What is it about?
Do you know someone who speaks your native language (L1) as a second language (L2)? Have you noticed that this person – although knowing the grammar of your language (almost) perfectly and having no difficulties in finding and articulating the right words most of the time – sometimes expresses things differently than you or other native speakers of your language would do? Non-native-like language use in highly advanced L2 speakers is the phenomenon that this article is about. More specifically, it summarizes several studies that have looked at how L2 speakers produce narratives compared to native speakers, and how L2 speakers spontaneously describe short videos clips of simple everyday situations. The approach in these studies is empirical. Language production data were elicited from native speakers of a language A, from native speakers of a language B, and from L2 speakers of language B who are native speakers of language A, all under controlled conditions. The production data were then compared. Across studies it was found that even very advanced L2 speakers often fall back into patterns of language use that they have acquired through experience with their L1. In other words, L2 speakers often express “L1 thoughts” using L2 words and an L2 grammar. The article concludes that this type of verbal behavior reflects deeply-entrenched principles of information selection and information organization.
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Why is it important?
The research covered by this overview article illustrates how growing up with a specific language and using it within a specific language community has an effect on what information is ranked as more important over other information and in what way information is expressed. However, what is presented as a conclusion by the authors is not the same as what is known as Linguistic Determinism (“Sapir-Whorf-Hypothesis”), which states that one’s native language determines how one perceives the world. The conclusion is more subtle: Speakers are confronted with pragmatic conventions when learning how to use their L1, and with time, adhering to these patterns becomes more and more automatized. Since different languages have developed different principles of information selection and organization, learning a new language ultimately requires to uncover the principles in the L2. The difficulty lies in the fact that these principles are not visible at the surface of the language, meaning the grammar and the vocabulary – they lie “under the surface”. One further implication of the survey is that L2 teaching should go beyond teaching grammar and vocabulary, it should also place focus on the pragmatic principles underlying language use.
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This page is a summary of: Under the surface, Language Interaction and Acquisition, August 2022, John Benjamins,
DOI: 10.1075/lia.21014.lam.
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Limitations on the role of frequency in L2 acquisition
In the context of theories of statistical learning, frequency of encounter is viewed as a major driving force in L2 acquisition. The present paper challenges this position with respect to core components at the level of language competence which relate to language-specific patterns in cognitive construal. Empirical evidence from very advanced L2 speakers (L1 French, L2 English and L2 German) shows that forms and constructions which are highly frequent in the target languages in the expression of motion events are not used in a target-like form by L2 speakers. The study shows how the basis for language use which is not target-like lies at the level of event construal: conceptual frames, which are language-specific and are deeply anchored in the course of L1 acquisition, drive allocation of attention and the extraction of forms in L2 acquisition. Findings in the domain of spatial cognition show that motion event frames based on the L1 take precedence over frequency of occurrence of forms in the target language as a factor in L2 use.
What makes up a reportable event in a language? Motion events as an important test domain in linguistic typology
Numerous crosslinguistic studies on motion events have been carried out in investigating the scope of the two-fold typology “path versus manner” (Talmy 1985, 2000) and its possible implications. This typological contrast is too narrow as it stands, however, to account for the diversity found both within and across types. The present study is based on what can be termed a process-oriented perspective. It includes the analyses of all relevant conceptual domains notably the domain of temporality, in addition to space, and thus goes beyond previous studies. The languages studied differ typologically as follows: path is typically expressed in the verb in French and Tunisian Arabic in contrast to manner of motion in English and German, while in the temporal domain aspect is expressed grammatically in English and Tunisian Arabic but not in German and French. The study compares the representations which speakers construct when forming a reportable event as a response to video clips showing a series of naturalistic scenes in which an entity moves through space. The analysis includes the following conceptual categories: (1) the privileged event layer (manner vs. path) which drives the selection of breakpoints in the formation of event units when processing the visual input; (2) the privileged category in spatial framing (figure-based/ground-based) and (3) viewpoint aspect (phasal decomposition or not). We assume that each of these three cognitive categories is shaped specifically by language structure (both system and repertoire) and language use (frequency of constructions). The findings reveal systematic differences both across, as well as within, typologically related languages with respect to (1) the basic event type encoded, (2) the changes in quality expressed, (3) the total number of path segments encoded per situation, and (4) the number of path segments packaged into one utterance. The findings reveal what can be termed language-specific default settings along each of the conceptual dimensions and their interrelations which function as language specific attentional templates.
Event segmentation: Cross-linguistic differences in verbal and non-verbal tasks
Events, as fundamental units in human perception and cognition, are limited by quality changes of objects over time. In the present study, we investigate the role of language in shaping event units. Given fundamental cross-linguistic differences in the concepts encoded in the verb, as in French compared to German, event unit formation was tested for motion events in a verbal (online event description, experiment 1), as well as a non-verbal task (Newtson-test, experiment 2). In German, motion and direction are described by a single assertion, i.e. one verb encoding manner (to walk …), in conjunction with adpositional phrases for path and direction (… over x across y toward z). In contrast, when information on path and direction is encoded in the verb, as typically in French, each path segment requires a separate assertion (head for x, cross y, approach z). Both experiments were based on short naturalistic video clips showing a figure moving through space along a path either without changing orientation/direction (control), or with changes in orientation/direction (critical). Analysis of the verbal task concerned the probability of producing more than one assertion to refer to the motion events presented in the clips; in the non-verbal event segmentation task, the analysis concerned the probability of marking an event boundary, as indicated by pressing a button. Results show that in French, the probability of producing more than one assertion was significantly higher in the critical condition (experiment 1) and the probability to identify an event boundary was also significantly higher (experiment 2), compared to the German participants but only in the critical condition. The findings indicate language-driven effects in event unit formation. The results are discussed in the context of theories of event cognition, thereby focusing on the role of language in the formation of cognitive structures
Conceptual blending across ontological domains - References to Time and Space in motion events by Tunisian Arabic speakers of L2 German
Patterns of information selection and verbal encoding may rely on an interdependence between the spatial and temporal conceptual domain in the context of motion events. This has been shown, e.g., for Tunisian Arabic (TA), a language with a highly differentiated aspectual system. We address the question whether this interdependence can also be observed when L1 speakers of TA describe motion events in their L2 German, a language without grammaticalized aspect. Data obtained in an unscripted language production experiment in which L1 and highly advanced L2 speakers of German describe videos showing different types of motion events (one type showing boundary crossing at a goal like a woman entering a supermarket, the other type showing motion along a path with no evident goal such as a car driving along a road) suggest that this is indeed the case. The L2 speakers deviate systematically from the L1 speakers of German in the information they select for verbal encoding, but show clearly similar patterns to those used when describing the same scenes in the L1 (TA). The differences can be interpreted as pointing to the high relevance attributed to the temporal dimension of the events shown in the videos by the L2 speakers. The results are placed in the theoretical framework of schema theory. The findings for Arabic speakers of L2 German can be explained by assuming that the same event schema is activated in the context of L2 use as in the context of L1 use.
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