Journal articles on the topic 'French language Acquisition Case studies'

In this article the relationship between the source language (Spanish) and the target language (French) in the construction of lexis during the first phases of target language acquisition is examined from a psycholinguistic perspective. After an analysis of two case studies, it is hypothesized that there are two types of approaches to the construction of lexis used by Hispanophones learning French: systematic and non-systematic.

There is increasing evidence that most European-lexifier plantation creoles developed over several generations, as successive waves of African slaves acquired increasingly basilectal varieties of the lexifier language, allowing shift-induced interference to play a central role in creole genesis. If in most cases the creators of creoles were adult learners of a second language, and if many of the creole features are the result of second language acquisition over several generations, the next step is to test the hypothesis and to see whether data from current case studies on second language acquisition can shed light on the gradual creolization process. This paper shows that many of the features found in French-lexifier creoles do occur in L2 French and other interlanguages, as a result of L1 transfer and other acquisition processes; examples discussed include word-order within the noun phrase, pronominal clitics, the absence of copula, reduplication, the reanalysis of articles, grammatical gender, verb movement and TMA markers. The major claim of the model of creole genesis advocated here, which can be called the ‘gradualist / second language acquisition model’, is that creole genesis does not involve any specific mental processes or strategies other than those found in ordinary second language acquisition. While in normal, successful second language acquisition, L1 transfer, relexification and reanalysis are relatively marginal in the end, they are nevertheless present, as illustrated in the examples provided here. It is the social and historical circumstances that accelerated the changes and allowed ?deviant? interlanguage structures to fossilize and to create a new language from the linguistic chaos of plantation societies.

Divergent hypotheses exist concerning the types of knowledge underlying early bilingualism, with some portraying a troubled course marred by language delays and confusion, and others portraying one that is largely unremarkable. We studied the extraordinary case of bilingual acquisition across two modalities to examine these hypotheses. Three children acquiring Langues des Signes Québécoise and French, and three children acquiring French and English (ages at onset approximately 1;0, 2;6 and 3;6 per group) were videotaped regularly over one year while we empirically manipulated novel and familiar speakers of each child's two languages. The results revealed that both groups achieved their early linguistic milestones in each of their languages at the same time (and similarly to monolinguals), produced a substantial number of semantically corresponding words in each of their two languages from their very first words or signs (translation equivalents), and demonstrated sensitivity to the interlocutor's language by altering their language choices. Children did mix their languages to varying degrees, and some persisted in using a language that was not the primary language of the addressee, but the propensity to do both was directly related to their parents' mixing rates, in combination with their own developing language preference. The signing-speaking bilinguals did exploit the modality possibilities, and they did simultaneously mix their signs and speech, but in semantically principled and highly constrained ways. It is concluded that the capacity to differentiate between two languages is well in place prior to first words, and it is hypothesized that this capacity may result from biological mechanisms that permit the discovery of early phonological representations. Reasons why paradoxical views of bilingual acquisition have persisted are also offered.

Multilingualism has established itself as a separate area of research in linguistic studies for the two last decades. Therefore, the present study aims at examining Algerian Multilingual students’ perceptions of linguistic distance i.e., psychotypology, between their first Language Arabic and Second language French and third language English. It focuses on the role of psychotypology as a constraining factor of cross-linguistic influence in third language acquisition that may lead to the activation of the background languages in the production of L3 English. Therefore, the researcher used a mixed research method to explore which typological or psychotypological languages L1 Arabic or L2 French would be the source of language transfer in L3 production. Forty students participated in this study, and data was gathered through a psychotypological questionnaire. The results of a qualitative and quantitative analysis showed students perceive French as a closed language to English in most the language aspects and they used it to fill a linguistic gap in their English production. It also showed that psychotypology is a complex concept that would affect students’ language choice in L3 production as well as a crucial factor in determining the source language of transfer. The findings indicated that further investigations of Psychotypology in L3 production are necessary.

Human beings have a genetically-determined capacity to walk, rather than to fly or swim. People can learn to swim, but it is not something that is genetically programmed. Do humans have a genetically-determined capacity to acquire language? Universal Grammar is a theory that assumes that they do. Except in cases of genetic disorder, humans have specialised mental architecture which is uniform across the species in its initial state, and which determines the ways in which samples of language encountered are converted into mental grammars. The specialised architecture is Universal Grammar, and it underlies our capacity to acquire particular languages like English, French, Chinese and so on. Two questions that need to be asked immediately about Universal Grammar if it is to be of any interest in understanding the acquisition of French as a second language are: (i) What evidence is there that Universal Grammar is operating when people who have already acquired a native language learn French as a second language? (ii) What insight does the adoption of a theory of Universal Grammar bring to understanding the processes involved, the course of development over time and the nature of the end state grammars that learners achieve? The article presents empirical evidence from a selection of studies bearing on these questions. It will be argued that the assumption that humans have mental architecture dedicated specifically to language acquisition – Universal Grammar – even in the case of second language acquisition, has allowed considerable progress to be made in understanding second language French.

The acquisition of negation is perhaps the best-studied syntactic phenomenon in early interlanguage research,and many of these publications concluded that first (L1) and second language (L2) development had much more in common than had previously been assumed. In the present paper, the problem of whether the same underlying principles and mechanisms guide L1 and L2 acquisition will be re-examined from the perspective of more recent grammatical theory. The empirical basis consists of longitudinal case-studies of the acquisition of French and German as first and second languages. The L2 learners' first language is Spanish. In L1 data one finds a rapid, uniform and almost error-free course of development across languages exhibiting quite different morphosyntactic means of expressing negation. This is explained in terms of Parameter Theory, primarily referring to functional categories determining the placement of finite verbal elements. L2 acquisition, on the other hand, is characterized by considerable variability, not only crosslinguistically, but also across learners and even within individuals. This can be accounted for by assuming different strategies of language use. More importantly, different kinds of linguistic knowledge are drawn upon in L1 as opposed to L2. It is claimed that adult L2 learners, rather than using structure-dependent operations constrained by Universal Grammar (UG), rely primarily on linear sequencing strategies which apply to surface strings.

The study of the expression of negation in longitudinal adult-child data is a privileged locus for a multimodal approach to language acquisition. In the case of bilingual language acquisition, the necessity to enter two languages at once might have an influence on the management of the visual-gestural and the auditory modalities. In order to tackle these issues, we analyze the longitudinal data of Antoine, a bilingual French/Italian child recorded separately once a month for an hour with his Italian mother and with his French father between the ages of 1;5 and 3;5. Our analyses of all his multimodal utterances with negations show that Antoine has created efficient transitional systems during his developmental path both by combining modalities and by mixing his two native languages. The visual-gestural modality is a stable resource to rely on in all the types of linguistic environments Antoine experiences. His bilingual environment could be connected to the creation of his mixed verbal productions also addressed to both French speaking and Italian speaking interlocutors. Those two transitory creative systems are efficient elements of his communicative repertoire during an important period of his language development. Gesture might therefore have a compensatory function for that little boy. It is a wonderful resource to communicate efficiently in his specific environment during his multimodal, multilingual entry into language.

