Preserving bilingual speech on the U.S.-Mexico border
Unique bilingual speech patterns on the U.S.-Mexico border are now safely recorded and preserved online for future study.
Why it matters
- Documents unique bilingual speech patterns.
- Makes data accessible for further research.
- Addresses monolingual bias in linguistics.
By the numbers
- CESA corpus: 78 interviews.
- CoBiVa corpus: 76 interviews, with more in process.
- Participants diverse in age, sex, education, and immigrant generation.
The big picture
- Part of the open science movement.
- Collaborations with IT and librarians for long-term preservation.
- Helps in studying language variation and change.
What they're saying
- Common in Latino communities across the U.S.
- People often switch languages for specific expressions.
Caveats
- Uneven demographic representation in participant pools.
- Challenges in data sharing include time, funding, and ethical considerations.
What’s next
- More interviews being processed.
- Focus on diversifying participant pool.