Papers by Jackelyn Van Buren
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Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics, 2017
Fricative /f/ aspiration (i. e., /f/ -> [h] in words such as afuera ‘outside’ and fui ‘went.1s... more Fricative /f/ aspiration (i. e., /f/ -> [h] in words such as afuera ‘outside’ and fui ‘went.1sg’) is a nonstandard rural feature of Spanish that occurs in a Pacific Northwest speech community of migrant farmworkers of Mexican descent. While the historical change in Spanish from /f/ > [h] has an extensive literature (see Naro 1972; Penny 1990; Pensado 1993; Torreblanca 1984), the social and linguistic factors that condition the variable’s synchronic use are poorly understood (Renaud 2014). This study examines the current trajectory of /f/ aspiration in the context of migration in the U.S., utilizing sociolinguistic interviews conducted with 28 participants ranging in age from 17 to 71, born in either Mexico or the U.S. The study demonstrates that speakers who are more tightly integrated into local family and agriculture networks are more likely to produce [h]. A significant interaction between gender and age is also found: while women of all ages are sensitive to the standard v...
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Recent trends in documentation and revitalization have emphasized the empowerment model which hig... more Recent trends in documentation and revitalization have emphasized the empowerment model which highlights the importance of collaboration between academic and speech community members (Cameron et al. 1992, 1997;SSHRC 2007; Czaykowska-Higgins 2007), yet few articles describe actual collaborative projects and their outcomes (Yamada 2007). Among the few, Yamada (2007) demonstrates the success of the model within the Aretyry speech community of Suriname. Similarly, our project adds to the literature a case study using collaborative methodological frameworks and offers documentation and revitalization work among linguists, graduate students, a college Blackfoot instructor (native speaker), an elementary school teacher, and grade school students on the Blackfeet reservation in Montana. The project is a creation of original language education material: a short animated story in Blackfoot entitled O’towaawahkao’pa Ponoka: ‘Let’s walk around with Elk.’ In our presentation we demonstrate a mut...
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Spanish in Context, 2016
It has been suggested that contact between Spanish and English results in an increased rate of Sp... more It has been suggested that contact between Spanish and English results in an increased rate of Spanish subject pronouns and a desensitization to factors that constrain pronoun usage. Yet, evidence for such contact-induced change has been found in some U.S. communities, but not others. In this study we analyze Spanish pronoun expression in interviews with Hispanics in Washington State who do agricultural work in Montana each summer. We compare U.S.-born bilingual children to monolingual adults from this community. Results from analyses of 3,572 verb tokens indicate little to no change in pronoun expression — neither in rates of expression nor in usage patterns. We explain this lack of change in pronoun expression by drawing on the well-established connection between social networks and language change. Poorer, more rural communities, like the farmworker community in Washington/Montana, tend to have tight-knit social networks, which increases the likelihood of retention of linguistic ...
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Spanish in Context, 2016
It has been suggested that contact between Spanish and English results in an increased rate of Sp... more It has been suggested that contact between Spanish and English results in an increased rate of Spanish subject pronouns and a desensitization to factors that constrain pronoun usage. Yet, evidence for such contact-induced change has been found in some U.S. communities, but not others. In this study we analyze Spanish pronoun expression in interviews with Hispanics in Washington State who do agricultural work in Montana each summer. We compare U.S.-born bilingual children to monolingual adults from this community. Results from analyses of 3,572 verb tokens indicate little to no change in pronoun expression– neither in rates of expression nor in usage patterns. We explain this lack of change in pronoun expression by drawing on the well-established connection between social networks and language change. Poorer, more rural communities, like the farmworker community in Washington/Montana, tend to have tight-knit social networks, which increases the likelihood of retention of linguistic patterns.
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Papers by Jackelyn Van Buren