AbstractIn this article, the acquisition of French subject and object pronouns by Anouk, a French-Dutch bilingual girl is studied and compared with the acquisition by monolingual French children. At first sight there are no major differences between Anouk and the children discussed in the literature. There are however some indications that the status of the pronouns in Anouk’s data is not the same as that in the monolingual data. In Anouk’s data, there are no utterances where a quantified nominal subject is doubled by a subject clitic. Consequently, it is impossible to argue that her subject pronouns have the status of agreement markers which they are claimed to have in the case of monolingual children. Moreover, Anouk acquires both subject and object pronouns at roughly the same moment—to what is found for the monolinguals. Finally, Anouk makes position errors with object pronouns which are similar to those found in French L2 acquisition data. It is proposed that this may be due to the (indirect) influence of Dutch, her other language.

Purpose The aim of this study was to provide a cross-linguistic review of acquisition of consonant phonemes to inform speech-language pathologists' expectations of children's developmental capacity by (a) identifying characteristics of studies of consonant acquisition, (b) describing general principles of consonant acquisition, and (c) providing case studies for English, Japanese, Korean, and Spanish. Method A cross-linguistic review was undertaken of 60 articles describing 64 studies of consonant acquisition by 26,007 children from 31 countries in 27 languages: Afrikaans, Arabic, Cantonese, Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, Haitian Creole, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Jamaican Creole, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Maltese, Mandarin (Putonghua), Portuguese, Setswana (Tswana), Slovenian, Spanish, Swahili, Turkish, and Xhosa. Results Most studies were cross-sectional and examined single word production. Combining data from 27 languages, most of the world's consonants were acquired by 5;0 years;months old. By 5;0, children produced at least 93% of consonants correctly. Plosives, nasals, and nonpulmonic consonants (e.g., clicks) were acquired earlier than trills, flaps, fricatives, and affricates. Most labial, pharyngeal, and posterior lingual consonants were acquired earlier than consonants with anterior tongue placement. However, there was an interaction between place and manner where plosives and nasals produced with anterior tongue placement were acquired earlier than anterior trills, fricatives, and affricates. Conclusions Children across the world acquire consonants at a young age. Five-year-old children have acquired most consonants within their ambient language; however, individual variability should be considered. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.6972857

Background and Purpose: Second language (L2) learners have been observed making generation errors, i.e., derivational morphology, in the prospects of learning another language by translating it into their mother tongue. This research has studied these errors in L2 regarding derivational morphology. Methodology: This study was designed as descriptive research, using a quantitative approach to collect data. The respondents in this research are a total of 100 undergraduates who volunteered to take part, comprising 50 from the second semester, and 50 from the fourth semester who majored in French, and had been chosen using a purposive sampling method. The current study contained an expanded instrument that included each of the four sentences from each of the fourfold or more distractors, comprising 108 items. The affectability of learners to the use of these structures in an unfavourable syntactic situation was tested by crossing derivationally related suffixed shapes with their bases. Data obtained from the 108 item questionnaires was analysed inferentially using ANOVA and t-test. Findings: Results showed that learners were dissatisfied with the presence or absence of postfixes, implying that generation errors are a problem of performance rather than competence. Contributions: The current study discovered a gap between the creation of defined and curved structures, confirming phonetic hypotheses that differentiate these two morphological mechanisms. Moreover, this study suggested that the root structures and inferred frames are vulnerable to the area of an incidental postfix and to the nonattendance of a requisite one. Effects are greater at higher levels, suggesting that syntactic knowledge starts to improve in advanced learners. Keywords: Derivational morphology, language interference, bilingualism, translation, language teaching. Cite as: Akbari Motlaq, M. D., Tengku Mahadi, T. S., Adi Kasuma, S. A., & Zulkifli, Z. I. (2022). Investigating the impact of derivational morphology in foreign language acquisition: A case study. Journal of Nusantara Studies, 7(2), 184-xx. http://dx.doi.org/10.24200/jonus.vol7iss2pp184-201

This paper presents a longitudinal analysis of French liaison among Irish university learners. Quantitative analysis of their spoken language points to the clear distinction that underlies their use of liaison between obligatory and variable contexts. In the former case, they evidence near-categorical levels of use, while their use of liaison in variable contexts is more frequent than that observed in studies of native speakers in the same age group. Morphosyntactic and lexical analyses indicate that the learners use variable liaison in a small number of morphosyntactic contexts as opposed to the full range within which it is possible, while applying it to a limited number of words within these contexts. The findings are discussed in relation to a number of hypotheses that they raise concerning the acquisition of liaison in L2 French, along with some methodological issues that they evidence concerning the study of liaison in learner language.

In this article, we show that the generative phonological distinction between lexical and surface representation can explain apparently contradictory orders of acquisition of L2 voice and aspiration contrasts by native speakers of English. Cross-language speech perception research has shown that English speakers distinguish synthetic voice onset time counterparts of aspirated–unaspirated minimal pairs more readily than voiced–voiceless. Here, we present evidence that in the perceptual acquisition of the same Thai contrasts, English speakers acquire voicing before aspiration. These divergent orders are argued to be due to the levels of representation tapped by the methodologies employed in each case: surface representations in the earlier studies, and lexical in the present one. The resulting difference in outcomes is attributed to the presence of aspiration in surface, but not lexical, representations in English (Chomsky and Halle, 1968). To address the further question of whether allophonic aspiration in English aids in the eventual acquisition of contrastive aspiration in Thai, we compare the developmental progression of the English learners to that of native speakers of French, whose L1 contains only a voicing contrast, and no surface aspiration. The performance of the anglophone group improves over time, suggesting that L1 surface features can be lexicalized in L2 acquisition,even though they are not initially transferred across levels.

This article is based on the model of SLA presented in Approaches to Second Language Acquisition (Towell & Hawkins 1994). It begins by presenting that view in summarised form. It then looks at four sets of empirical data drawn from two longitudinal multiple case studies and interprets the evidence in the light of the particular approach. The first two deal with learners in the initial stages of learning and show how they have to store formulaic knowledge in order to be able to extract syntactic information. The second two deal with advanced learners and show how they have to chunk and proceduralise intermediate knowledge in order to be able to develop both their knowledge and their fluency. The study of the advanced learners shows, however, that they do not become either as knowledgeable or as fluent in the L2 as they are in the L1. An interpretation of that evidence within the model offered suggests that this is because their L2 is based on a multiplicity of knowledge sources and that processing this kind of knowledge is more demanding of the memory systems than acquiring knowledge of and the ability to process the L1.

