Dresden 2006 – wissenschaftliches Programm

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AKSOE: Physik sozio-ökonomischer Systeme

AKSOE 10: Poster Session (posters are expected to be displayed the full day 8:30-18:00)

AKSOE 10.53: Poster

Mittwoch, 29. März 2006, 16:00–18:00, P2

Dynamics of language competition: bilingualism and local effects. — •Xavier Castelló, Victor M. Eguíluz, and Maxi San Miguel — IMEDEA (CSIC-UIB), Universitat Illes Balears, E-07122 Palma de Mallorca, Spain

Several models have been proposed to study the dynamics of competition between languages [1]. Starting from the model of Abrams and Strogatz for the dynamics of endangered languages [2], the models proposed by Mira and Paredes, and Minett and Wang [3] address the issue of bilingualism. Along these lines we consider the dynamics of language use, allowing for bilingualism, within a social network, in the case where the languages are equivalent. Understanding this case seems a necessary first step to describe the more general case of an endangered language competing against another one with a higher status. Local effects are analyzed, studying the interface dynamics and growth laws of the system. We observe that the interface density and bilingual population density decay following a power law. The system reaches an absorbing state where one of the languages dominates, and the other language together with the bilingual community disappears. We also study the stability of the bilingual communities, which suggests possible explanations for the difficulty of coexistence of languages in the long term.

[1] Schulze, C., Stauffer, D. (2005) Simulation of language competition by physicists, Preprint cond-mat/0511049.

[2] Abrams, D.M., Strogatz, S. H. (2003). Nature 424, 900.

[3] Mira, J., Paredes, A. (2005). Europhysics Letters 69, 1031; Minett, J. W., Wang, W. S-Y. (unpublished).