Читать книгу Bilingual Couples in Conversation - Silja Ang-Tschachtli - Страница 39

A factor that is relevant with regard to the partners’ L2 proficiency, and thus potentially also their language choice in the long term, is the community or majority language in the bilingual couple’s country of residence. It is often assumed that the majority language is the natural choice for bilingual couples (Piller 2002a: 133), and that “[i]n mixed marriages there is usually a shift to the majority language” (Romaine 1995: 42). This was confirmed in Piller’s study of 51 couples, which suggested that “the community language is the most powerful indicator of the language bilingual couples will use for marital communication” (2000: section 4.1, para. 5). In a different sample of 36 couples, though, Piller found that only 29.2% of the couples residing in Germany used German with each other, whereas 80% and 40% of the UK and US-based couples respectively used English as their common language, and almost a third of the couples claimed to use a mixed code (2002a: 134). Nonetheless, it seems that couples usually consider the community language the more obvious or preferable choice; Piller reports that the couples in her study who used the minority language or a mixed code “tend[ed] to engage in lengthy discussions, explanations and justifications in their responses”, whereas couples who used the community language rarely did so (2002a: 135). However, there may also be feelings of solidarity towards the less prestigious language (Siguan 1980, in Piller 2002a: 22). Thus, couples might use the non-community languagenon-community language to compensate for the immigrant’s potentially weaker position and attempt to even out the power imbalance to some extent (see also section 3.3.3.1, “L2 Learning and use”).