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Review article published In: Studies of Bilingual Processing Presented to Kenneth I. Forster
Edited by Nan Jiang
[Journal of Second Language Studies 4:2] 2021
► pp. 245–267

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Review article

Beyond segments

Towards a lexical model for tonal bilinguals

 | Macquarie University, Australia
Published online: 23 July 2021
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/jsls.21011.wan
Abstract
This review attempts to chart a research program that focuses on tonal bilingualism. More than 70% of the world languages use pitch contours to disambiguate word meanings, however, limited empirical and theoretical effort was made to understand the processing mechanisms of lexical tones in the bilingual context. This article will start with the main characteristics of tonal languages, with a focus on Mandarin Chinese, followed by empirical findings on lexical tones in both monolingual and bilingual populations. Finally, this article will propose a few important theoretical issues relevant to tonal bilingualism and implications of learning a tonal language as a second/foreign language.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Tones vs. segments in Mandarin Chinese
  • 3.Tones in bilingual word recognition
    • 3.1Main theoretical issues in bilingual spoken word recognition
    • 3.2Evidence for language selectivity vs. language non-selectivity
    • 3.3Lexical tone in bilingual spoken word recognition
      • 3.3.1Lexical tone activation via the bottom-up cross-language mechanism
      • 3.3.2Lexical tone activation via the top-down and/or lateral cross-language mechanism
  • 4.Future research directions on tonal bilingualism
  • Acknowledgements
  • References
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