Interpreting mood choice effects in L2 and L1 Spanish: empirical evidence and theoretical implications
-
Aoife Ahern
,
José Amenós-Pons
Abstract
The rich morphology of Spanish, such as that of tense and verbal mood, encodes a range of features leading to diverse contextual effects on interpretation, some of which are examined in the light of original experimental data in the present study. Specifically, we analyse data on the interpretation of mood in concessive structures by upper-intermediate and advanced learners of L2 Spanish, with L1 French (N=48) and L1 English (N=40), and from an L1 European Spanish control group (N=35). The results of the learner-group interpretation experiment led to a follow-on study enquiring into the understanding of mood alternation in concessive clauses by another group of L1 European Spanish speakers through a metalinguistic interpretation task. Learner group findings suggested a heavier reliance on lexical information and world-knowledge than on grammatical cues, while L1 speakers’ data indicate a default association maintained between subjunctive and irrealis interpretations, leading to a greater measure of variability in describing presuppositional uses of this mood. The native speaker data may reflect challenges posed by representing and describing, using metalinguistic knowledge, structures whose interpretation requires the integration of linguistic, discourse and extralinguistic information. Findings are discussed in relation to current linguistic descriptions and potential contributions of our empirical data.
This research has been developed as part of the research project “Semántica procedimental y contenido explícito III” (SPYCE III), funded by the Spanish Ministry for Economy and Competitivity (FFI2012-31785). We thank the two anonymous reviewers who provided helpful suggestions and observations on a previous draft; all disclaimers hold.
References
Ahern, Aoife. 2004. El subjuntivo: Significado e inferencia. Un estudio basado en la Teoría de la Relevancia. PhD Dissertation. Madrid: UNED.Search in Google Scholar
Ahern, Aoife. 2006. Spanish mood, metarepresentation and propositional attitudes. In Klaus Von Heusinger & Ken Turner (eds.), Where Semantics Meets Pragmatics, 445–471. Leiden & Boston: Brill.10.1163/9780080462608_021Search in Google Scholar
Ahern, Aoife, José Amenós-Pons & Pedro Guijarro-Fuentes. 2014. Interfaces in the interpretation of mood alternation in L2 Spanish: Morpho-phonology, semantics and pragmatics. In Leah Roberts, Ineke Vedder & Jan H. Hulstijn (eds.), Eurosla Yearbook 14, 173–200. Amsterdam: John Benjamin.10.1075/eurosla.14.07aheSearch in Google Scholar
Ahern, Aoife, José Amenós-Pons & Pedro Guijarro-Fuentes. 2016. Mood interpretation in Spanish: Towards and encompassing view of L1 and L2 interface variability. In Pedro Guijarro-Fuentes & María Juan-Garau (eds.), The Acquisition of Romance Languages, Edition: Studies on Language Acquisition, 141–170. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.10.1515/9781614513575-008Search in Google Scholar
Allen, Mary J. & Wendy M. Yen 2002. Introduction to Measurement Theory. Long Grove: Waveland Press.Search in Google Scholar
Real Academia Española & Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española. 2009. Nueva Gramática de la Lengua Española. Madrid: Espasa.Search in Google Scholar
Ballestero, Carmen. 2010. La construction avec aunque : définition, selection modale, traductions françaises. PhD Dissertation, Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle-Paris III.Search in Google Scholar
Bergs, Alexander & Lena Heine. 2010. Mood in English. In Björn Rothstein & Rolf Thieroff (eds.), Mood in the Languages of Europe, 103–116. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.10.1075/slcs.120.06berSearch in Google Scholar
Borgonovo, Claudia, Joyce Bruhn De Garavito & Philippe Prévost. 2015. Mood selection in relative clauses: Interfaces and variability. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 37 (1). 33–69.10.1017/S0272263114000321Search in Google Scholar
Collentine, Joseph G. 2003. The Development of Subjunctive and Complex-Syntactic Abilities among FL Spanish Learners. In Barbara A. Lafford & Rafael Salaberry (eds.), Studies in Spanish Second Language Acquisition: The State of the Science, 74–97. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Cook, Vivian. 1999. Going Beyond the Native Speaker in Language Teaching. Tesol 33. 185–209.10.2307/3587717Search in Google Scholar
De Mulder, Walter. 2010. “Mood in French”. In Björn Rothstein & Rolf Thieroff (eds.), Mood in the Languages of Europe, 157–169. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.10.1075/slcs.120.09demSearch in Google Scholar
Fábregas, Antonio. 2014. A guide to subjunctive and modals in Spanish: Questions and analyses. Borealis. An International Journal of Hispanic Linguistics 3 (2). 1–94.10.7557/1.3.2.3064Search in Google Scholar
Gudmestad, Aarnes. 2010. Moving beyond a sentence-level analysis in the study of variable mood use in Spanish. Southwest Journal of Linguistics, 29 (1). 25–51.Search in Google Scholar
Hwang, Sun He & Donna Lardiere. 2013. Plural-marking in L2 Korean: A feature-based approach. Second Language Research 29. 57–86.10.1177/0267658312461496Search in Google Scholar
Iverson, Michael, Paula Kempchinsky & Jason Rothman. 2008. Interface vulnerability and knowledge of the subjunctive/indicative distinction with negated epistemic predicates in L2 Spanish. In Leah Roberts, Florence Myles & Annabelle David (eds.), EuroSLA Yearbook, 8: 135-163. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.10.1075/eurosla.8.09iveSearch in Google Scholar
Kanwit, Matthew & Kimberly Geeslin. 2014. The interpretation of Spanish subjunctive and indicative forms in adverbial clauses: A cross-sectional study. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 36(3). 487–533.10.1017/S0272263114000126Search in Google Scholar
