Language attrition

7 Maio 2021, 14:00 • Ana Lúcia da Silva Dias Gonçalves Santos

Special session with Cristina Flores (Universidade do Minho): Language attrition, effects of age and quantity of input in the linguistic development of heritage speakers.

Distribution of subjunctive in complement clauses: acquisition by monolingual and bilingual speakers

30 Abril 2021, 14:00 • Ana Lúcia da Silva Dias Gonçalves Santos

Mood alternations in finite complement clauses: 

1. The acquisition of the subjunctive in European Portuguese complement clauses: semantic effects, interaction with cognitive development (presentation by Alice Jesus);

2. Monolingual vs. bilingual acquisition of the distribution of the subjunctive: effects of quantity of input and protracted acquisition (results of Flores, Santos, Jesus & Marques, 2017).

The acquisition of control structures

23 Abril 2021, 14:00 • Ana Lúcia da Silva Dias Gonçalves Santos

General results concerning early spontaneous production of complement clauses. Identification of control structures as a relevant object of inquiry.  Present analyses of control (PRO vs. movement account) and predictions for acquisition. Classic studies and more recent studies on the acquisition of control structures: results of comprehension experiments centred on subject ( promise-type)  and object control structures.

The acquisition of the passive (cont.)

16 Abril 2021, 14:00 • Ana Lúcia da Silva Dias Gonçalves Santos

Other approaches and other factors that may play a role in the acquisition of the passive: syntactic complexity explanations (Hyams & Snyder, 2015) vs. processing explanations (incremental processing and the first NP as agent hypothesis, Huang et al., 2013). The relevance of considering incremental processing when considering children's results in comprehension tasks, according to Omaki & Lidz (2015).

Exercise allowing to introduce the main topic of next class: control structures.

The acquisition of the passive

9 Abril 2021, 14:00 • Ana Lúcia da Silva Dias Gonçalves Santos

Classic studies and well-known facts concerning the acquisition of the passive (the contrast between short and long passives and the contrast between actional and non-actional passives).

Different types of explanation for the difficulty with passives: frequency effects; syntactic complexity; cue-based accounts and incremental processing accounts.

(i) Frequency effects (Demuth, 1898, Gordon & Chafetz, 1990) and recently explored priming effects (Bencini & Valian, 2008); 

(ii) Syntactic complexity explanations: A-Chain deficit hypothesis (Borer & Wexler, 1987) (to be continued).

 

(The same topic will be explored in the next class, considering other approaches to the acquisition of the passive.)