Bilingualism

Bilingualism

Bilingualism has been derived from Latin word "bi" means "two” and "lingualism" means "tongue". Monolingualism refers to the ability to use a single language. Bilingualism is the ability to use two languages effectively. The ability to use multiple languages is known as multilingualism.

When we talk about the knowledge of languages, we come across terms like Monolingualism, Bilingualism, and Multilingualism. Simply speaking, they mean one, two or more languages. It is evident that the distinction is of degree only. Different people use the term “Bilingualism” in different ways. For some Bilingualism means an equal ability to communicate in two languages. For others, it means the ability to communicate in two languages but with the possibility of greater skill in one language.

The traditional definition of Bilingualism is something like “the ability to use two languages freely and fluently with the native speaker like proficiency”. This approach to bilingualism appears to rule out a great many people, especially learners, who have a good working knowledge of a second language and a fair ability to express themselves, but who cannot claim to have the accuracy and fluency of a native speaker. This type of perfect bilingualism is extremely rare. However, it is not uncommon for people to approximate to perfect bilingualism by being equally competent in both languages over a fairly wide range of situations. So we should prefer to view Bilingualism as “language ability which can be placed on a line from monolingualism to bilingualism”. It means this ability can occur anywhere on a scale from speaking only one’s native language to speaking two or more languages with equal skill.

Bilingualism in its broad definition is very common indeed all over the world. Monolingualism speech communities are extremely rare. People are required to attempt to learn at least one other language. Over 70% of the earth's population is thought to be bilingual or multilingual, and there is a good reason to believe that bilingualism or multilingualism has been the norm for most human beings at least for the last few millennia. In countries like Switzerland, Canada, and the United States, people speak more than one language. Two well-known examples of officially bilingual countries are Canada and Belgium. An equally well-known example of an officially multilingual country, which has not experienced any comparable language-problems, is Switzerland. Other countries, though not officially bilingual or multilingual, have two or more different languages spoken within their borders. Most countries of the world fall into this latter category. Furthermore, although it does not follow from what has been said so far, in most countries whether they are officially bilingual or multilingual or not, there are whole communities that are bilingual or multilingual in the sense that their members commonly use two or more languages in their daily lives. It is not the case, of course, that all the citizens of an officially bilingual or multilingual country use, or even know, more than one language.

In New Guinea, in southeast Asia, in India, in the Caucasus, in the Amazon rainforest, people routinely learn two or three neighboring languages as well as their own, and the same was true of Australia before the European settlement. Even today, many millions of European are at least bilingual, speaking both their own mother tongue and the national language of the country they live in, and many of them can additionally speak a global language or world languages like English or French.

People of a country may feel obliged to study a foreign language under political pressure or adopt it of their own free will to join the mainstream of human relationship. Individual bilingualism, however, doesn’t have to be the result of political dominance by a group using different language. It can simply be the result of having two parents who speak different languages. If a child simultaneously acquires the French spoken by her mother and the English are spoken by her father, then the distinction between the two languages may not even be noticed. There will simply be two ways of talking according to the person being talked to. However, even in this type of bilingualism, one language tends eventually to become the dominant one, with the others in a subordinate role.

Sociolinguists have identified two main types of bilingualism: Co-ordinate and Compound.

Co-ordinate bilinguals tend to keep the two languages separate and have a language choice governed by language domains(area of language activity). They may think in their dominant language but have the ability to switch from one language to another when the need arises.

Compound bilinguals have their two languages as a merged system. They have a single semantic base or competence and can use it to produce other languages. They move from one language to another with much less hesitation. The compound bilinguals use both languages at the same time interchangeably. Compound bilingualism results in code-switching which means a change from one language to another. This change of switch may take place from one language to another in the same situation, or from one sentence to another sentence in the discourse, or within the same sentence.

The classification of bilinguals just given may or may not be well founded from a psychological, and neurophysiological, point of view. But it is one that has guided a good deal of recent research. At the very least, it serves to emphasize the fact that there are many different kinds of bilingual individuals.

Similarly, there are many different kinds of bilingual communities: different in respect of whether one language is clearly dominant or not for most members; whether one language is dominant for some, but not for others; whether some members approximate to perfect bilingualism or not; whether both languages are acquired simultaneously or not; and so on. However, regardless of all these differences, there is one thing that most, if not all, bilingual communities have in common: a fairly clear functional differentiation of the two languages in respect of what many sociolinguists refer to as domains. For example, one such domain might the home, this being defined in terms, not simply of the actual place where the conversation occurs, but also of the participants, the topic of conversation, and other relevant variables.

Thus one language might be the language of the home, in the sense that it would always be used in talking informally with other members of the family at home about domestic matters. However, another language might be used outside the home, or inside the home when strangers are present (even though they might well be bilingual too) or when the topic of conversation is other than domestic. This notion of a domain is intuitively attractive.

Bilingualism or multilingualism can be the property of an individual, but equally, it can be the property of an entire speech community in which two or more languages are routinely used. The existence of bilingual and multilingual societies raises a number of important social, political and educational issues. In what languages should education be delivered, and at what levels? What languages should be accepted for publication and broadcasting? In what languages should laws be written, and what languages should be accepted in court proceedings?