The Frequency Code and gendered attrition and acquisition in the German-English heritage language community in Vancouver, Canada
The paper investigates pitch level and span in a group of German L1-English L2 late bilinguals in comparison to two monolingual control groups. The late bilinguals had moved to Vancouver, Canada in adulthood, and had been living in Vancouver for an average of 40 years. The results indicate that the bilingual males increased their pitch in both English and German, and widened their pitch span, therefore indexing non-aggressive, friendly behaviour, but deviating from both monolingual pitch norms. Thus, the results offer evidence that pitch changes are at least in part dependent on the social and political environment in which they are embedded, as a low pitch level is associated with dominance and aggression which would boost the negative image of the Vancouver German community due to their ethnic origin after WWII.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction: First language attrition as it relates to heritage language research
- 2.Purpose of this study
- 3.Defining pitch
- 4.The Frequency Code
- 5.Pitch in German and English
- 6.Methodology
- 6.1Participants
- 6.2Data collection
- 6.3Measuring pitch range
- 6.4Hypotheses
- 7.Results
- 7.1Pitch level
- 7.2Pitch span
- 7.3Bilingual variation in pitch range
- 8.Discussion
-
Acknowledgements
-
Notes
-
References
References
Au, T. K., Knightly, L. M., Jun, S.-A. & Oh, J. S.
2002 Overhearing a language during childhood.
Psychological Science 13(3): 238–243.


Boersma, P. & Weenink, D.
2010 PRAAT. Doing Phonetics by Computer [Computer Program]. University of Amsterdam.
[URL]
Bowers, J. S., Mattys, S. L. & Gage, S. H.
2009 Preserved implicit knowledge of a forgotten childhood language.
Psychological Science 20(9): 1064–1069.


Brown, A. & Docherty, G. J.
1995 Phonetic variation in dysarthric speech as a function of sampling task.
International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders 30(1): 17–35.


Cherciov, M.
2013 Investigating the impact of attitude on first language attrition and second language acquisition from a Dynamic Systems Theory perspective.
International Journal of Bilingualism 17(6): 716–733.


Cheshire, J., Kerswill, P., Fox, S. & Torgersen, E.
2011 Contact, the feature pool and the speech community: The emergence of Multicultural London English.
Journal of Sociolinguistics 15(2): 151–196.


de Leeuw, E.
2009 When Your Native Language Sounds Foreign: A Phonetic Investigation into First Language Attrition. PhD dissertation, University of Edinburgh.

de Leeuw, E.
2010 Measuring language-specific phonetic settings.
Second Language Research 26(1): 13–41.


de Leeuw, E.
2019 Phonetic attrition. In
The Oxford Handbook of Attrition,
M.S. Schmid et al. (eds), 204–217. Oxford: OUP.

Dominguez, L. & Hicks, G.
Eckert, H. & Laver, J.
1994 Menschen und ihre Stimmen. Weinheim: Psychologie Verlags Union.

Eckert, P. & Rickford, J. R.
2001 Style and Sociolinguistic Variation. Cambridge: CUP.

Gibbon, D.
1998 Intonation in German. In
Intonation Systems. A Survey of Twenty Languages,
D. Hirst &
A. Di Cristo (eds), 78–95. Cambridge: CUP.

Grazia Busà, M. & Urbani, M.
2011 A cross-linguistic analysis of pitch range in English L1 and L2. In
Proceedings of the 17th International Conference of Phonetic Sciences, 380–383. Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong.

Gussenhoven, C.
2004 The Phonology of Tone and Intonation. Cambridge: CUP.


Gussenhoven, C. & Jacobs, H.
1998 Understanding Phonology. London: Arnold.

Hayward, K.
2000 Experimental Phonetics: An Introduction. Harlow: Pearson Education.

Hewlett, N. & Beck, J.
2006 An Introduction to the Science of Phonetics. Mahwah NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Kagan, O. & Dillon, K.
2001 A new perspective on teaching Russian: Focus on the heritage learner.
The Slavic and East European Journal 45(3): 507–518.


Kupisch, T. & Rothman, J.
2018 Terminology matters! Why difference is not incompleteness and how early child bilinguals are heritage speakers.
International Journal of Bilingualism 22(5): 564–582.


Labov, W.
1963 The social motivation of a sound change.
Word 19(3): 273–309.


Ladd, D. R.
2008 Intonational Phonology. Cambridge: CUP.


Laver, J.
1980 The Phonetic Description of Voice Quality. Cambridge: CUP.

Levon, E.
2009 Dimensions of style: Context, politics and motivation in gay Israeli speech.
Journal of Sociolinguistics 13(1): 29–58.


Lieb, C.
2008 German diaspora experiences in British Columbia after 1945. In
German Diasporic Experiences: Identity, Migration, and Loss,
M. Schulze,
J. M. Skidmore,
D. G. John,
G. Liebscher &
S. Siebel-Achenbach (eds), 305–316. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.

Linville, S. E.
1996 The sound of senescence.
Journal of Voice 10(2): 190–200.


Mennen, I.
2007 Phonological and phonetic influences in non-native intonation. In
Non-native Prosody. Phonetic Description and Teaching Practice,
J. Trouvain &
U. Gut (eds), 53–76. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Mennen, I. & de Leeuw, E.
2014 Beyond segments.
Studies in Second Language Acquisition 36(2): 183–194.


Mennen, I., Schaeffler, F. & Dickie, C.
2014 Second language acquisition of pitch range in German learners of English.
Studies in Second Language Acquisition 36: 303–329.


