Speaka da language

August 9, 2009 - 2:55 PM by

alefHere’s a fun concept to contemplate from the University of Haifa. A recent study showed that the more empathy one has for another, the lighter the accent will be when speaking a second language. That’s what Dr. Raphiq Ibrahim and Dr. Mark Leikin of the Department of Learning Disabilities, and Dr. Zohar Eviatar of the psychology department found and published in the International Journal of Bilingualism.

I gotta say, it makes sense. When I’m feeling ‘Israeli,’ and that is a completely random occurence for me, depending on a number of factors such as level of restedness, if I’ve eaten recently and am feeling confident about what’s going on in life in general, my fluidity and accent in Hebrew are much smoother and my conversational Hebrew flows. And that also relates to empathy, because if I’m feeling good, I can also be empathetic. Make sense?

Maybe. But these researchers were getting at something else slightly more serious, more on the coexistence level of life in Israel.

According to them, accents, whether from the average Hebrew speaker trying to speak English or the average English speaker trying to speak Hebrew, are a dead giveaway. (Although my mortgage banker recently thought I was English, not American.) But why, asked the researchers, is there an accent and what are the factors that make one speaker have a heavier accent than another? One possible explanation is derived from the socio-lingual field, which claims that socio-affective elements have an effect on accent and that the second language constitutes an image label for the speaker in the presence of a majority group.

“Israel is a perfect lab location for testing the topic of second languages, because of the complex composition of its population. This population is made up of immigrants who learn Hebrew at an advanced age; an ethnic minority of Arabs, some of whom learn Hebrew from an early age, and others who learn the language as mature adults; and a majority group of native Hebrew speakers,” the researchers explained.

The study divided the participants –- students from the University of Haifa -– into three groups: 20 native Hebrew speakers, 20 Arabic speakers who learned Hebrew at the age of 7-8, and 20 Russian immigrants who learned Hebrew after age 13. The participants’ socioeconomic characteristics were identical. The results showed that the accent level of Russian immigrants and of native Arabic speakers was similar. It also revealed that for the Russian immigrants, the higher the ability to exhibit empathy for the other, the weaker the accent. Amongst the Arabic speakers, there was no link between level of empathy and heaviness of accent.

The researchers’ hypothesis is that in the group of Arabic speakers, there is the factor of sociopolitical position, and, as to be expected, a lack of natural empathy for the native Hebrew-speaking population. That led the reseachers to conclude that both personal and sociopolitical aspects have an influence on accent in speaking a second language, and that teachers giving instruction in languages as second languages, especially among minority groups, must relate to the social and political connections when teaching.

Go share that tidbit of information with your ulpan teacher.

Tags: , • Category: coexistence, General, Immigrant Moments, Israeliness, Politics 

Comments

7 Comments on Speaka da language

  1. David-Joe on Sun, Aug 9th 2009 5:12 PM

    2. Havent they any proper research to do than waste time on nonsense like this?

  2. Mr. reality on Sun, Aug 9th 2009 6:42 PM

    3. IT IS REALY A GOOD PIECE OF WORK..

  3. k on Mon, Aug 10th 2009 7:44 AM

    4. How is this nonsense? All kinds of researches can contribute information to the world, they don’t need to be cancer-related to be considered important.

  4. David-Joe on Tue, Aug 11th 2009 4:11 AM

    5. It is government – taxpayer – funded. Therefore the money was forcibly taken from those that earned it. So whether or not it is a waste is irrelevant anyway.

    In the responsible world – the private sector that actually generates the money through productive work – research money is a scarce resource and not available for frivolous projects.

    So unless there is a valid scientific reason the entire project is a waste of money which might have been used for proper purposes.

  5. k on Tue, Aug 11th 2009 8:46 AM

    6. This is hardly the worst place that the taxpayer’s money goes to. Whether you agree with them on conducting this research or not, it doesn’t change the fact that way more money goes into corrupt politicians’ pockets and places that you wish you wouldn’t have known about.

  6. Steven on Wed, Aug 12th 2009 6:18 AM

    7. I don’t think I can speak to the necessity of this research. But I do think it is cool. Of course, I think it sort of confirms the obvious. Learning the language of another people requires you to have an understanding of who they are. A high degree of empathy seems a minimum requirement.

  7. Kaviani on Thu, Aug 20th 2009 10:58 PM

    8. What a thinly-veiled bit of racist nonsense! First, only Russians were picked for foreign (presumably Jewish) pools- no Americans, Canadians, French, etc. Second, nothing is said about Arabic being a Semitic language and that accents actually carry heavier in related languages due to cognates and a wonky sense of general familiarity (grammar and some vocab may be alike, but phonology is not.).

    Finally, nothing is said about natural acoustic talent. Good singers and musicians naturally pick up foreign sounds much better than the tone-deaf, regardless of empathy. IE. I have no Israeli relatives or direct ties to Israel other than my genome, but I spoke better Hebrew after my college courses than did the kids who’d spent summers ba’aretz. Would that make their empathy false? NO.

    Some people are just better at it than others. Empathy may confer a desire to sound more like so-and-so, but little actual skill.

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