In this paper we show that supplying positive evidence in the second language (L2) classroom does not necessarily trigger the appropriate L2 value of a parameter of Universal Grammar. The parameter we investigate is the verb movement parameter of Pollock (1989), which accounts for the fact that English and French adverbs differ as to where they occur in relation to the verb: In French the verb raises past the adverb, allowing the order SVAO but not SAV, whereas in English the verb does not raise, allowing SAV but not SVAO. Fifty-four francophone children (aged 11) in intensive English-as-a-second-language programs in Quebec, Canada, were exposed to a 2-week input flood of specially prepared materials containing English adverbs used naturalistically. No form-focused instruction or negative evidence on adverb placement was provided. Subjects were pretested immediately prior to the input flood, posttested immediately afterward, and again 3 weeks later, on four different tasks. On all tasks there is a change between pretest and posttest behavior, namely, a dramatic increase in use of the English SAV order but little or no decline in incorrect usage of SVAO. Results are also compared to groups reported in White (1991a, 1991b); the subjects in the present study differ from both groups in the previous studies. The results of the present study suggest that positive evidence does not serve to preempt the first language parameter setting in this case; acquiring the correct English SAV order did not lead to loss of incorrect SVAO. Implications of this result for theories of preemption and parameter setting in L2 acquisition are discussed.

In the continuing debate on the origins of creole languages, Lefebvre has long taken a strong stance in favor of an essential contribution of the West African substratum to the grammatical makeup of Haitian Creole; thus, she opposes both a universalist account along the lines of Derek Bickerton's bioprogram (e.g. 1984), and Robert Chaudenson's superstratist approach (e.g. 1992). Lefebvre's present book summarizes the main findings of two decades of research by herself and others (such as John Lumsden and Anne-Marie Brousseau) through various projects carried out at the Université du Québec à Montréal. The overall aim of this enterprise has been to test the hypothesis that adult speakers of the substratum languages, in creating a new creole language, use the properties of their native lexicons as well as the parametric values and semantic interpretation rules of their native grammars (9). In order to test this hypothesis, Haitian Creole is compared, on the one hand, with its superstratum or lexifier language, French, and on the other hand, with Fongbe (or Fon, belonging to the Gbe cluster of Kwa languages), as a representative of the substratum. Most of the book consists of the presentation of such three-way comparisons in regard to nominal structure (Chap. 4), the marking of tense, mood, and aspect (Chap. 5), pronouns (Chap. 6), clausal operators and the structure of the clause (Chaps. 7–8), the properties of verbs (Chap. 9), derivational affixes (Chap. 10), compounds (Chap. 11), and parametric options (Chap. 12). In all these areas, striking similarities between Haitian and Fongbe are revealed.

AbstractThe roles of interaction have been studied for several decades. Recent studies have turned to investigate “the details of which components of interaction might be more or less effective in which contexts with which learners” (Loewen, Shawn & Masatoshi Sato. 2018. Interaction and instructed second language acquisition. Language Teaching 51(3). 285–329: 286). This case study, based on three unstructured interactions outside the classroom between two L2 Mandarin Chinese learners, investigates the learning opportunities these interactions brought about in terms of helping them to increase in control over forms that had already been encountered inside the classroom. Using the concept of the language-related episode (Swain, Merrill & Sharon Lapkin. 1998. Interaction and second language learning: Two adolescent French immersion students working together. The Modern Language Journal 82(3). 320–337), this study sets focus on learning opportunities for lexis- and grammar-related items. It finds learning opportunities arise as the two peers negotiate for meaning motivated by the need to comprehend, strive to use the L2 to express/co-express themselves, and improve their form through the other’s feedback. In addition, lexis-related learning is found to be very positive in this study. The dictionary played an indispensable role in facilitating the learners when they encountered lexis-related issues. Further, it enabled the learners to learn new vocabulary when driven by communicative needs. In comparison, the grammar-related learning is found to be relatively complicated. And the fact the learners had nowhere to resort to concerning grammatical issues attributed to it. In terms of the different types of interactions, compared to learning through negotiation for meaning and feedback, output and co-construction/collaboration were found to be most productive in promoting the learning.

Bone artefacts are among the less thoroughly studied classes of archaeological material, especially in the case of particular periods and regions. The reasons behind this are not uniform. The most obvious and general are linked to the research practices of culture-historical archaeology, often neglecting bone artefacts, considering them not sufficiently attractive or informative. The most significant shift towards recognition of a set of potential information gained from bone objects was achieved in the framework of studies of prehistoric technology during the second half of 20th century, especially in the French archaeological school. This research strategy raised a number of questions concerning the acquisition of raw material, modes of production and usage of objects, whose interpretative potential gained in power, leading to the increased attention paid to faunal remains in archaeological investigations. Yet this source of information on the actual details of relations between people and material culture, opened by technology studies, has not been sufficiently explored. It may be suggested that the reasons are the narrow specialization of researchers and insufficient inclusion of the gathered information into the wider interpretive framework, various traditions and lack of cooperation among the national archaeological “schools”, language barriers etc. However, the main reason behind this state of affairs may be sought for in non-integrated theoretical perspectives and the lack of clearly articulated interpretive position of researchers seeking to apply the knowledge gained from technology studies, considering this strategy as an “objective, scientific method”, providing concrete answers clearly complying to the expectations of the dominant archaeological paradigm.The paper offers a critical review of a number of examples of application of technology studies in archaeology and possible directions of a more integrated and theoretically informed approach. One of the obvious solutions may be sought in the direction of another research strategy – material culture studies. The aim of the paper is thus to link these two approaches, whose theoretical foundations are not uniform today, but the history of the ideas and the mode of articulation of the basic theoretical assumptions indicate similar theoretical roots.

