Dwujezyczność a język globalny

Idalia Kurcz

Abstract

Bilingualism versus global language

The paper deals with some general problems of bilingualism presented in the psychological perspective and based on the model of human language knowledge in which language competence and communicative competence play distinctive but related roles. The above mentioned problems concern the differences between L1 and L2, between acquisition and learning a language, as well as the problem of the critical period of language acquisition. Special attention is given to the benefits of bilingualism in childhood and adulthood, but some limitations are also presented.

As concerns a global language (the term introduced by David Crystal) as a tool of communication in the contemporary globalizing world, the perspective of English in this role is discussed.