Bilingualism

Question

Hello everybody,First of all, I apologize if this is not the right place to ask this question... But I haven't been able to find a better one!I would like to know your opinion on what requirements should be met in order to call someone bilingual. In many cases, when one is applying for a job, he must state his level of English. Well, I've known many people whose English is much worse than mine that claim to be bilingual, while I would never consider myself so, by far, in spite of my CPE and all that. Somehow it gets on my nerves, because I see that people tend to exaggerate about their CVs, and I don't, but everyone'll believe I'm doing so, following the general trend, and so I feel as if I were almost underestimating myself.For example, the guy who's sitting next to me at the office says he's bilingual because he spent a couple of years in Australia when he was a child. I cannot deny he's got a very good accent, and speaks rather fluently (although not completely grammatically), but each time he has to write something, he's continually asking me how he can translate this or that, or how a word is spelt. I, on the contrary, am much better at writing or reading, but my foreign accent is very strong, I'm not half as fluent as he is, and I have a hard time understanding spoken English.I've always thought that in order to be called bilingual, someone's knowledge of a language must be like a native's. But like what native's? An illiterate beggar may not know how to spell anything, but anyway, his English will be always better than mine, won't it?

Cool Breeze · Accepted Answer

Hi Colombo

No need to apologise! I think this forum is perfect for your question. What bilingual really means may be a matter of opinion, but Webster's Unabridged Dictionary certainly agrees with your definition. "Bilingual: able to speak two languages with the facility of a native speaker."

The Collins Concise Dictionary is less demanding: "Able to speak two languages, especially with fluency." I think the meaning this British dictionary offers is closer to what the majority of people associate bilingual with, be it right or wrong.

Whichever definition is closer to the truth, to my mind it is rather difficult to acquire a fluency in two languages if one lives in a monolingual country. Very often, too little time is assigned to language lessons in schools for students to become bilingual even in the Collins Dictionary sense. As you said, people often resort to exaggeration, which is human.

An illiterate beggar whose native language is English is more fluent in English than you or me. On the other hand, we may have a better knowledge of English grammar than he. I hope you'll get a lot of (diverse) replies to your question!

CB

Kooyeen · Answer

ColomboI would like to know your opinion on what requirements should be met in order to call someone bilingual.

Hi,
well, it's controversial. There isn't one accepted definition. Some tend to define it very loosely, others are stricter. I am very strict, because I make a distinction between "knowing a language", "being fluent in a language", and being "bilingual, trilingual, etc." I am going to give you my current definition (yes, my definitions change over time, LOL).
I think you can only be considered bilingual if you know two languages and both of them are more or less at the same level and the ones you know the best. This implies that in everyday situations you choose between those two languages, since they are the ones you know the most and you are most fluent in, but neither of them should give you a big advantage over the other, or give you too much trouble compared to the other.

So, bilingual = the two languages you are most fluent in should be more or less at the same level.

That definition is not perfect though, because I think a person can be very fluent in different areas but has poor skills in other areas (ex: Native-like written English and spoken Spanish, but relatively poor spoken English and written Spanish). That person would still be bilingual, I guess, it's just that the two languages wouldn't be at the same level.
So, you see? I keep updating my definitions, LOL. So now I would say there might be two definitions:

1) The two languages you are most fluent in should be more or less at the same level.
Or:
2) In at least one area, each of the two languages is the one you are the most fluent in.

And now that I think of it, definition #2 probably contains definition #1, so #1 is just a particular case described by #2. Yeah, I like #2 more now, LOL. I'm crazy. I'd better cut this short. So, if you consider what I said, and especially definition #2, maybe we can't really define what means to be bilingual, but we can say whether someone is NOT bilingual:

If the language you are most fluent in, skilled in, and comfortable with is always the same in EVERY area of usage, then you are definitely NOT bilingual.

I want to become bilingual too. I don't know if I am already bilingual according to definition #2 (that is, if my English is better than my Italian in some areas or particular cases), but my goal is to become bilingual according to definition #1, and I am sure I am not that kind of bilingual yet, because English still gives me too much trouble (= vocabulary, spoken English). When I am bilingual, the way I want to be, I will be able to use it in most situations without feeling awkward at all, compared to any other language I might use instead of English. The problem is that I already know by the time I know English at that level, my Italian will be so corrupt that I will feel awkward using Italian, and so I'll be monolingual again, LOL. For some weird reason I am now thinking that being bilingual as in definition #1 is likely to be impractical.
Anyway, I think you've had enough of my rambling, so it's time to say goodbye.

Forbes · Answer

ColomboFor example, the guy who's sitting next to me at the office says he's bilingual because he spent a couple of years in Australia when he was a child. I cannot deny he's got a very good accent, and speaks rather fluently (although not completely grammatically), but each time he has to write something, he's continually asking me how he can translate this or that, or how a word is spelt. I, on the contrary, am much better at writing or reading, but my foreign accent is very strong, I'm not half as fluent as he is, and I have a hard time understanding spoken English.