Summary This contribution is dedicated to William Dwight Whitney (1827–1897), a scholar who generally has a modest space dedicated to him in the historiography of linguistics, despite his name and works having had considerable circulation among his contemporaries. His originality and method are outlined with particular attention being given to his reception in Europe and in the setting of Italian studies of theoretical and empirical linguistics. Whitney was among the first to contest Schleicher’s concept of language as a natural fact, claiming, instead, that it has social nature, as an ‘institution’ created by man; he was a forerunner in recognizing the relevance of signs and their value, and of language acquisition. In his demonstrations and in his methods he proposes a science of historical linguistics but at the same time it is open to 20th century linguistics and the concept of language as a complex system ordered and crossed by relationships. Both his unique approach to the study of Sanskrit, which emphasised the study of its use and its variants, and his interest for modern languages, makes him a particularly interesting scholar, as he and his reception testify the rise, in Europe and especially in Italy, of a new approach to linguistic issues, no longer exclusively historical-comparative, but also theoretical and general. Nonetheless, Whitney ought to occupy a prominent place in the history of linguistics, because he was also the author of one of the first introductory texts of the discipline, which was published in 1875; in that same year a French translation came out, which was soon followed by an Italian, and a German translation (both 1876).The number of almost contemporaneous translations gives an idea of the gap which a general and introductory work like Whitney’s filled and illustrates that there was a clear need for it. In several works, including recent ones, De Mauro identified the specific characteristics of Italian linguistic studies: we can find a good many of these traits in Whitney as well. Although the fruitful contribution of Whitney’s ideas in an environment which is ‘naturally’ inclined towards the themes and methods the American linguist dealt with, i.e., the ‘Italian linguistic school’, has not been fully recognised until now, it is undeniable that his ideas provided an important stimulus for new interpretations and new models.

Research on child heritage speakers (HSs) has shown successful language acquisition, comparable to monolinguals, whereas research on adult HSs often claims incomplete acquisition. This seems to be an evident contradiction in the current state of research, which may be explained by a possible language shift during adolescence or adulthood, but which does not necessarily have to be equated with a lack of competence. In an overview of the existing studies on child and adult HSs of French in Germany, we show that HSs are not incomplete acquirers of French and we suggest theoretical and practical implications following these findings. Our aim is to show, first, that HSs of French in Germany are not unanimously disadvantaged compared with French speakers in countries where French is a majority language, and second, that complete acquisition is independent of language dominance, a notion that has received particular attention in studies on multilingual and HL acquisition.

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the role played by linguistic universals in second language acquisition. Research reported here focuses on the acquisition of dative structures and dative questions in a passive context in English by French and Inuit (Eskimo) students. Data were also elicited from native English-speaking students to serve as the norm. The data are interpreted within the theory of markedness and core grammar, as well as Case theory. The results of the testing, showing that unmarked forms are acquired before marked ones, are consistent with the predictions made by the theory of markedness and the property of adjacency which is crucial for Case assignment.

The development of lexical complexity in second language acquisition has received a considerable amount of attention in applied linguistics research. Many studies have examined the role of lexical diversity, sophistication and density as indicators of L2 proficiency. Few studies, though, have considered the development of lexical complexity from an explicitly cross-linguistic perspective. This article reports on an explorative, cross-linguistic study on the development of lexical diversity, sophistication and density in L2 French and English at four levels of linguistic proficiency. Additionally, the study proposes a number of alternative measures tapping into collocational knowledge and lexical sophistication. The analyses were carried out on a cross-sectional, multilingual corpus of L2 French and English consisting of oral narrative data. The results show a similar development of lexical diversity in L2 French and English, but considerably different developmental tendencies in terms of sophistication and density. The concluding sections discuss possible explanations for these differences and consequences for the measurement of linguistic proficiency.

This article presents an experimental study investigating the compounding parameter in the L2 Spanish interlanguage of English and French NSs in light of the Subset Principle and its predictions for the process of L2 development. The compounding parameter (Snyder, 1995, 2001) argues that languages permit complex predicate constructions like verb particles, resultatives, and double objects if and only if they can productively form N-N compounds. English exhibits the plus value of the parameter, allowing N-N compounds and the related constructions, whereas in Spanish and French these compounds and constructions are ungrammatical. Because English also allows periphrastic constructions of the same meaning, which are the only option in French and Spanish, English represents the superset parameter value to the Spanish and French subset value. At issue is whether L2 learners are able to acquire the subset value of the compounding parameter based on the naturalistic input they receive. In this case, the learning task involves realizing that some L1 constructions are unavailable in the L2. Results indicate that the learners initially transfer the L1 (superset) value and do not start with the subset value of the parameter. Findings also inform the debate on whether negative evidence can engage UG-related acquisition. Ten of the 26 advanced subjects were able to successfully reset the whole parameter based on negative data for only two of the four constructions in the cluster. This fact suggests that it is not impossible for negative evidence to be utilized in grammar reorganization.

The present study aims to sensitize SLA researchers to the importance of documenting and controlling for their participants’ proficiency in the target language, with the goal of establishing more robust proficiency assessment standards in experimental research. First, this article presents a survey of recent (2000–2008) foreign and second-language (L2) acquisition studies that show that such standards have yet to be met. Second, it demonstrates the validity, reliability, and practicality of a cloze (i.e., fill-in-the-blank) test designed to discriminate among L2 learners of French at different proficiency levels. Subject and item analyses are performed on the cloze test scores of 169 L2 learners of French from various language backgrounds. The relationship between these scores and the learners’ language background is examined. Cutoff points between proficiency levels are identified in the data. The test then is shared with scholars so that those working with a similar population of L2 learners of French can also use it.

This is the first Special Issue of the Journal of French Language Studies, which will from now on have one thematic number per year. This issue is devoted to the acquisition of French as a second language.

Abstract This paper analyzes the usage of frequent polysemous verbs by native speakers and by L2 learners and it makes several pedagogical suggestions on how to teach polysemous verbs in a L2 classroom. To achieve these objectives, we have examined the case of the Spanish verb quedar, which means “to remain”, “to stay”, “to be left”, “to make an appointment”, etc. A methodology based on narratives and sentence elicitation has been created. The experiences were accomplished by Spanish speakers (adults and children), and French university students of Spanish, who performed productions in Spanish (L2) and in French (L1). The results of this study seem to confirm that adult native speakers used the semantic network of polysemous verbs in a very conventional manner. Meanings appear to have been acquired thanks to usage, by storing linguistic experiences as patterns, and operating mostly by analogy process. Children seem to have primarily elicited quedar in conventional situations (for instance, to fix an appointment) and depending on a cost-effectiveness criteria (only if this verb adds a pragmatic gain compared to simpler options). The acquisition path of quedar by children (L1) seems to be driven by different factors than for L2 learners. French learners of Spanish used quedar meanings differently from native speakers and they were highly influenced by their L1, both semantically and syntactically.

<em>The mastery of grammatical categories is a very important aspect during the acquisition of foreign languages in general, and in particular contrastive linguistics. Verb tenses in French are important part of speech grammar. Non-Mastery of them may cause second language acquisition mistake and misunderstanding especially in French with the verb lexeme. Their confusion by Chinese learners leads to mistakes. This paper uses descriptive method to analyze Chinese learners’ mistake in French speaking and writing.</em>

The large and wide-ranging body of research in French as a second language has contributed significantly to the development of several branches of the broad discipline of applied linguistics. However, there have to date been few attempts to provide a comprehensive account of this literature as a distinct, language-specific body of knowledge. The present overview summarises a large number of studies published since the year 2000 under the twin broad categories of research in L2 French acquisition and research in L2 French teaching and learning. The overview of the studies, representing different epistemological approaches and targeting different research objectives, provides an up-to-date account of the main concerns of L2 French researchers working in different countries. The article also draws out salient themes that link this work (such as insights gained from analysis of the impact of different L1 backgrounds on L2 French acquisition) and highlights differences in L2 French research trends (such as different emphases and perspectives adopted in anglophone and francophone studies).

