Pocholo Umbal
Biographic Data
| ID | 733016 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Pocholo Umbal |
| GIVEN NAMES | Pocholo |
| FAMILY NAME | Umbal |
| SIGNATURE | UMBAL P |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Toronto |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2423-0156 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 8 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 6 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 8 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2021 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Stability in the face of contact: U/ in (Heritage) Tagalog
The sociolinguistic realities of multilingualism raise questions about the linguistic outcomes of language contact. The present study addresses this issue in the context of heritage languages. It investigates whether the relative backness of /u/ in Heritage Tagalog exhibits crosslinguistic influence from English. Over 1600 tokens of Tagalog /u/ were extracted from spontaneous speech of two generations of heritage speakers in Toronto and two group…
Cross-generational Phonetic Drift in Toronto Heritage Tagalog: A Variationist Sociolinguistic Investigation of VOT in Spontaneous Speech
This study provides a variationist sociolinguistic investigation of voice onset time ( VOT ) of voiceless stops in Tagalog, focusing on two generations of heritage speakers in Toronto, with the goal of documenting patterns of variation and illuminating the linguistic and social mechanisms that underlie variability. Data on Tagalog drawn from naturalistic speech were examined, and comparisons between heritage speakers and age-matched homeland spea…
Variation in Asian and Pacific Islander North American English: What the patterns of scholarship demonstrate about race in sociolinguistics
Within sociolinguistic research on English variation, Asian and Pacific Islander North Americans (APINAs) are frequently described as an “understudied population” due to the relative lack of published studies that analyze these speakers or communities. This structured literature review systematically characterizes the state of the field from a variationist perspective. We find that while studies on APINAs have become more common in the last decad…
On the use of names and example sentences in the linguistics classroom
In addition to representing a main source of data in linguistic research, example sentences are a core vehicle for linguists in teaching a wide range of phenomena to our students. However, the content of these sentences often reflects the biases of the researchers who construct them: referents are typically given Anglocentric proper names like John and Mary , reflecting (at least implicitly) dominant white culture and conformity to heteronormativ…
Integrating qualitative and quantitative analyses of stance: A case study of English that/ zero variation
Previous work has shown that stance—the way speakers position themselves with respect to what they are talking about and who they are talking to—provides powerful insights into why speakers choose certain linguistic variants, beyond correlations with macro-social categories such as gender, ethnicity, and social class. However, as stancetaking moves are highly context-dependent, they have rarely been explored quantitatively, making the observed va…
Challenging norms of gender and language
In this special issue of Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics, we engage in this productive and growing conversation by bringing together ongoing work on gender-inclusive language as well as the linguistic practices among trans and non-binary communities. Each of these papers offers a unique perspective on the ever-diversifying nuances of language, and together challenge established norms of language use and research practices
Heritage Tagalog Phonology and a Variationist Framework of Language Contact
Heritage language variation and change provides an opportunity to examine the interplay of contact-induced and language-internal effects while extending the variationist framework beyond monolingual speakers and majority languages. Using data from the Heritage Language Variation and Change in Toronto Project, we illustrate this with a case study of Tagalog (r), which varies between tap, trill, and approximant variants. Nearly 3000 tokens of (r)-c…
Filipinos FrontToo! A Sociophonetic Analysis of Toronto English /u/-Fronting
The fronting of the back vowel /u/is an ongoing sound change in many varieties of English. While /u/-fronting is argued to be primarily phonetically constrained, many studies report the significant role of various social factors, including ethnicity. This article investigates the linguistic and social conditioning of /u/-fronting in Toronto English. A sociophonetic analysis of /u/, extracted from spontaneous speech data of second-generation Filip…
Heritage Tagalog Phonology and a Variationist Framework of Language Contact
Heritage language variation and change provides an opportunity to examine the interplay of contact-induced and language-internal effects while extending the variationist framework beyond monolingual speakers and majority languages. Using data from the Heritage Language Variation and Change in Toronto Project, we illustrate this with a case study of Tagalog (r), which varies between tap, trill, and approximant variants. Nearly 3000 tokens of (r)-c…
Filipinos FrontToo! A Sociophonetic Analysis of Toronto English /u/-Fronting
