This study investigated acoustic-phonetics of coronal stop production by adult simultaneous bilingual and monolingual speakers of Canadian English (CE) and Canadian French (CF). Differences in the phonetics of CF and CE include voicing and place of articulation distinctions. CE has a two-way voicing distinction (in syllable initial position) contrasting short-and long-lag VOT; coronal stops in CE are described as alveolar. CF also has a two-way voicing distinction, but contrasting lead and short-lag VOT; coronal stops in CF are described as dental. Acoustic analyses of stop consonants for both VOT and dental/alveolar place of articulation are reported. Results indicate that simultaneous bilingual as well as monolingual adults produce language-specific differences, albeit not in the same way, across CF and CE for voicing and place. Similarities and differences between simultaneous bilingual and monolingual adults are discussed to address phonological organization in simultaneous bilingual adults.

Anecdotal reports provide evidence of so called “hybrid” gesturer whose non-verbal behavior of one language/culture becomes visible in the other. The direction of this gestural transfer seems to occur from a high to a low frequency gesture language. The purpose of this study was therefore to test systematically 1) whether gestural transfer occurs from a high frequency gesture language to a low frequency gesture language, 2) if the frequency of production of some gesture types is more likely to be transferred than others, and 3) whether gestural transfer can also occur bi-directionally. To address these questions, we investigated the use of gestures of English–Spanish bilinguals, French–English bilinguals, and English monolinguals while retelling a cartoon. Our analysis focused on the rate of gestures and the frequency of production of gesture types. There was a significant difference in the overall rate of gestures: both bilingual groups gestured more than monolingual participants. This difference was particularly salient for iconic gestures. In addition, we found that French–English bilinguals used more deictic gestures in their L2. The results suggest that knowledge of a high frequency gesture language affects the gesture rate in a low-frequency gesture language.

This contribution discusses findings and hypotheses from empirical data of naturally-occurring codeswitching. The discussion is framed by some comparisons of the approaches of contact linguists and psycholinguists to bilingual production data. However, it emphasizes the relevance of naturally-occurring codeswitching to the theoretical questions asked by psycholinguists. To accomplish this, relevant grammatical structures in codeswitching are exemplified and analyzed. Analysis largely follows the Matrix Language Frame (MLF) model, but differing approaches are mentioned.

The Editors and members of the Editorial Board wish to thank the following guest consultants for having reviewed manuscripts submitted to the journal this past year.