AbstractMany of the studies devoted to the acquisition of liaison in French as a foreign language have been carried out with advanced learners, whose first languages were often typologically close to French, and typically without much consideration to the graphophonemic dimension, which is an essential part of the learning process. In this article, we provide a brief overview of the linguistic and contextual factors in the acquisition of liaison by Japanese learners of French in Japan, with a particular focus on the connection between literacy and phonological skills. We then present initial results of a two-year longitudinal study (four sessions) of text-reading tasks with beginner Japanese learners of French (n = 12) in Tokyo, using the same tasks employed in two large corpora of French native (PFC) and non-native (IPFC) speakers/readers. Our data offer a glimpse into the evolution of these learners during the initial acquisition of L2 phonological/literacy skills.

It has been argued that the study of child L2 development can inform different maturational accounts of language acquisition. One such specific proposal was put forward by Meisel (2008), arguing for a cut-off point for monolingual or bilingual first language acquisition — (2)L1 — type of development at 3–4 years. The paper analyses the longitudinal development of object clitics in child L2 French (L1 Swedish) and compares the developmental sequence in child L2 learners (n = 7) with different Ages of Onset of Acquisition (AoA) (from 3;0 to 6;5) to the adult L2 sequence that was found in previous studies (Granfeldt & Schlyter 2004). The study also includes age-matched simultaneous bilingual children (n = 3) and monolingual controls (n = 5). The results show that some of the child L2 learners with an AoA over 4 years display structures that are typical of adult L2 acquisition, whereas these structures were not found in the simultaneous bilingual children or in the child second language acquisition (cL2) children with an AoA under 4 years. It is suggested that differences in developmental sequences are due to a combination of AoA and the level of L1 linguistic development at the onset of L2 acquisition.

ABSTRACTThis special issue of the Journal of French Language Studies participates in the ‘methodological turn’ (Byrnes, 2013) in the field of Second Language Acquisition (SLA), by presenting five original articles that focus on different methodological issues in studies on various aspects of the acquisition of French as an additional language. We highlight the contributions of the five articles and situate them within the larger discussion on research methodology. We end by arguing for the need for additional attention to methodology in SLA.

Children’s creation of novel words is thought to be guided by several variables of their language(s), including the simplicity and frequency of required morphology and/or target structure (Clark, 1993). This study documents children’s acquisition of French deverbal Verb–Object compounds (e.g., lave-vaisselle ‘wash-dishes’ meaning dishwasher). Research from previous studies suggests that simple infrequent forms such as these will be acquired later (i.e., around 5 years). 34 monolingual French-speaking children between 3 and 5 years produced and indicated their understanding of novel deverbal compounds. The children’s vocabulary size was more strongly positively related to their production and comprehension of novel compounds than age. In comprehension, children often misinterpreted the Object of novel compounds as the subject of the action in the Verb. These results confirm that this simple infrequent form is acquired late.

This article is situated within the recent strand of SLA research which applies variationist sociolinguistic methods to the study of the acquisition of sociolinguistic variation by the L2 speaker. Whilst that research has tended to focus on the study of morphological and morphosyntactic variables, this article aims to investigate a number of acquisitional trends identified in previous research in relation to phonological variation, namely the variable deletion of /l/ by Irish advanced L2 speakers of French in both an instructed and study abroad environment. Based on quantitative results using GoldVarb 2001, the study further illuminates the difficulty that the acquisition of sociolinguistic variation poses to the instructed L2 speaker, who is found to make minimal use of informal sociolinguistic variants. In contrast, contact with native speakers in the native speech community is seen to allow the L2 speaker to make considerable sociolinguistic gains, not only in relation to the acquisition of the informal variant in itself, but also in relation to the underlying native speaker grammatical system as indicated by the constraint ordering at work behind use of the variable.

ABSTRACTThis article supports the diglossic approach to variation in metropolitan French by delving into the subject from the point of view of acquisition. Drawing on naturalistic data from 37 native French children between the ages of 2;3 and 4;0, the investigation exemplifies the existence of two cognate, but distinct grammars in the mind/brain of these children. The distinction between Spontaneous French (G1, all children) and Normed French (G2, 4 children by age 4) hinges upon two crucial characteristics, i.e. the morpho-syntactic status of nominative clitics and the emergence of the negative particlene. Accusative clitics with imperatives and past-participle agreement are also examined in order to gain a comprehensive picture of the two grammars. Finally, the emergence ofneis interpreted as a trigger forcing a speaker to move from G1to G2due to the total unavailability ofnein G1.

Usage-based approaches suggest that children gradually build abstract syntactic patterns, called constructions, through processes of abstraction and schematization from the input they receive. Bilingual children have the challenge of learning two sets of non-equivalent constructions when they build their constructicon. This can result in deviations from monolinguals, which are commonly referred to as transfer. Targeting the expression of the caused-motion construction, the present study focuses on idiosyncratic utterances, those that do not correspond to monolingual adult language use, in three different age groups (4, 6, and 8 years old) of German–French bilingual children in comparison to monolingual control groups. The quantitative analysis showed that idiosyncrasies could be found in both groups, but with significantly higher rates in bilinguals at all ages. In a qualitative analysis, idiosyncratic utterances were clustered into three different types: syntactic patterns, use of verbs, and directional phrases. Regarding the analysis of these types, the influence of French could be shown. In order to classify this linguistic phenomenon in a usage-based approach, we propose to consider transfer as a form of overgeneralization within the bilingual constructicon.

