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IS-AUR-Samarb.progr. Norge Frankrike

Language contact and language change across Three Generations in Turkish families in Norway and France

Awarded: NOK 48,236

This project is based upon a collaboration among scholars whose expertise lies in Turkish as a heritage language spoken in Europe and its contact with majority languages such as Norwegian, French and Dutch, [see Akinci (2004, 2009, 2010, 2016) Nistov (1989, 1999, 2001), Türker (1993, 1999, 2000, 2005) Sevinç (2012, 2014, 2016, Sevinç and Dewaele, 2016)]. Turkish is one of the most widely spoken immigrant languages in Europe (see Backus 2013). Including first, second and third generation, there are about 18,000 Turks living in Norway (SSB, 2015), and 611,500 Turks living in France (Akinci, 2016). This research project aims to investigate language contact phenomena in an immigrant situation across three generations within the same family. We would like to have a both grammatical and a sociolinguistic approach to the data analysis. The linguistic contact phenomena are also vital for the study of identity constructions across generations. Le Page and Tabouret-Keller (1985) take individual as the central point in order to reach the linguistic behaviors of the communities. Therefore, it is wise to combine the analysis of the social network (results from the questionnaire) with an examination of identity- and culture-related issues among generations. In this way, we can have a better understanding of the individuals? immigrant experiences, therefore family attitudes towards the languages they use. This research will add to new knowledge and understanding of language maintenance and shift within immigrant families by combining both linguistic factors (i.e. language contact phenomena at lexical and structural level) and social factors (i.e. attitudes towards both the heritage language - Turkish- and majority languages-Norwegian and French).

Funding scheme:

IS-AUR-Samarb.progr. Norge Frankrike