GROUP 5 ANNIS LUTHFIANA AULYA PURNAWIDHA D FITA ARIYANA

LINGUISTIC ASPECTS OF INTERLANGUAGE BY: ROD ELLIS

Languages vary in whether they have relative clauses structures. This linguistic difference influences the ease with which learners are able to learn relative clauses.

In language like English, a relative clause can be attached to the end of matrix clause:  The police have caught the man who bombed the hotel. Or they can be embedded in the main clause:  The man who bombed the hotel has been caught by the police.

Linguistic have shown that languages are more likely to permit relative clauses with a subject pronoun than with an object pronoun. It is called accessibility hierarchy. For example: the use of who rather than the use of whom

Relative pronoun functionExample SubjectThe writer who won the Booker prize is my lofelong friend. Direct objectThe writer whom we met won the Booker prize. Indirect objectThe writer to whom I introduced you won the Booker prize Object of prepositionThe writer with whom we had dinner won the Booker prize. GenitiveThe writer whose wife we met won the Booker prize Object of comparativeThe writer who I have written more books than has won the Booker prize.

The accesibility hierarchy serves as an example of how SLA and linguistics can assist each other.  Linguistic facts can be used to explain and even predict acquisition.  The results of empirical studies of L2 acquisition can be used to refine our understanding of linguistic facts.

Effects of relative clause structure on L2 acquisition ◦ It is easier to learn a L2 with relative clauses if you already know them from your L1. ◦ There are two ways to use relative clauses in English: attached to the end of a sentence or interrupting a main clause. Learners of L2 English tend to use the first possibility.

Noam Chomsky`s theory of Universal grammar: Example: (Reflexives) governed by a set of highly abstract principles. Language Only local binding English Local and long-distance binding Japanese

Result: Japanese Learners of L2 English do have to learn that reflexives in English permit only local binding. The question if they are able to do so could not be answered clearly. Not even by a number of studies. It is not absolutely clear, although very important.

 Children learning their L1 must rely on innate knowledge of a language.  Poverty of stimulus insufficiency which enables children to discover the rules of a language.  Input Positive evidence: what is gramatical their parents do not generally correct their grammatical mistakes Negative evidence: what is ungrammatical

 The input seriously undetermines learning, it does not provide the information needed for learning to be successful  Children must have prior knowledge of what is grammatically possible and impossible and that this is part of their biological endowment.

 The Critical Period Hypothesis states that there is a period when language acquisition is easy and complete, and beyond which it is difficult and incomplete.  People who lost their linguistic capabilities: as a result of an accident, were able to regain them totally before puberty but were unable to do so afterwards.  The Critical Period Hypothesis states that there is a period when language acquisition is easy and complete, and beyond which it is difficult and incomplete.  People who lost their linguistic capabilities: as a result of an accident, were able to regain them totally before puberty but were unable to do so afterwards.

There is a considerable evidence that supports the claim that L2 learners who begin lerning as adults are unable to achieve native- speaker competence in either grammar or pronunciation (Immigrants in the United States). Not all learners are subject to critical periods. Some achieve native-speaker ability from an adult start. The relative lack of success of most L2 learners in comparison to L1 learners suggests that there may be radical differences in the way first and second languages are acquired.

Chomskyan linguistics Unmarked structures are those that are governed by UG and which, therefore require only minimal evidence for acquisition. For example, ‘local binding’ of reflexives is considered unmarked in relation to ‘long-distance binding’.

Hypothesis relating to markedness: The learners acquire less marked structures before more marked ones. Learners are much more likely to transfer unmarked structures from their L1 than they are marked structured.

 It has been proposed that learners are much more likely to transfer unmarked structures from their L1 than their marked structures. For example: English contrasts the sounds /t/ & /d/ Word initially (tin/din), word medially (betting/bedding), finally (wet/wed) German, however, only contrasts these two sounds word initially and medially

There is no consensus on whether L2 acquisition is to be explained in terms of a distinct and innate language faculty or in terms of general cognitive abilities. It allows for modularity – the existence of different components of language that are learned in different ways, some through UG and others with the assistance of general cognitive abilities.