Increasing preoccupations and interest manifested for the Romanian language as a foreign language compose a focused and clear expression in the volume “Romanian as a foreign language. Methodology and cultural applicability”, launched at the Turku University publishing house, Finland (2018). The editors, Paul Nanu (Department of Romanian Language and Culture, University of Turku, Finland) and Emilia Ivancu (Department of Romanian Studies of the Adam Mickiewicz University of Poznań, Poland) with this volume, continue a series of activities dedicated to the promotion of the Romanian language and culture outside the country borders. This volume brings together a collection of articles, previously announced and briefly presented at a round table organized by the two Romanian lectors, as a section of the International Conference “Dialogue of cultures between tradition and modernity”, (Philological Research and Multicultural Dialogue Centre, Department of Philology, Faculty of History and Philology, “1 Decembrie 1918” University of Alba Iulia). The thirteen authors who sign the articles are teachers of Romanian as a foreign language, either in the country or abroad. The challenge launched by the organisers pointed both at the teaching methods of Romanian as a foreign language – including the authors’ reflections upon the available textbooks (Romanian language textbooks) and the cultural implications of this perspective on the Romanian language. It is probably no accident that the first article of the aforementioned volume – “Particularities of teaching Romanian as a foreign language for the preparatory year. In quest of “the ideal textbook’’ (Cristina Sicoe, University of the West, Timișoara) – brings a strict perspective upon that what should be, from the author’s point of view, “the ideal textbook”. The fact that it does not exist, and has little chances ever to exist, could maybe be explained by the multitude of variables which appear in practice, within the didactic triangle composed by teacher – student – textbook. The character of the variables is the result of particular interactions established between the components of the triad. A concurrent direction is pointed out by the considerations that make the object of the second article, “To a new textbook of Romanian language as a foreign language’’ (Ana-Maria Radu-Pop, University of the West, Timișoara). While the previous article was about an ideal textbook for foreign students in the preparatory year of Romanian, this time, the textbook in question has another target group, namely Erasmus students and students from Centres of foreign languages. Considering that this kind of target group “forms a distinct category”, the author pleads for the necessity of editing adequate textbooks with a part made of themes, vocabulary, grammar and a part made of culture and civilization – the separation into parts belongs to the author – that should consider the needs of this target group, their short stay in Romania (three months to one year) and, last but not least, the students’ poor motivation. These distinctive notes turn the existent RFL textbooks[1] in that which the author calls “level crossings”, which she explains in a humorous manner[2]. Since the ideal manual seems to be in no hurry to appear, the administrative-logistic implications of teaching Romanian as a foreign language (for the preparatory year) should be easier to align with the standards of efficiency. This matter is addressed by Mihaela Badea and Cristina Iridon from the Oil & Gas University of Ploiești, in the article “Administrative/logistic difficulties of teaching RFL. Case study”. Starting from a series of practical experiences, the authors are purposing to suggest “several ideas to improve existent methodologies of admitting foreign students and to review the ARACIS criteria from March 2017, regarding external evaluation of the ‘Romanian as a foreign language’ study programme”. Among other things, an external difficulty is highlighted (common to all universities in the country), namely the permission to register foreign students until the end of the first semester of the academic year, meaning around the middle of February. The authors punctually describe the unfortunate implications of this legal aspect and the regrettable consequences upon the quality of the educational act. They suggest that the deadline for admitting foreign students not exceed the 1st of December of every academic year. The list of difficulties in teaching Romanian as a foreign language is extremely long, reaching sensitive aspects from an ethical perspective of multiculturalism. This approach belongs to Constantin Mladin from Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, Macedonia, who writes about “The role of the ethical component in the learning process of a foreign language and culture. The Macedonian experience”. Therefore, we are moving towards the intercultural competences which, as the author states, are meant to “adequately and efficiently round the acquired language competences”. In today’s Macedonian society, that which the author refers to, a society claimed to be multiethnic, multilingual and pluriconfessional, the emotional component of an intercultural approach needs a particular attention. Thus, reconfigurations of the current didactic model are necessary. The solution proposed and successfully applied by Professor Constantin Mladin is that of shaking the natural directions in which a foreign language and culture is acquired: from the source language/culture towards the target language/culture. All this is proposed in the context in which the target group is extremely heterogeneous and its “emotional capacity of letting go of the ethnocentric attitudes and perceptions upon otherness” seem to lack. When speaking about ‘barriers’, we often mean ‘difficulty’. The article written by Silvia Kried Stoian and Loredana Netedu from the Oil & Gas University of Ploiești, called “Barriers in the intercultural communication of foreign students in the preparatory year”, is the result of a micro-research done upon a group of 37 foreign students from 10 different countries/cultural spaces, belonging to different religions (plus atheists), speakers of different languages. From the start, there are many differences to be reconciled in a way reasonable enough to reduce most barriers that appear in their intercultural communication. Beneficial and obstructive factors – namely communication barriers – coexist in a complex communicational environment, which supposes identifying and solving the latter, in the aim of softening the cultural shock experienced within linguistic and cultural immersion. Several solutions are recommended by the two authors. An optimistic conclusion emerges in the end, namely the possibility that the initial inconvenient of the ethnical, linguistic and cultural heterogeneity become “an advantage in learning the Romanian language and acquiring intercultural communication”. Total immersion (linguistic and cultural), as well as the advantage it represents as far as exposure to language is concerned, is the subject of the article entitled “Cultural immersion and exposure to language”, written by Adina Curta (“1 Decembrie 1918” University of Alba Iulia). Considered to be a factor of rapid progress and effectiveness of acquisition, exposure to language that arises from the force of circumstances could be extended to that what may be named orchestrated exposure to language. This phrase is consented to reunite two types of resources, “a category of statutory resources, which are the CEFRL suggestions, and a category of particular resources, which should be the activities proposed by the organizers of the preparatory year of RFL”. In this respect, we are dealing with several alternating roles of the teacher who, besides being an expert, animator, facilitator of the learning process or technician, also becomes a cultural and linguistic coach, sending to the group of immersed students a beneficial message of professional and human polyvalence. A particular experience is represented by teaching the Romanian language at the Sapienza University of Rome, Italy. This experience is presented by Nicoleta Neșu in the article “The Romanian language, between mother tongue and ethnic language. Case study”. The particular situation is generated by the nature of the target group, a group of students coming, on the one hand, from Romanian families, who, having lived in Italy since early childhood, have studied in the Italian language and are now studying the Romanian language (mother tongue, then ethnic language) as L1, and, on the other hand, Italian mother tongue students who study the Romanian language as a foreign language. The strategies that are used and the didactic approach are constantly in need of particularization, depending on the statute that the studied language, namely the Romanian language, has in each case. In the area of teaching methodology for Romanian as a foreign language, suggestions and analyses come from four authors, namely Eliana-Alina Popeți (West University of Timișoara), “Teaching the Romanian language to students from Romanian communities from Serbia. Vocabulary exercise”, Georgeta Orian (“1 Decembrie 1918” University of Alba Iulia) “The Romanian language in the rhythm of dance and hip-hop music”, Coralia Telea (“1 Decembrie 1918” University of Alba Iulia), “Explanation during the class of Romanian as a foreign language” and Emilia Ivancu (Adam Mickiewicz University of Poznań, Poland), “Romanian (auto)biographic discourse or the effect of literature upon learning RFL”. The vocabulary exercise proposed to the students by Eliana-Alina Popeți is a didactic experiment through which the author checked the hypothesis according to which a visual didactic material eases the development of vocabulary, especially since the textual productions of the students, done through the technique that didactics calls “reading images”, were video recorded and submitted to mutual evaluation as well as to self-evaluation of grammar, coherence and pronunciation. The role of the authentic iconographic document is attested in the didactics of modern languages, as the aforementioned experiment confirms once again the high coefficient of interest and attention of the students, as well as the vitality and authenticity of interaction within the work groups. It is worth mentioning that these students come from the Serbian Republic and are registered in the preparatory year at the Faculty of Letters, History and Theology of the West University of Timișoara. Most of them are speakers of different Romanian patois, only found on the territory of Serbia. The activity consisted of elaborating written texts starting from an image (a postcard reproducing a portrait of the Egyptian artist Eman Osama), imagining a possible biography of the character. In the series of successful authentic documents in teaching-learning foreign languages, there is also the song. The activities described by Georgeta Orian were undertaken either with Erasmus students from the preparatory year at the “1 Decembrie 1989” University of Alba Iulia, or with Polish students (within the Department of Romanian Studies in Poznań), having high communication competences (B1-B2, or even more). There were five activities triggered by Romanian songs, chosen by criteria of sympathy with the interests of the target group: youngsters, late teenagers. The stake was “a more pleasant and, sometimes, a more useful learning process”, mostly through discovery, through recourse to musical language, which has the advantage of breaking linguistic barriers in the aim of creating a common space in which the target language, a language of “the other”, becomes the instrument of speaking about what connects us. The didactic approach, when it comes to Romanian as a foreign language taught to students of the preparatory year cannot avoid the extremely popular method of the explanation. Its story is told by Coralia Telea. With a use of high scope, the explanation steps in in various moments and contexts: for transmitting new information, for underlining mechanisms generating new rules, in evaluation activities (result appreciation, progress measurements). Still, the limits of this method are not left out, among which the risk of the teachers to annoy their audience if overbidding this method. Addressing (Polish) students from the Master’s Studies Program within the Romania Philology at the Adam Mickiewicz University of Poznań, Emilia Ivancu crosses, through her article, the methodological dimensions of teaching Romanian as a foreign language, entering the curricular territory of the problematics in question by proposing an optional course entitled Romanian (auto)biographic discourse”. Approaching contact with the Romanian language as a foreign language at an advanced level, the stakes of the approach and the proposed contents differ, obviously, from the ones only regarding the creation and development of the competence of communication in the Romanian Language. The studied texts have been grouped into correspondence/epistolary discourse, diaries, memoires and (auto)biography as fiction. Vasile Alecsandri, Sanda Stolojan, Paul Goma, Neagoe Basarab, Norman Manea, Mircea Eliade are just a few of the writers concerned, submitted to discussions with the help of a theoretical toolbox, offered to the students as recordings of cultural broadcasts, like Profesioniștii or Rezistența prin cultură etc. The consequences of this complex approach consisted, on the one hand, of the expansion of the readings for the students and, on the other hand, in choosing to write dissertations on these topics. A “tangible” result of Emilia Ivancu’s course is the elaboration of a volume entitled România la persoana întâi, perspective la persoana a treia (Romania in the first person, perspectives in the third person), containing seven articles written by Polish Master’s students. Master’s theses, a PhD thesis, several translations into the Polish language are also “fruits” of the initiated course. Of all these, the author extracted several conclusions supporting the merits and usefulness of her initiative. The volume ends with a review signed by Adina Curta (1 Decembrie 1918 University of Alba Iulia), “The Romanian language, a modern, wanted language. Iuliana Wainberg-Drăghiciu – Textbook of Romanian language as a foreign language”. The textbook elaborated by Iuliana Wainberg-Drăghiciu (“1 Decembrie 1918” University of Alba Iulia) respects the CEFRL suggestions, points at the communicative competences (linguistic, sociolinguistic and pragmatic) described for levels A1 and A2, has a high degree of accessibility through a trilingual dictionary (Romanian-English-French) which it offers to foreign students and through the phonetic transcription of new vocabulary units.

