Exploring oral and written bilingual narratives inspanish and english.

Main Article Content

María Luisa Spicer-Escalante

Abstract

This study investigates the similarities and/or difference on the oral and written personal narratives told by bilingual Spanish and English high school students. Previous research suggests that bilingual Spanish native speakers tend to use different narratives strategies, depending on the language in which they tell a personal story. Participants for this study wrote a personal narration in Spanish first; and few days later, they were asked to write the same narration in English. Later, during a personal interview, students were asked to orally narrate the story that they had written, first in Spanish and then in English. The oral and written narratives were analyzed based on the Labovian Highpoint Analysis, which examines personal narratives according six different features. The results support previous research and suggest that there are very important differences in the structures that students use when narrating a personal story orally or in a written fashion.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Article Details

Section
Artículo de investigación
Author Biography

María Luisa Spicer-Escalante, Utah State University

Associate Professor of Spanish & Linguistics  Co-Director, Master of Second Language Teaching program

Department of Languages, Philosophy & Speech Communication

Utah State University.

 

References

Bamberg, M. (1987). The acquisition of narratives: Learning to use the language. New York: Mouton de Gruyter.

Bamberg, M. (Ed.) (1997). Narrative development: Six approaches. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Bamberg, M. (2006). Stories: Big or small-Why do we care? Narrative Inquiry (Special issue), 16(1), 39-147.

Bamberg, M. (2011). Who am I? Narration and its contribution to self and identity. Theory Psychology, 21, 3-24. Doi: 10.1177/0959354309355852.

Bamberg, M., & Georgakopoulou, A. (2008). Small stories as a new perspective in narrative and identity analysis. Text & Talk, 28(3), 377-396.

Canagarajah, S. (2002). Critical academic writing and multilingual students. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.

Canagarajah, S. (Ed.). (2005). Reclaiming the local in language policy and practice. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Colombi, M. (2000). En vías del desarrollo del lenguaje académico en español en hablantes nativos del español en los Estados Unidos. En A. Roca (Ed.), Research on Spanish in the United States: Linguistic issues and challenges (pp. 296-309). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

De Fina, A., & Georgakopoulou, A. (2008). Introduction: Narrative analysis in the shift from texts to practices. Text & Talk, 28(3), 275-281.

Eggins, S., & Martin, J. (2003). El contexto como género: una perspectiva lingüística funciona. Revista Signos, 36(54), 185-205. Recuperado de http://www.scielo.cl/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0718-09342003005400005&lng=es&tlng=es. 10.4067/S0718-09342003005400005.

Georgakopoulou, A. (2006). Thinking big with small stories in narrative and identity analysis. Narrative Inquiry, 1(16),122-130.

Guerrero, S. (2011). Diferencias de género en evaluaciones de narraciones de experiencias personales en el habla juvenil de Santiago de Chile: Una aproximación sociolingüística. Revista Signos: Estudios de Lingüística, 44(75), 18-32. Doi: 10.4067/S0718-09342011000100002.

Jiménez, T. (2006). La narración infantil: un estudio en niños de educación básica. Revista de Investigación, 60,157-174.

Kachru, B. (1983). The bilingual's creativity: Discoursal and stylistic strategies in contact literatures in English. Studies in the Linguistic Sciences, 13(2), 37-55.

Kachru, B. (1990). The alchemy of English: The spread, functions, and models of non-native Englishes. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.

Labov, W. (1972). Language in the inner city: Studies in the Black English Vernacular. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Labov, W. (2010). Where should I begin? En D. Schiffrin, A. De Fina, & A. Nylund (Eds.). Telling stories: Language, narrative, and social life (pp. 7-22). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.

Labov, W., & Waletzky, J. (1997). Narrative analysis: Oral versions of personal experience. Journal of Narrative and Life History, 7(1-4), 3-38.

McCabe, A. (1997). Developmental and cross-cultural aspects of children's narrations. En M. Bamberg (Ed.). Narrative development: Six approaches (pp. 137-174). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

McCabe, A., Bailey, A., & Melzi, G. (Eds.) (2008). Spanish-language narration and literacy: Culture, cognition, and emotion. New York: Cambridge University Press.

McCabe, A., & Bliss, L. (Eds.) (2003). Patterns of narrative discourse: A multicultural, life span approach. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

McCabe, A., & Peterson, C. (1991). Developing narrative structure. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Mitchell, C. (2008). Writing on the margins: Narratives as border discourse. The Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, 30, 162-193.

Moyano, E. (2007). Enseñanza de habilidades discursivas en español en contexto pre-universitario: una aproximación desde la LSF. Revista Signos, 40(65), 573-608. Recuperado de http://www.scielo.cl/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0718-09342007000300009&lng=es&tlng=es. 10.4067/S0718-09342007000300009.

Ochs, E., & Capps, L. (2001). Living narrative. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Ozyldirim, I. (2009). Narrative analysis: An analysis of oral and written strategies in personal experience narratives. Journal of Pragmatics, 41, 1209-1222.

Peterson, C., & McCabe, A. (1983). Developmental psycholinguistics: Three ways of looking at a child's narrative. New York: Plenum Press.

Pew Hispanic Center (2015). Recuperado de http://www.pewhispanic.org/2015/05/12/statistical-portrait-of-hispanics-in-the-united-states-1980-2013-trends/.

Schleppegrell, M., & Colombi, M. (1997). Text organization by bilingual writers. Written Communication, 14, 481-503.

Schiffrin, D., De Fina, A., & Nylund, A. (Eds.) (2010). Telling stories: Language, narrative, and social life. Georgetown: Georgetown University Press.

Shiro, M. (2003). Genre and evaluation in narrative development. Journal of Child Language, 30,165-195.

Spicer-Escalante, M. (2002). Spanish heritage speakers' Spanish and English writings: Contrastive rhetorical and linguistic analyses (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL.

Spicer-Escalante, M. (2005). Writing in two languages/living in two worlds: Rhetorical analysis of Mexican-American written discourse. En M. Farr (Ed.), Latino language and literacy in ethnolinguistic Chicago (pp. 217-244). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Spicer-Escalante, M. (2007). Análisis lingüístico de la escritura bilingüe (español inglés) de los hablantes de herencia en los Estados Unidos. Estudios de Lingüística Aplicada, 45, 63-80.

Spicer-Escalante, M. (2009). La enseñanza de la escritura de textos académicos para los estudiantes bilingües: prácticas pedagógicas de dos preparatorias en México y en los Estados Unidos. Textos: Didáctica de la Lengua y la Literatura, 50, 68-77.

Spicer-Escalante, M. (2011). Revising our curriculum/ empowering students: Teachers' preparation and perceptions about bilingual writing. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 1(11), 1453-1458.

Tannen, D. (1982). The oral /literate continuum in discourse. In Spoken and written language: Exploring orality and literacy (pp. 1-16). Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing Corporation.

Tawake, S. (2003). Bilingual's creativity: Patricia Grace and Maori cultural context. World Englishes, 22(1), 45-54.

Tawake, S. (2006). Cultural rhetoric in coming-out narratives: Witi Ihimaera's The Uncle's Story. World Englishes, 25(3/4), 373-389.

Uccelli, P. (2008). Beyond chronicity: Evaluation and temporality in Spanish-speaking children's personal narratives. En A. McCabe, A. Bailey, & G. Melzi (Eds.), Spanish-language narration and literacy: Culture, cognition, and emotion (pp. 175-212). New York: Cambridge University Press.

U.S. Census Bureau. (2013). Hispanic population of the United States. Recuperado de U4 http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/hispanic/hispanic_popresentation.html.