Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-10-30T14:26:10.318Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

4 - The Complementarity Principle

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 February 2024

François Grosjean
Affiliation:
Université de Neuchâtel, Switzerland
Get access

Summary

The author’s Complementarity Principle states that bilinguals usually acquire and use their languages for different purposes, in different domains of life, with different people. Different aspects of life require different languages. The author first evokes the contribution of past research on his thinking about the topic. For instance, early sociolinguistic studies of bilingual communities put heavy emphasis on the functions of languages. He then concentrates on the principle itself as it slowly came into focus in his work. He defines it, presents it in a diagram, and discusses its impact on language proficiency, dominance, and translation abilities in bilinguals. This is followed by a description of studies undertaken in his laboratory that found evidence for it, as well as his search for studies in production, perception, and language acquisition that confirmed its importance. The author then discusses the coming of age of the principle reflected in the reactions of researchers in the field, and the various studies, mostly experimental and descriptive, they have conducted to examine it. The principle is one of the most pervasive aspects of individual bilingualism, and it is invariably present in bilingual psycholinguistic research as an independent, control, or confounding variable.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×