This article presents a selective review of the work carried out recently in second language acquisition (SLA) research which makes use of oral learner corpora and computer technologies. In the first part, the reasons why the field of SLA needs corpora for addressing current theoretical issues are briefly reviewed. In the second part, recent literature on corpora and SLA is presented, as well as corpora currently available. The final part of the article demonstrates the way in which computerized methodologies can be used, by presenting a case study of a project whose aim was to construct a database of French Learner Oral Corpora, and by illustrating how the CHILDES tools have assisted in addressing a specific research agenda.

ABSTRACTThis study investigates the applicability of the Subset Principle in the second language (L2) acquisi:ion of the Oblique-Case Parameter by 45 learners of French. First, the Subset Principle is defined and discussed, along with its learnability predictions in first language (L1) acquisition. Then, a brief overview of the relevant literature in L2 acquisition shows that the applicability of the Subset Principle is very much debated. In the present study, the results of a grammaticality judgment task and a correction task provide partial support for the Subset Principle. It seems that the learners have acquired the lack of Exceptional-Case marking and preposition stranding, two of the syntactic properties tested, based on the positive evidence available to them. However, they failed to reject a number of ungrammatical instances of dative alternation and dative passive, leading them to an overgeneralized grammar. It is suggested that L2 learners may need direct or indirect negative evidence to constrain their grammar. Further research is needed to conclude whether the Oblique-Case Parameter really is a parameter of Universal Grammar, and if so, whether adult L2 learners are able to reset their parameters to the proper target language values.

Second language acquisition research has historically been influenced by the field of linguistics, not only in terms of theoretical inisghts, but also in terms of the emphasis placed on varioustopics. Within linguistics, the lexicon has taken on a secondary role in terms of theory construction; within second language acquisition, the rift between studies of the lexicon and theory construction seems to be even greater. While it is no longer possible to say that the lexicon is the ‘neglected component’ of second language acquisition research, it does appear to be the case that most lexical studies are not centrally concerned with the establishment of a theory of the lexicon; rather, the majority deal with descriptive aspects of the lexicon.

Epistemic stance markers, such as je pense in French, take on a variety of discursive functions, ranging from asserting an opinion, indicating the source of information, and mitigating a claim, to pragmatic functions, such as gaining time for discourse planning. Previous research suggests that the epistemic marker je pense is mostly used in French conversation to express opinions and can be used as an indicator of the development of a learner’s assertiveness and pragmatic competence during a study abroad period. Using a functional approach, this paper seeks to find out the extent to which study abroad fosters the development of assertiveness and pragmalinguistic competence among L2 learners, through an analysis of stance marking in interview data from 26 Anglophone learners of French, who spent nine months abroad in a French-speaking country, and 10 French native speakers. The results show that learners are globally less assertive in their use of je pense than native speakers, particularly prior to departure, and that they develop pragmatic uses of je pense, thereby showing a development in their interactional strategies. Finally, the high inter-variability in the way learners used je pense suggests the importance of personal style.

