Search

Studies testing the knowledge of syntactic properties have resulted in two potentially contrasting proposals in relation to third language acquisition (TLA); the Cumulative Enhancement Model (Flynn et al., 2004), which proposes that previously learned languages will positively affect the acquisition of a third language (L3); and the ‘second language (L2) status factor’ hypothesis (Bardel and Falk, 2007), which proposes that the primacy of the L2 can block the potential positive effects that may be transferable from the first language (L1). This article attempts to extend these hypotheses to the domain of morphosyntax, in relation to the TLA of the properties of grammatical number and gender concord marking on German attributive adjectives; these properties not present in the L1 of Japanese, or the L2 of English. Two further factors are of interest in the current study; first, the performance of the learners according to their L3 and their L2 proficiency levels, a variable not discussed in the above-mentioned studies; and, second, the role that the type of task has on the performance of these learners. Three groups of Japanese native speakers (matched for proficiency within each German group), but with differing English proficiencies, completed a carefully balanced gap-filling task, together with two oral elicitation tasks in the form of games; both of these elicited tokens of adjectival inflection. Initial results offer partial support for weaker versions of the two hypotheses mentioned above. However, neither of the L3 models tested can fully account for the results obtained, which are more consistent with a feature-based account of the organization of grammar in the domain of morphosyntax, such as that of Distributed Morphology (DM) (Halle and Marantz, 1993). DM is a model for language acquisition which — coupled with a view that the Subset Principle proposed by this account is not observed by non-primary language learners — has recently been proposed to explain the optionality observed in L2 learners’ production (Hawkins et al., 2006). The data presented here suggest that it could be extended to L3 learners’ production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the delimitation of adjectives as a lexical category by children acquiring Brazilian Portuguese. It reconciles a psycholinguistic approach to language acquisition with a minimalist conception of language (Chomsky, 1995-2001). The results of the experiments reported here are compatible with the working hypothesis, namely, that children make use of syntactic and morphological information in the delimitation of adjectives as a lexical category. They also reveal that the semantic properties of derivation affixes forming adjectives are already available by the age of two. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The hypothesis initially defended in [Abney, S.P., 1987. The English noun phrase in its sentential aspects. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT] that determiners, quantifiers, and adjectives are heads and NP is their syntactic complement became one of the standard analyses within P&P and early minimalist syntax, but, examined in an unprejudiced way, causes more difficulties than it solves at both the empirical and the conceptual level. Without rejecting the head status of articles and the DP view of nominals, Kayne [Kayne, R., 1994. The Antisymmetry of Syntax. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA], Cinque [Cinque, G., 1995. On the evidence for partial N-movement in the Romance noun phrase. In: Cinque, G. (Ed.), Italian Syntax and Universal Grammar. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 287–309] and others have subsequently proposed that demonstratives, quantifiers, possessives, and adjectives be considered phrasal specifiers of various functional projections, rather than heads, with only articles treated as heads of DP, and such is now the standard view within Chomskian generative grammar, but the specifier theory is itself subject to serious objections. This work evaluates afresh the pros and cons of both accounts, but finally rejects them to return to the earlier NP analysis of NPs and the traditional view of articles, demonstratives, quantifiers, adjectives, PPs and relative clauses as modifiers of the noun, which, under the theory of modification presented in [Escribano, J.L.G., 2004. Head-final effects and the nature of modification. Journal of Linguistics 40, 1–43], accounts for the facts quite well and meets the Occamian ideals of Minimalist Theory rather better than current competitors. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]