proto-southwestern-tai revised: a new reconstruction - seals 22

242 Songgot Paanchiangwong
of interference –graphic interference– the transfers of writing habits from one language to
another.
Dulay (1982) points out that interference refers to two very different/distinct
linguistics phenomena – one that is essentially psychological and the other that is
essentially socio-linguistic. The psychological refers to the influence of old habits when
new ones are being learned, whereas the socio-linguistic refers to language interactions
that occur when two language communities are in contact. Dulay also added that the fewer
the bilingual speakers are, the more interference there will be when attempts are mark to
communicate with speakers of the target language.
Crystal (1991) identifies interference as a term used in socio-linguistics and
foreign-language learning to refer to the errors a speaker introduces into one language as a
result of contact with another language, also called negative transfer. The most common
source of error is in the process of learning a foreign language, where the native tongue
interferes although interference may occur in other contact situations (as in the case of
multilingualism).
Lehiste (1998) states that interference frequently takes place as deviation from the
norm of either language that occurs in the speech of bilinguals as a result of their
familiarity with more than one language. A bilingual here is defined as a person who is
able to produce grammatical sentences in more than one language. Interference can be
found at all levels: phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and lexis.
3. Reduplication in Vietnamese of Udon Thani compared to Standard Vietnamese
and Thai
The following are examples of complete reduplication of Vietnamese that were found in
conversations of immigrant Vietnamese in Udon Thani. They are different from complete
reduplication of standard Vietnamese in its structure and meaning. Note how in the
following examples immigrant Vietnamese in Udon Thani express intensification of verbs
such as mừng (happy), đẹp (beautiful), yêu (love), the quantifier đông, adjectives bận
(dirty), dày (thick), đen (black), ngon (delicious) and adverbs nhanh (quickly) and tốt
(well) the forms are reduplicated, with the first iteration given a rising tone (or in the case
of tốt which already has a rising tone, the first iteration has a marked immediate rising tone
compared to the second):
(1) VnU: Hôm đó chị đi siêu thị, chị đã gặp người Việt, chị mứng mừng.
Eng: I met a Vietnamese when I went to the supermarkets that day, I was very
happy.
(2) VnU: Năm nay hoa hậu Thái Lan đép đẹp.
Eng: Miss Thailand this year is very beautiful.
(3) VnU: Lần đầu tiên tôi đến Việt Nam, tôi thấy xe máy trên đường đống đông.
Eng: The first time I went to Vietnam, I saw a lot of motorbikes on the road.
(4) VnU: Tôi không dám đi với nó, nó lái xe máy nhánh nhanh.
Eng: I do not dare to go with him; he drives his motorbike so fast.