2. UG in L2A” so far
To what extent is UG still involved in L2A?
Speaker’s “interlanguage” shows a lot of systematicity , complexity which also seems
to be more than the linguistic input could motivate.
The question then: Is this systematicity “left over” (transferred) from the existing L1,
where we know the systematicity exists already? Or is L2A also building up a new
system like L1A?
We’ve seen that universal principles which operated in L1 seem to still operate in L2
Initial state: 3 options
The L1 (parameter settings)
Schwartz & Sprouse (1996) “Full Transfer/Full Access”
Parts of the L1 (certain parameter settings)
Eubank (1993/4) “Valueless Features Hypothesis”
Vainikka & Young-Scholten (1994) “Minimal trees”
3. The Minimal- trees hypothesis
Vainikka and Young- Scholten made distinctions between lexical categories (such as N,
V, A, P) and functional categories (such as 3rd person singular –s and past tense –ed).
They argued that only lexical categories are drawn from the L1, and that functional
categories do not; rather, the learner 'grows' new ones because they start their L2
acquisition with only a 'minimal' syntactic tree (Hawkins, 2001). In other words, lexical
categories exist in the early stages of second language acquisition and functional
categories emerge as second language learners develop. Moreover, they claimed that
lexical categories will transfer from the L1. For instance, if the verb follows its
complement in the first language, this will transfer to the L2 in the initial stages of
acquisition even if such a structure does not exist in the target language.
In this theory 'tree' is a metaphor of syntax for the branching structure which indicates
how words of a phrase or sentence co-relate (Vainikka & Young-Scholten, 2003).
4. The hypothesis concerns what aspects of a language learner's first language (L1) is carried
over into the grammar of their second language (L2), in addition to mechanisms of
universal grammar that allow new acquisition to take place. According to “minimal trees”
hypothesis, first language influence of functional categories does not exist. As learners are
exposed to these categories, they develop
them in their L2 mental grammar.
In sum, the key point in Minimal Trees Hypothesis is that the development of the second
language is similar to the first language acquisition. In L1 acquisition, the children acquire
lexical projections first. At this stage, functional projections are absent and gradually
develop during the course of acquisition. They propose that this gradual development is
similar to first language acquisition. First, they learn the bare L1 VP and transfer it to the L2
grammar along with the L1 headedness. If the headedness of the L1 VP does not
correspond to the VP headedness of the L2,
the learners switch to L2 headedness at a certain point of development.
5. V&YS claim that L2 phrase structure initially has no functional projections, and so as a
consequence the only information that can be transferred from L1 at the initial state is that
information associated with lexical categories (specifically, headedness). No parameters tied
to functional projections (e.g., V->T) are transferred.
So, Vainikka & Young-Scholten propose that L2A is acquired by “building up” the syntactic
tree—that beginner L2 learners have syntactic representations of their utterances which are
lacking the functional projections which appear in the adult L1’s representations, but that
they gradually acquire the full structure.
V&YS also propose that the information about the VP is borrowed wholesale from the L1,
that there is no stage prior to having just a VP.
Lastly, V&YS consider this L2A to be just like L1A in course of acquisition (though they leave
open the question of speed/success/etc.)
