Abstract
English serves as a lingua franca in situations with varying degrees of formality. How formality affects non-native speech has rarely been studied. We investigated register variation by Spanish users of English by comparing formal and informal speech from the Nijmegen Corpus of Spanish English that we created. This corpus comprises speech from 34 Spanish speakers of English in interaction with Dutch confederates in two speech situations. Formality affected the amount of laughter and overlapping speech and the number of Spanish words. Moreover, formal speech had a more informational character than informal speech. We discuss how our findings relate to register variation in Spanish.
Funding statement: This work was partly funded by an ERC starting grant (284108) to the second author.
Appendix
Individual Spanish speakers’ proficiency levels.
| Male speakers | CEFR proficiency level | Female speakers | CEFR proficiency level |
|---|---|---|---|
| M1 | B1− | F1 | A2 |
| M2 | B1 | F2 | B1 |
| M3 | B1 | F3 | B1 |
| M4 | B1 | F4 | A2 |
| M5 | B1 | F5 | A2+ |
| M6 | A2 | F6 | B1+ |
| M7 | A2 | F7 | A2+ |
| M8 | B1 | F8 | B1+ |
| M9 | A2 | F9 | B1 |
| M10 | A2 | F10 | B1+ |
| M11 | A2 | F11 | B1− |
| M12 | B1 | F12 | B2− |
| M13 | A2 | F13 | B2− |
| M14 | B1+ | F14 | B1 |
| M15 | B1+ | F15 | A1 |
| M16 | A1 | F16 | B1− |
| M17 | B2 | F17 | B1 |
Number of Spanish speakers by proficiency level.
| CEFR proficiency level | Number of speakers |
|---|---|
| A1 | 2 |
| A2 | 8 |
| A2+ | 2 |
| B1− | 3 |
| B1 | 11 |
| B1+ | 5 |
| B2− | 2 |
| B2 | 1 |
Excerpts of formal and informal speech produced by a female Spanish speaker (SP_F2) in interaction with female Confederate 1 (Conf1; informal conversation) and male Confederate 2 (Conf2; formal interview).
| Formal interview | Informal conversation | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| SP_F2: | eh I think that the prest\- the main reason [breath] is the ^speculuc\- spe\- | SP_F2: | in Andorra |
| Conf2: | wh\- is that far? | ||
| -/culation about the buildings [breath] people working built a lot of flat [breath] eh and it cost a lot more than the real value of this this house | SP_F2: | [breath] hm [click] near *Pirineos | |
| Conf2: | [laughter] oh th\- b\- th\- | ||
| SP_F2: | between France and Spain | ||
| Conf1: | hm | Conf2: | Pyrenees ok |
| SP_F2: | ok? [breath] and some people [click] eh have sorry some people eh in in this moment [breath] eh I do n\- [breath] obtain a lot of money | SP_F2: | [breath] |
| Conf2: | oh yeah oh that is quite far then | ||
| Conf1: | hm | SP_F2: | a bit |
| SP_F2: | ok for a work that [breath] is not eh necessary | Conf2: | yeah I have never been skiing I do not is it do you like skiing? |
| Conf1: | yes | ||
| SP_F2: | eh f\- eh for example | SP_F2: | [breath] [start laughter] no no [end laughter] |
| Conf1: | give me an example | Conf2: | no? [laughter] but did you go? |
| SP_F2: | [click] [breath] | SP_F2: | no m\- |
| Conf1: | give us an example | Conf2: | no |
| SP_F2: | eh [click] I think that eh nurse [breath] eh it is is more important than #ts eh *ˆconstructor | SP_F2: | but my partners hm eh hm went to this trip |
| Conf2: | your your boyfriend? | ||
| Conf1: | hm | SP_F2: | partn\- no hm sorry [breath] |
| SP_F2: | of building ok [breath] | Conf2: | eh [breath] |
| Conf1: | hm | SP_F2: | partner |
| SP_F2: | and the the money which gain a nurse [breath] is e\- eh [breath] it is more small than #ts than the *ˆconstructor ok? | Conf2: | your partner |
| SP_F2: | *companeros *que *no *se *acuerdo *a *ver | ||
| Conf2: | is it friend? | ||
| SP_F2: | yes m\- my [breath] friend of class | ||
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank José Manuel Pardo for putting at our disposal a sound-attenuated booth in the laboratory of the Grupo de Tecnología del Habla at the Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingenieros de Telecomunicación of the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. Also, many thanks to Juan M. Lucas Cuesta, Julian D. Echeverry and Syaheerah Lutfi for their assistance during the recordings.
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