Volume 52, Issue 3

Phraseological competence, the use of (semi-)prefabricated expressions in language, is a major component of second language acquisition. Recent research focused on lexical bundles, i.e. recurrent contiguous strings of words, has highlighted quantitative and qualitative differences between native and non-native speaker use of these strings. Few studies, however, have investigated the development of phraseological competence as a function of degree of proficiency in L2. Relying on a methodology used by Durrant and Schmitt (2009: IRAL 47, 157–177 ) to compare native and non-native speakers, the present study identifies significant differences in the way in which intermediate and advanced learners use collocations. In particular, the intermediate learners tend to overuse high frequency collocations (such as hard work ) and underuse lower-frequency, but strongly associated, collocations (such as immortal souls ). The concluding section addresses the limits of the study and points to possible applications in foreign language teaching and automated scoring.

For some time second language acquisition researchers have been interested in the idea that various systematic characteristics of a target language can be highlighted in such a way as to facilitate learning. However, apart from persistent methodological obstacles, research has been handicapped by the lack of a theoretical framework of sufficient power to analyse and explain the effects of such “input enhancement”. The advantages of such a framework are discussed here with particular reference to the Modular Online Growth and Use of Language framework (Truscott and Sharwood Smith 2004). The discussion covers the difficulties encountered by researchers trying to identify the processes that take place within the learner when given aspects of speech and writing are somehow converted into new knowledge. The basics of the framework are discussed and applied to concepts familiar from the second language acquisition literature also making reference to some established language teaching approaches and techniques.

Previous research demonstrates that L2 learners are sensitive to morphophonological and semantic information regarding grammatical gender in European languages (e.g., Spinner & Juffs, 2008). In this study we examine the use of morphophonological and semantic information by two groups of English-speaking learners acquiring Swahili gender (noun class). The results of an oral agreement-marking task, a written gender assignment task, and interviews indicate that learners are sensitive to morphophonological information regarding gender in Swahili. The findings for semantic information are more complex; learners appear to be sensitive to animacy but not to other “minor” semantic information such as tree or active body part . We propose the Semantic Core Hypothesis, which suggests that core semantic principles such as biological sex, animacy and humanness may be more easily accessible to L2 learners than other semantic principles.