This longitudinal experimental study is concerned with the L2 acquisition of argument structure and its relationship with Case Theory. French ( n = 17) and English ( n = 19) intermediate learners of Spanish as a Second Language were tested three times over a period of eight months on their knowledge of dative experiencers. Eighteen Spanish native speakers acted as a control group. Dative experiencers in Spanish are common with a subset of psych verbs and unaccusative predicates. These experiencers look like indirect objects on the surface, and indeed can appear in the position of indirect objects. Most of the time, however, they appear in canonical subject position and behave like subjects for some modules of the grammar, such as Control PRO in adjunct clauses. It was hypothesized that if a thematic hierarchy is operative in SLA,both English and French learners would have no difficulty interpreting experiencers as subjects, but that English learners would experience greater difficulty with dative case because there is no dative case in English.An Interpretation Task and a Preference Task were designed to test these hypotheses. Results indicate that,whereas both groups of subjects have access to the thematic hierarchy (a UG component),L1 influence plays an important role with case assignment and checking.

The present study examined the language development of children adopted from China to examine possible early age effects with respect to their use of complement clitics, lexical diversity and verb morphology. We focused on these aspects of French because they distinguish second language learners of French and native French-speaking children with language impairment from children learning French as a native language and, in the case of object clitics and certain verb tenses, are relatively late to emerge in native speakers. Thus, it might be expected that they would be susceptible to the delayed onset of acquisition of French experienced by internationally adopted children. Language samples of twelve adopted children from 3;6 to 4;8 living in French-speaking families were analyzed and compared to those of non-adopted monolingual French-speaking children of the same age, sex and socio-economic status. The adopted and control children had similar levels of socio-emotional adjustment and non-verbal intellectual abilities. The adopted children exhibited accelerated language development in general, and there were no significant differences between the internationally adopted and control children with respect to lexical diversity and verb tense. However, the adopted children made significantly more errors using complement clitics, and in particular object clitics, compared to the non-adopted children. The results are discussed in terms of possible effects related to delayed age of acquisition of French.

Abstract In the present paper, we compare L2 English influence on French third language acquisition (L3A) in first-year and third-year bilingual stream secondary school students and in third-year mainstream secondary school students by means of a gap-filling task. We found that the influence of L2 English on French L3A increases from first- to third-year bilingual students, which is not the case in the mainstream group. This raises the question if L2 influence on L3A in bilingual education is the result of the increased L2 exposure or of a higher L2 proficiency, factors that both have been claimed to play a role in L3A-research (Hammarberg, 2001; Tremblay, 2006; Jaensch, 2009). The results of this study show that there is no individual correlation between L2 English proficiency and influence of English in L3 French learning. Therefore, we suggest that it is L2 exposure rather than L2 proficiency that leads to more influence of the L2 in L3 French.

This study investigates the combined effects of Age of Onset of Acquisition (AOA) and quality and quantity of input on the development of three grammatical structures in French. In a longitudinal and multiple case study including successive (L2) Swedish-French bilingual children (n = 3), simultaneous (2L1) Swedish-French bilingual children (n = 3) and monolingual French children (n = 3), we examine the development of finite verb forms, object pronouns and subject-verb agreement. A distinction is made between structures that are early/ late in different modes of acquisition and less/more difficult. The operationalization of quantity and quality of input is based on individual input profiles. The results show that AOA affects the development of less difficult and early grammatical structures whereas AOA has no influence on more difficult structures that are acquired late. An effect of input is found in the 2L1 children, and in some of the L2 children. This effect is most clear with more difficult and late structures.

This paper presents the findings of a longitudinal study of seven Basque-French bilingual children and three monolingual Basque-speaking children concerning the acquisition of the morphological marking of the ergative case in Basque. Following the hypotheses put forth to account for the development of early bilingualism, the aim of the study was to establish whether bilingual children follow the same developmental sequences as monolingual children during the acquisition of the ergative case. The research protocol we have developed involves relatively unguided as well as constrained data focusing on the production of the ergative case in these two contexts. The data show significant inter-individual and inter-task differences in the production of the ergative case that contribute to some variation in language acquisition. The findings lead us to question classifications of early bilinguals based on age of acquisition alone.

Four recent volumes on acquisition of French by different populations cover a range of areas, particularly the development of verbal tense/agreement and nominal gender/concord in first language (L1) acquirers, as opposed to second language (L2) learners; the generalizability of grammatical deficits (e.g. difficulty acquiring parametrized features different from the L1); and variation in acquisition between functional features from different domains: nominal and verbal, for example, are not all acquired at a comparable rate or with analogous errors across different learning populations. The detailed data on acquisition of French presented in these studies furnishes strong evidence for Universal Grammar (UG) systematicity that is not at all predictable from input frequency alone.

Introduction. The paper presents observations of the author on acquisition of case markers in the Romani language of two Roma children from Bulgaria. This is the first study ever done on acquisition of case system of Romani by children in their natural environment. The study is done in one of the biggest Roma settlement of Bulgaria in the city of Sofia. Romani being a new-Indian language has some features from the Indian languages but also adapted some features from some European languages. It has the ability to express one and the same idea either with a preposition or with a case marker. Methods. The author uses the longitudinal observation of the children in their natural environment, where a woman – representative of the community, was trained to audio record the interviews between parents, family members, community members and the children. This method is known from other studies in field of sociolinguistics and psycholinguistics (Labov, 1973) Results. The study is investigating what is used more frequently by the children - prepositions or case markers. For this purpose, the utterances of the parents and the children with case markers and with the prepositions have been analyzed. It was found that in the age between 1 to 2 parents and respectively their children use more case markers. In the age from 2 to 3 children use more prepositions. It seems that Roma children need more experience with the language in order to connect the case marker with the function of the preposition in the Romani language.

This paper synthesizes research on the acquisition of linguistic variation by learners of French as a second language—an overview that, to our knowledge, is the first of its kind. It also presents a case study on French immersion students' acquisition of the pronouns nous and on “we,” an alternation in many varieties of spoken French. The study shows that the students use the mildly marked variant on slightly more often than the formal variant nous but much less often than native speakers (who use it almost categorically) and immersion teachers (who strongly favor it). Female and middle-class students favor nous, students with greater extracurricular French language exposure favor on, and students who speak a Romance language at home favor nous. Various explanations are proposed for these correlations. Finally, the students, like L1 Francophones, favor on in linguistic contexts in which the referent is both nonspecific and unrestricted.