Language Acquisition Beyond Parameters

The chapters in this volume take different approaches to the exploration of language acquisition processes in various populations (monolingual and bilingual first language acquisition, L2 acquisition) and address issues in syntax, morphology, pragmatics, language processing and interface phenomena. This volume is a tribute to Juana M. Liceras’ fundamental and enduring contribution to the field of Spanish Second Language Acquisition (SLA). All the chapters in the volume are linked to or inspired by Juana’s extensive body of work, and, like Juana’s research, they all stand at the crossroads of formal and experimental linguistics. Together, the studies presented in this volume are a reflection of Juana’s impact both as a mentor and as a collaborative researcher while at the same time showcasing current trends and new directions in the field of generative SLA.

In this final volume in the series, the contributors attempt to "expand the contexts" in which child language has been examined crosslinguistically. The chapters build on themes that have been touched on, anticipated, and promised in earlier volumes in the series. The study of child language has been situated in the disciplines of psychology and linguistics, and has been most responsive to dominant issues in those fields such as nativism and learning, comprehension and production, errors, input, and universals of morphology and syntax. The context has primarily been that of the individual child, interacting with a parent, and deciphering the linguistic code. The code has been generally treated in these volumes as a system of morphology and syntax, with little attention to phonology and prosody. Attention has been paid occasionally to the facts that the child is acquiring language in a sociocultural setting and that language is used in contexts of semantic and pragmatic communication. In addition, there has been a degree of attention paid to the interactions between language and cognition in the process of development. As for individual differences between children, they have been discussed in those studies where they could not be avoided, but such variation has rarely been the focus of systematic attention. Differences between individual languages have been of great interest, but these differences have not often been placed in a framework of systematic typological variation. And although languages and their grammars change over time, the focus of attention on the individual child learner has generally led to neglect of explanatory principles that are best found on the level of linguistic diachrony, rather than the level of innate ideas or patterns of learning and cognition in the individual child. The chapter authors seek to explore these neglected contexts in more depth.

The book addresses some important issues in second language acquisition research, such as access to Universal Grammar, the factors that account for success or failure in L2 learning, as well as parameter (re)setting, within the generative framework. The empirical data against which the research hypothesis is tested come from two main studies: a longitudinal one, involving beginner learners, and an experimental one, with elementary and advanced learners; all subjects are adults learning English in a formal instruction setting, with Romanian as L1. Starting from Chomsky’s (2005) account of first language acquisition in terms of three factors, namely genetic endowment, experience and non-linguistic principles, the first chapter of the book explores the question of whether the same three factors may be operating in second language learning. The rest of the book focuses on more specific research issues related to access to Universal Grammar and parameter (re)setting. Since L1 acquisition is defined mainly as the process of parameter setting on the basis of the input, parameter setting is expected to be at the core of L2 learning as well. However, in the literature, it has often been argued that one of the most important differences between L1 and L2 acquisition is related precisely to this process. The parameter which the book focuses on is the split IP parameter (Bobaljik and Thráinsson, 1998), in the case of Romanian L1 learners of English as L2. Romanian is (+ split IP) while English is (- split IP). In this case, the learners would need to move from the positive (+) value of the parameter to the negative (-) one, i.e. from a wider set of property values to a more restrictive one. There are three possible scenarios: (i) the L2 learners set the negative (-) value from the target language from the very beginning, on the basis of input alone; (ii) the learners first transfer the positive (+) value from their L1 and reset this value to the L2 negative (-) one as they progress in acquiring the L2; the final state is L2-like; (iii) the learners first transfer the positive (+) value from their L1 but resetting is impossible; the L2 underlying representations are different from those of native speakers even with advanced speakers, and what may account for final L2 state is parameter learning. These scenarios are explored with the help of the data provided by longitudinal and experimental studies.

The comparative investigation of the acquisition of gender in Spanish by early and late bilinguals of different language combinations is highly debated and crucial as the phenomenon of gender involves grammatical features that differ in all three languages under investigation. Against this background, both early and late bilinguals face an arduous learning task which differs in complexity. Couched within a generative framework, the empirical study focuses on 257 participants with different levels of proficiency in Spanish ranging from low to advanced, and through a series of tests aims to discover which extra-linguistic and intra-linguistic factors act as triggers for non-native outcomes in adult heritage speakers and L2 learners. The observed morphological variability is argued not to stem from a representational (i.e. syntactic) deficit, but rather from a mapping problem in L2 learners and heritage speakers. Successful attainment in terms of gender is possible but dependent on the interplay between various extralinguistic and linguistic factors.