The fronting of the back vowel /u/is an ongoing sound change in many varieties of English. While /u/-fronting is argued to be primarily phonetically constrained, many studies report the significant role of various social factors, including ethnicity. This article investigates the linguistic and social conditioning of /u/-fronting in Toronto English. A sociophonetic analysis of /u/, extracted from spontaneous speech data of second-generation Filip…
Integrating qualitative and quantitative analyses of stance: A case study of English that/ zero variation
Previous work has shown that stance—the way speakers position themselves with respect to what they are talking about and who they are talking to—provides powerful insights into why speakers choose certain linguistic variants, beyond correlations with macro-social categories such as gender, ethnicity, and social class. However, as stancetaking moves are highly context-dependent, they have rarely been explored quantitatively, making the observed va…
Challenging norms of gender and language
In this special issue of Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics, we engage in this productive and growing conversation by bringing together ongoing work on gender-inclusive language as well as the linguistic practices among trans and non-binary communities. Each of these papers offers a unique perspective on the ever-diversifying nuances of language, and together challenge established norms of language use and research practices
Heritage Tagalog Phonology and a Variationist Framework of Language Contact
Heritage language variation and change provides an opportunity to examine the interplay of contact-induced and language-internal effects while extending the variationist framework beyond monolingual speakers and majority languages. Using data from the Heritage Language Variation and Change in Toronto Project, we illustrate this with a case study of Tagalog (r), which varies between tap, trill, and approximant variants. Nearly 3000 tokens of (r)-c…
Filipinos FrontToo! A Sociophonetic Analysis of Toronto English /u/-Fronting
The fronting of the back vowel /u/is an ongoing sound change in many varieties of English. While /u/-fronting is argued to be primarily phonetically constrained, many studies report the significant role of various social factors, including ethnicity. This article investigates the linguistic and social conditioning of /u/-fronting in Toronto English. A sociophonetic analysis of /u/, extracted from spontaneous speech data of second-generation Filip…
Integrating qualitative and quantitative analyses of stance: A case study of English that/ zero variation
Previous work has shown that stance—the way speakers position themselves with respect to what they are talking about and who they are talking to—provides powerful insights into why speakers choose certain linguistic variants, beyond correlations with macro-social categories such as gender, ethnicity, and social class. However, as stancetaking moves are highly context-dependent, they have rarely been explored quantitatively, making the observed va…
Variation in Asian and Pacific Islander North American English: What the patterns of scholarship demonstrate about race in sociolinguistics
Within sociolinguistic research on English variation, Asian and Pacific Islander North Americans (APINAs) are frequently described as an “understudied population” due to the relative lack of published studies that analyze these speakers or communities. This structured literature review systematically characterizes the state of the field from a variationist perspective. We find that while studies on APINAs have become more common in the last decad…
On the use of names and example sentences in the linguistics classroom
In addition to representing a main source of data in linguistic research, example sentences are a core vehicle for linguists in teaching a wide range of phenomena to our students. However, the content of these sentences often reflects the biases of the researchers who construct them: referents are typically given Anglocentric proper names like John and Mary , reflecting (at least implicitly) dominant white culture and conformity to heteronormativ…
Stability in the face of contact: U/ in (Heritage) Tagalog
The sociolinguistic realities of multilingualism raise questions about the linguistic outcomes of language contact. The present study addresses this issue in the context of heritage languages. It investigates whether the relative backness of /u/ in Heritage Tagalog exhibits crosslinguistic influence from English. Over 1600 tokens of Tagalog /u/ were extracted from spontaneous speech of two generations of heritage speakers in Toronto and two group…
Cross-generational Phonetic Drift in Toronto Heritage Tagalog: A Variationist Sociolinguistic Investigation of VOT in Spontaneous Speech
This study provides a variationist sociolinguistic investigation of voice onset time ( VOT ) of voiceless stops in Tagalog, focusing on two generations of heritage speakers in Toronto, with the goal of documenting patterns of variation and illuminating the linguistic and social mechanisms that underlie variability. Data on Tagalog drawn from naturalistic speech were examined, and comparisons between heritage speakers and age-matched homeland spea…
Linguistic Variation and Morphology (7 works) · Multilingual Education and Policy (7 works) · Linguistics (5 works) · Psychology (5 works) · Sociology (5 works) · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies (4 works) · Tagalog (4 works) · Heritage language (3 works) · Phonetics and Phonology Research (3 works) · Computer Science (2 works)