Lardiere, Donna. 2008. Feature Assembly in Second Language in Second Language Acquisition. In Juana M. Liceras, Helmut Zobl & Helen Goodluck (eds.), Features in Second Language Acquisition, 106–140. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum.10.4324/9781315085340-5Search in Google Scholar
Lardiere, Donna. 2009. Some thoughts on a contrastive analysis of feature in second language acquisition. Second Language Research 25.2. 173–227.10.1177/0267658308100283Search in Google Scholar
Papp, Szilvia. 2000. Stable and developmental optionality in native and non-native Hungarian grammars. Second Language Research 16 (2). 173–200.10.1191/026765800666966395Search in Google Scholar
Parodi, Teresa & Ianthi-Maria Tsimpli. (2005). ‘Real’ and apparent optionality in second language grammars: Finiteness and pronouns in null operator structures. Second Language Research, 21(3). 250–281.10.1191/0267658305sr248oaSearch in Google Scholar
Pérez Saldanya, Manuel. 1999. El modo en las subordinadas relativas y adverbiales. In Ignacio Bosque & Violeta Demonte (dirs.), Gramática Descriptiva de la Lengua Española, 3253–3322. Madrid: Espasa.Search in Google Scholar
Pérez-Leroux, Ana-Teresa. (1998). The acquisition of mood selection in Spanish relative clauses. Journal of Child Language 25 (3). 585–604.10.1017/S0305000998003614Search in Google Scholar
Quer, Josep. 2001. Intepreting mood. Probus 13 (1). 81–111.10.1515/prbs.13.1.81Search in Google Scholar
Rhis, Alain. 2013. Subjonctif, gérondif et participle présent en français. Une pragmatique de la dépendence verbale. Bern: Peter Lang.10.3726/978-3-0352-0232-8Search in Google Scholar
Ridruejo, Emilio. 1999. Modo y modalidad. El modo en las subordinadas sustantivas. In Ignacio Bosque & Violeta Demonte (dirs.), Gramática Descriptiva de la Lengua Española, 3209–3251. Madrid: Espasa.Search in Google Scholar
Sánchez-Naranjo, Jeannette & Ana Teresa Pérez-Leroux (2010). In the wrong mood at the right time: Children’s acquisition Spanish subjunctive in temporal clauses. Canadian Journal of Linguistics 55-2. 227–255.10.1353/cjl.2010.0000Search in Google Scholar
Sorace, Antonella. 2000. Syntactic optionality in non-native grammars. Second Language Research 16 (2). 93–102.10.1191/026765800670666032Search in Google Scholar
Sorace, Antonella. 2011. Pinning down the concept of ‘interface’ in bilingualism. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 1. 1–33.10.1075/lab.1.1.01sorSearch in Google Scholar
Truscott, John & Michael Sharwood Smith. 2014. The Multilingual Mind: A modular processing perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Veiga, Aleixandre & Manuel Mosteiro Louzao. 2006. El modo verbal en cláusulas condicionales, causales, consecutivas, concesivas, finales y adverbiales de lugar, tiempo y modo. Salamanca: Ediciones Universidad de Salamanca.Search in Google Scholar
© 2019 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Effects of age and education on variable but native heritage grammars: Theoretical and empirical implications for the Null Subject Parameter
- Interpreting mood choice effects in L2 and L1 Spanish: empirical evidence and theoretical implications
- Does empirical data from bilingual and native Spanish corpora meet linguistic theory? The role of discourse context in variation of subject expression
- English for sale: Using race to create value in the Korean ELT market
- Language tests and neoliberalism in “global human resource” development: A case of Japanese Universities
- A mixed methods study of “English Corners” funded by the Taiwan Ministry of Education “Program for Promoting Teaching Excellence of Universities”
- Questions about CLIL which are unfortunately still not outdated: A reply to Pérez-Cañado
- Effects of recasts and form-focused instruction on the acquisition of novel vocabulary
- A translanguaging view of the linguistic system of bilinguals
- The relationship between English proficiency and humour appreciation among English L1 users and Chinese L2 users of English
- Beyond ‘(non) native-speakerism’: Being or becoming a native-speaker teacher of English
- “So, why do you sign?” Deaf and hearing new signers, their motivation, and revitalisation policies for sign languages
- Microaggressions as speech acts: Using pragmatics to define and develop a research agenda for microaggressions
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Effects of age and education on variable but native heritage grammars: Theoretical and empirical implications for the Null Subject Parameter
- Interpreting mood choice effects in L2 and L1 Spanish: empirical evidence and theoretical implications
- Does empirical data from bilingual and native Spanish corpora meet linguistic theory? The role of discourse context in variation of subject expression
- English for sale: Using race to create value in the Korean ELT market
- Language tests and neoliberalism in “global human resource” development: A case of Japanese Universities
- A mixed methods study of “English Corners” funded by the Taiwan Ministry of Education “Program for Promoting Teaching Excellence of Universities”
- Questions about CLIL which are unfortunately still not outdated: A reply to Pérez-Cañado
- Effects of recasts and form-focused instruction on the acquisition of novel vocabulary
- A translanguaging view of the linguistic system of bilinguals
- The relationship between English proficiency and humour appreciation among English L1 users and Chinese L2 users of English
- Beyond ‘(non) native-speakerism’: Being or becoming a native-speaker teacher of English
- “So, why do you sign?” Deaf and hearing new signers, their motivation, and revitalisation policies for sign languages
- Microaggressions as speech acts: Using pragmatics to define and develop a research agenda for microaggressions