Whatever bilingual means:

1. The inability to write a language or write it properly does not come into it.

2. Having difficulty translating from one language to another quite often happens to bilinguals; indeed, some people take it as an inidicator of bilingualism.

3. Having a strong foreign accent does not in itself mean that you are not a bilingual, but is in many cases going to be indicator that you are not, for the simple reason that it shows that you probably did not acquire the language at a young age, a requirement in some people's book for being truly bilingual.

4. I think that making mistakes has to disqualify you from being bilingual. (By "mistakes" I do not mean not conforming to the standard language, but the sort of "mistakes" that no native speaker would make.)

It is really a question of degree. If you are brought up in a Spanish speaking family living in Stockholm then you are going to be fluent in Spanish and Swedish. You will be able to say "correctly" anything that a person brought up in a Spanish speaking family living in Stockholm needs or wants to say whether in Spanish or Swedish. However, the range of your Spanish is likely to be less than that of a native Spanish speaker brought up in a Spanish speaking country. Language is part of ones experience and the experience of a person brought up in a Spanish speaking family living in Stockholm is not the same as that of a native Spanish speaker brought up in a Spanish speaking country. A Catalan speaker brought up in Barcelona is in a different position. His Spanish and Catalan will range over almost exactly identical areas. The experience of an Italian who speaks one of the many languages spoken in Italy that is not Italian is different again. He will have a perfect command of both Italian and the other language, but his "home" language may not have developed the necessary registers to talk about everything (though it is of course capable of doing so). If he wants to talk about certain subjects he may be more or less forced to talk about them in Italian. The chances are that not only does he never write the home language, but that he has not thought about how it should be written. In each of these cases, the individuals can justifiably call themselves bilingual, but what they know is different in each case.

Colombo · Answer

Hi everybody,

First, my apologies for not answering before (apologizing seems to be a habit with me the moment I write in this forum!

). I didn't intend not to pay attention to your answers, but I've had (and still have) severe problems with my computer (as a matter of fact, I'm formatting it today, as soon as it finishes making a backup).

Thanks a lot for your comments and opinions. I've found them very interesting and enlightening. I can see that the concept of bilingualism admits a lot of interpretations. But, from reading your comments, I gather that what is important is to speak a language, not to read or write it. So, an illiterate person could very well be bilingual if he spoke two languages fluently and at the same level, even if he could not read or write any of them.

As for the inability to translate from one language to another, I have already noticed that in persons who are really bilingual without the slightest doubt. I probably didn't express myself clearly with the example I mentioned of the guy sitting next to me. What he does is asking me about words in English when he is writing in English from scratch, not when translating something that's written in Spanish. For example, let's say he's writing an e-mail to a German guy he met while on holidays. I suppose that if he were bilingual, he would be just writing down what he thinks in English, instead of asking me how to say words like "tent", "unless" or "past tense of speak". Well, I don't know, but after such questions, I'm always surprised that he calls himself bilingual.

To me, the clearest examples of bilingualism are those Forbes has talked about in his last paragraph, a Catalan or an Italian who speaks one of the other languages in Italy (I'm afraid I don't know much about them; I think one of them's Ladin, and I think Sicilian's another, am I right? I suppose there will be more.) To me, they're clearly in a situation in which they're immersed in an everyday life involving both languages, so they're able to use them with the same fluency in most of situations. I also include in this group those children whose parents speak a language but who are living in a country with a different one, provided that they use their parents' mother tongue at home. As for children with a foreign parent, I've known all situations, from those who never speak a word in that parent's language to those who are always spoken to by that foreign parent in his or her language so that the child will learn it to the point of speaking it like a native.

The only thing that is more or less clear to me (until someone comes and argues about it) is that accent is the least important issue, as long as it doesn't prevent a person to be understood without much effort. Of course, as Forbes says, it will indicate that he didn't learn that language as a child, but to me that's not a compulsory requirement (I think it's almost impossible to become bilingual in that case, but not completely unheard of - I know one case of a Swiss lady with some foreign language but who's really fluent in Spanish in every field).

Anyway, and turning from the field of linguistics to that of applied linguistics (ahem... I really don't know what I'm talking about!), what do you think a firm are thinking of when they talk of bilingualism when offering a job? Spoken or written English? Both? To me, it should be both, but I've known too many people who claim to be bilingual and ask for those jobs (some of them are even given them) that I cannot make head or tail of it. For example, in my work team I'm the person who's best at writing and reading in English, so each time we've got to write a paper, it's I who makes most of it. However, my boss (the other extreme of the group) is much better at speaking, even though he almost speaks like a Red Indian. He may say I be happy I meet you, but he says so in a way that makes he look like he knows what he's saying. When we go to a meeting, after one morning of listening to a series of conferences, my head just swells and stops working, while he can go on the whole week. And I spend all the gala dinner hoping I won't get involved in one of those conversations that include the whole table, because at the moment there are several persons speaking at the same time, I cannot understand it more than if it were Dutch. My boss, on the contrary, can handle such situations without any problem. But, surprisingly, they still consider my English is the best in the group, while I don't think so, since it leaves me much more defenseless in social situations (it's not as if I were altogether dumb, mind!)

Bilingualism

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