Mennen, I., Schaeffler, F. & Docherty, G.
2012 Cross-language differences in fundamental frequency range: A comparison of English and German.
The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 131(3): 2249–2260.


Mennen, I., Schaeffler, F. & Docherty, G. J.
2007 Pitching it differently: a comparison of the pitch ranges of German and English speakers. In
Proceedings of the 16th International Congress on Phonetic Sciences, 1769–1772. Saarbrücken: Universität des Saarlandes.

Morton, E. S.
1977 On the occurrence and significance of motivation-structural rules in some bird and mammal sounds.
The American Naturalist 111(981): 855–869.


Neppert, J. M.
1999 Elemente einer akustischen Phonetik, 4th edn. Hamburg: Buske.

Nishio, M. & Niimi, S.
2008 Changes in speaking fundamental frequency characteristics with aging.
Folia Phoniatrica et Logopaedica 60(3): 120–127.


Ohala, J. J.
1983 Cross-language use of pitch: An ethological view.
Phonetica 40(1): 1–18.


Ohala, J. J.
1984 An ethological perspective on common cross-language utilization of F0 of voice.
Phonetica 41(1): 1–16.


Ohara, Y.
1999 Performing gender through voice pitch: A cross-cultural analysis of Japanese and American English. In
Wahrnehmung und Herstellung von Geschlecht,
U. Pasero &
F. Braun (eds), 105–116. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften.


Opitz, C.
2013 A dynamic perspective on late bilinguals’ linguistic development in an L2 environment.
International Journal of Bilingualism 17(6): 701–715.


Ordin, M. & Mennen, I.
2017 Cross-linguistic differences in bilinguals’ fundamental frequency ranges.
Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research 60(6): 1493–1506.


Pallier, C., Dehaene, S., Poline, J.-B., LeBihan, D., Argenti, A.-M., Dupoux, E. & Mehler, J.
2003 Brain imaging of language plasticity in adopted adults: Can a second language replace the first? Cerebral Cortex 13(2): 155–161.


Passoni, E., Mehrabi, A., Levon, E. & de Leeuw, E.
2018 Bilingualism, pitch range and social factors: preliminary results from sequential Japanese-English bilinguals. In
Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Speech Prosody 2018, 1–5. Poznań: Adam Mickiewicz University.


Patterson, D.
2000 A Linguistic Approach to Pitch Range Modelling. Edinburgh: EUP.

Podesva, R. J.
2007 Phonation type as a stylistic variable: The use of falsetto in constructing a persona1.
Journal of Sociolinguistics 11(4): 478–504.


Polinsky, M.
2008 Gender under incomplete acquisition: Heritage speakers’ lnowledge of noun categorization.
Heritage Language Journal 6(1): 40–71.
[URL]> (
9 December 2018).
Rothman, J.
2007 Heritage speaker competence differences, language change, and input type: Inflected infinitives in Heritage Brazilian Portuguese.
International Journal of Bilingualism 11(4): 359–389.


Rothman, J. & Treffers-Daller, J.
2014 A prolegomenon to the construct of the native speaker: Heritage speaker bilinguals are natives too! Applied Linguistics 35(1): 93–98.


Scharff-Rethfeldt, W.
2000 Speaking Fundamental Frequency Differences in the Language of Bilingual Speakers. PhD dissertation, University of Newcastle upon Tyne.

Scharff-Rethfeldt, W., Miller, N. & Mennen, I.
2008 Speaking fundamental frequency differences in highly proficient bilinguals of German/English.
Sprache, Stimme, Gehör 32(3): 123–128.


Scherer, K. R.
1974 Voice quality analysis of American and German speakers.
Journal of Psycholinguistic Research 3(3): 281–298.


Schmid, M. S.
2011 Language Attrition. Cambridge: CUP.


Schmid, M. S. & Köpke, B.
2007 Bilingualism and attrition. In
Language Attrition: Theoretical Perspectives [
Studies in Bilingualism 33],
B. Köpke,
M. S. Schmid,
M. Keijzer &
S. Dostert (eds), 1–7. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.


Tagliamonte, S. A. & D’Arcy, A.
2009 Peaks beyond phonology: Adolescence, incrementation, and language change.
Language 85(1): 58–108.


Todd, D.
2011 Ethnic mapping 5: Find Metro’s Dutch, Germans, Iranians and Italians.
Vancouver Sun 19 October 2011.
[URL]> (
9 December 2018).
Trudgill, P.
1986 Dialects in Contact. Oxford: Blackwell.

Ullakanoja, R.
2007 Comparison of pitch range in Finnish (L1) and Russian (L2). In
Proceedings of the 16th International Congress on Phonetic Sciences, 1701–1704. Saarbrücken: Universität des Saarlandes.

Van Bezooijen, R.
1995 Sociocultural aspects of pitch differences between Japanese and Dutch women.
Language and Speech 38(3): 253–265.


Willems, N.
1982 English Intonation from a Dutch Point of View. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.


Cited by
Cited by 2 other publications
McCarthy, Kathleen M. & Esther de Leeuw
2022.
PROSODIC PATTERNS IN SYLHETI-ENGLISH BILINGUALS.
Studies in Second Language Acquisition 44:2
► pp. 562 ff.

Passoni, Elisa, Esther de Leeuw & Erez Levon
2022.
Bilinguals Produce Pitch Range Differently in Their Two Languages to Convey Social Meaning.
Language and Speech 65:4
► pp. 1071 ff.

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 10 may 2023. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
Any errors therein should be reported to them.