The focus of the seminar will be the growing multilingualism in Europe and the world. Given that 2/3 of the world population are bi- or multilingual, knowledge about the cognitive-linguistic basis of bi- or multilingualism is a necessary tool for students seeking careers in education, communication and the media, economy and other fields. After a short introduction into the mechanisms of language acquisition, we will investigate different forms of bilingualism and their linguistic and cognitive outcomes. A central problem, recently the focus of much research, is that bilingualism in children often leads to error patterns and delays which make it difficult for these children to perform at their best in academic achievement.
In particular, it is hard to diagnose global cognitive delay or specific language impairment in bilingual situations. Several projects in Oldenburg have recently addressed such problems, and we will discuss the methods and results of these projects. The seminar will therefore also introduce research methods, different experimental methods and data analysis.
A better understanding of bilingualism and the linguistic and cognitive mechanisms of bilingual language acquisition will be the main outcome of the seminar.

Requirements
Active participation is required and will be negotiated. Reading the respective literature or preparing data for the sessions is an integral part of the course.

Preparation
Guasti, M.-T. 2002. Language Acquisition: The Growth of Grammar. MIT Press.