Semantic and Conceptual Transfer in FL: Multicultural and Multilingual Competences

Abstract

This chapter presents a preliminary study of the influence of the L1 language and culture in a lexical availability task. Specifically, we focus on the influence that might reflect linguistic and cultural L1 manifestations: semantic transfer, or the attachment of L1 meaning traits to L2 lexical items, and conceptual transfer or attaching the L1 concept to its L2 equivalent. Thus, the Spanish concept pueblo is transferred to L2 English as “village”, which alludes to a conceptually different representation of reality. Here we explore how 256 Spanish EFL learners are influenced by their L1 in the completion of a lexical availability task. They were asked to write the words that came to their mind as reaction to the prompts “food and drink” and “countryside” and had 2 minutes to do this. Results show that learners are successful in suppressing L1 formal influence, but the conceptual information they carry is mostly L1 shaped.