraints of null-subject grammars are more difficult for bilinguals to acquire and maintain. The near adult-like performance of the bilinguals in some contexts can be attributed to the fact that most of them were Bulgarian-dominant and received non-attrited parental input. Differences are also attributable to cross-linguistic influence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
– Name: AbstractSuppliedCopyright
  Label:
  Group: Ab
  Data: <i>Copyright of Language Learning Journal is the property of Taylor & Francis Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract.</i> (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)
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RecordInfo BibRecord:
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      – Type: doi
        Value: 10.1080/09571736.2023.2294347
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      – Code: eng
        Text: English
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        PageCount: 13
        StartPage: 159
    Subjects:
      – SubjectFull: Bilingual education
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Bulgarian language
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: German language
        Type: general
    Titles:
      – TitleFull: Overt and null subjects in Bulgarian: comparing monolingual adults and children to child heritage speakers in Germany in their use of Bulgarian.
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            NameFull: Hamann, Cornelia
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              Text: Apr2024
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              Y: 2024
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              Value: 52
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            – TitleFull: Language Learning Journal
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