Emerging Bilingual Speech

Anna Verschik offers a new perspective on how a previously monolingual community of Russian-speakers in Estonia is rapidly becoming bilingual after the end of the Soviet occupation in 1991. The contact-induced change in Russian under the growing impact of Estonian is analysed in the theoretical framework of code-copying. Changes in linguistic behaviour of the speakers are often a result of intentional cultivation of non-monolingual communication strategies and language policies, and go hand in hand with the development of a new identity, 'Estonian Russians'. Emerging Bilingual Speech is a fascinating study that will be of interest to researchers studying language contact, language change and bilingualism.

Anna Verschik is Professor of Linguistics at Tallinn University, Estonia.

Abbreviations Transliteration of Russian Introduction 1. Theoretical background: combining structural and sociolinguistic factors 2.  Emerging multilingual communication: Russian in Estonia, Russian and Estonian, Estonia's Russian 3. Code-copying framework and copiability 4. Case-studies in code-copying 5. Code-copying and patterns of bilingual communication 6. Conclusions Bibliography Index