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Chapter 6. A typological approach to first language acquisition

  • Wolfgang U. Dressler
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Language Acquisition across Linguistic and Cognitive Systems
This chapter is in the book Language Acquisition across Linguistic and Cognitive Systems

Abstract

This paper will not simply be cross-linguistic, but typological, insofar as it refers to language types as constellations of typologically relevant linguistic properties. The general hypothesis is that children are sensitive to typological properties of the language they acquire, i.e. they are sensitive to the relative communicative importance and structure of linguistic patterns in their verbal interactions. This paper will focus on morphology as the backbone of holisic language typology. The data discussed will come especially from the collaborative results of the international “Cross-linguistic Project on Pre- and Protomorphology in Language Acquisition”. The paper will concentrate on early phases of language acquisition and on inflectional morphology. The relevant properties are degree of morphological richness of a language, of transparency, uniformity and productivity. It is assumed that children will develop morphology faster, the richer the morphology is they are acquiring. They will also acquire transparent, uniform and productive patterns faster than opaque, non-uniform and unproductive ones. Among the three epistemological levels of typology, i.e. classificatory, ordering and quantitative typology, the paper will focus on the second level, where languages, and more precisely language subsystems, are ordered according to how closely they approach the ideal morphological types of, in our case, the agglutinating, the inflecting(-fusional) and the isolating type.

Abstract

This paper will not simply be cross-linguistic, but typological, insofar as it refers to language types as constellations of typologically relevant linguistic properties. The general hypothesis is that children are sensitive to typological properties of the language they acquire, i.e. they are sensitive to the relative communicative importance and structure of linguistic patterns in their verbal interactions. This paper will focus on morphology as the backbone of holisic language typology. The data discussed will come especially from the collaborative results of the international “Cross-linguistic Project on Pre- and Protomorphology in Language Acquisition”. The paper will concentrate on early phases of language acquisition and on inflectional morphology. The relevant properties are degree of morphological richness of a language, of transparency, uniformity and productivity. It is assumed that children will develop morphology faster, the richer the morphology is they are acquiring. They will also acquire transparent, uniform and productive patterns faster than opaque, non-uniform and unproductive ones. Among the three epistemological levels of typology, i.e. classificatory, ordering and quantitative typology, the paper will focus on the second level, where languages, and more precisely language subsystems, are ordered according to how closely they approach the ideal morphological types of, in our case, the agglutinating, the inflecting(-fusional) and the isolating type.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction. New perspectives in the study of first and second language acquisition 1
  4. Part I. Emergence and dynamics of language acquisition and disorders
  5. Chapter 1. A tale of two paradigms 17
  6. Chapter 2. Dynamic systems methods in the study of language acquisition 33
  7. Chapter 3. Early bootstrapping of syntactic acquisition 53
  8. Chapter 4. Language acquisition in developmental disorders 67
  9. Part II. First language acquisition
  10. Chapter 5. Language development in a cross-linguistic context 91
  11. Chapter 6. A typological approach to first language acquisition 109
  12. Chapter 7. Linguistic relativity in first language acquisition 125
  13. Chapter 8. On the importance of goals in child language 147
  14. Chapter 9. Promoting patients in narrative discourse 161
  15. Chapter 10. On-line grammaticality judgments 179
  16. Chapter 11. The expression of finiteness by L1 and L2 learners of Dutch, French, and German 205
  17. Part III. Bilingualism and second language acquisition
  18. Chapter 12. Age of onset in successive acquisition of bilingualism 225
  19. Chapter 13. The development of person-number verbal morphology in different types of learners 249
  20. Chapter 14. Re-thinking the bilingual interactive-activation model from a developmental perspective (BIA-d) 267
  21. Chapter 15. Foreign language vocabulary learning 285
  22. Chapter 16. Cerebral imaging and individual differences in language learning 299
  23. Chapter 17. The cognitive neuroscience of second language acquisition and bilingualism 307
  24. Index of languages 323
  25. Index of subjects 325
https://doi.org/10.1075/lald.52.09dre

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction. New perspectives in the study of first and second language acquisition 1
  4. Part I. Emergence and dynamics of language acquisition and disorders
  5. Chapter 1. A tale of two paradigms 17
  6. Chapter 2. Dynamic systems methods in the study of language acquisition 33
  7. Chapter 3. Early bootstrapping of syntactic acquisition 53
  8. Chapter 4. Language acquisition in developmental disorders 67
  9. Part II. First language acquisition
  10. Chapter 5. Language development in a cross-linguistic context 91
  11. Chapter 6. A typological approach to first language acquisition 109
  12. Chapter 7. Linguistic relativity in first language acquisition 125
  13. Chapter 8. On the importance of goals in child language 147
  14. Chapter 9. Promoting patients in narrative discourse 161
  15. Chapter 10. On-line grammaticality judgments 179
  16. Chapter 11. The expression of finiteness by L1 and L2 learners of Dutch, French, and German 205
  17. Part III. Bilingualism and second language acquisition
  18. Chapter 12. Age of onset in successive acquisition of bilingualism 225
  19. Chapter 13. The development of person-number verbal morphology in different types of learners 249
  20. Chapter 14. Re-thinking the bilingual interactive-activation model from a developmental perspective (BIA-d) 267
  21. Chapter 15. Foreign language vocabulary learning 285
  22. Chapter 16. Cerebral imaging and individual differences in language learning 299
  23. Chapter 17. The cognitive neuroscience of second language acquisition and bilingualism 307
  24. Index of languages 323
  25. Index of subjects 325
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