This book examines child second language acquisition within the Principles and Parameters theory of Universal Grammar (UG). Specifically, the book focuses on null-subjects in the developing grammars of children acquiring English as a second language. The book provides evidence from the longitudinal speech data of four child second language (L2) learners in order to test the predictions of a recent theory of null-subjects, namely, the Morphological Uniformity Principle (MUP). Lakshmanan argues that the child L2 acquisition data offer little or no evidence in support of the MUP s predictions regarding a developmental relation between verb inflections and null-subjects. The evidence from these child L2 data indicates that regardless of the status of null subjects in their first language, child L2 learners of English hypothesize correctly from the very beginning that English requires subjects of tensed clauses to be obligatorily overt. The failure on the part of these learners to obey this knowledge in certain structural contexts is the result of perceptual factors that are unrelated to parameter setting. The book demonstrates the value of child second language acquisition data in evaluating specific proposals within linguistic theory for a Universal principle.

The Routledge Handbook of Second Language Acquisition and Pragmatics is a comprehensive critical survey of the field of L2 pragmatics, collecting a number of chapters that highlight the key theories, methods, pedagogies, and research findings throughout its development over the last four decades. Demonstrating the ways in which pragmatics has long served as a lens through which to examine patterns of L2 development, the volume is divided into six parts which reflect the field’s structure and evolution: • Constructs and units of analysis • Theoretical approaches • Methodological approaches • Pedagogical approaches • Contexts and individual considerations • L2 pragmatics in the global era The handbook has a particular focus on covering not only traditional topics in the field, such as constructs of pragmatic competence (e.g., speech acts, implicature), teaching and assessment, and pragmatics learning in a study abroad program, but also emerging areas of study, including interactional pragmatics, intercultural pragmatics, usage-based approaches, corpus linguistics, and psycholinguistic experimentation. Each chapter introduces the topic and follows with a description of its theoretical underpinnings, an overview of existing literature, appraisal of current practice, concluding with a discussion of future directions for research and key readings. The Routledge Handbook of Second Language Acquisition and Pragmatics is an essential resource for those with an interest in second language acquisition, pragmatics, and language teaching.

A comprehensive, current review of the research and approaches to advanced proficiency in second language acquisition The Handbook of Advanced Proficiency in Second Language Acquisition offers an overview of the most recent and scientific-based research concerning higher proficiency in second language acquisition (SLA). With contributions from an international team of experts in the field, the Handbook presents several theoretical approaches to SLA and offers an examination of advanced proficiency from the viewpoint of various contexts and dimensions of second language performance. The authors also review linguistic phenomena among advanced learners through the lens of phonology and grammar development. Comprehensive in scope, this book provides an overview of advanced proficiency grounded in socially-relevant domains of second language acquisition including discourse, reading, genre-based writing, and pragmatic competence. The authoritative volume brings together the theoretical accounts of advanced language use combined with solid empirical research. Includes contributions from an international collection of noted scholars in the field of second language acquisition Offers a variety of theoretical approaches to SLA Contains information on the most recent empirical research that contributes to an understanding of SLA Describes performance phenomena according to multiple approaches to SLA Written for scholars, students and linguists, The Handbook of Advanced Proficiency in Second Language Acquisition is a comprehensive text that offers the most recent developments in the study of advanced proficiency in the acquisition of a second language.

This book takes a hard look at some of the assumptions that are customarily made concerning the role of age in second language acquisition. The evidence and arguments the contributors present run counter to the notion that an early start in second language learning is of itself either absolutely sufficient or necessary for the attainment of native-like mastery of a second language. Another theme of the book is a doubt that there is a particular stage of maturity beyond which language learning is no longer fully possible. In short, the book presents a challenge to those who take it as given that second language learning is inevitably different in its essential nature from language acquisition in the childhood years and that second language knowledge acquired beyond the critical period is in all circumstances and in all respects doomed to fossilize at a non-native-like level.