Abstract: Recasts have figured prominently in recent SLA research, with studies documenting significant advantages for learners exposed to this type of negative feedback. Although some researchers have suggested that such findings imply a beneficial role for negative evidence (i.e., information regarding the impossibility of certain utterances in the language being learned), the source of these benefits has not been explored directly, as multiple variables are conflated in recasts. Specifically, recasts not only offer implicit negative evidence, but they also provide positive evidence. Moreover, recasts are believed to make this positive evidence especially salient. In the present study, 74 learners of L2 Spanish engaged in communicative interaction with the researcher in one of the following conditions: (a) recasts (i.e., negative evidence and enhanced salience of positive evidence), (b) negative evidence, (c) enhanced salience of positive evidence, and (d) unenhanced positive evidence (control). Only the recast and enhanced-salience groups performed significantly better than the control group on posttreatment measures, which suggests that the utility of recasts is derived at least in part from enhanced salience of positive evidence and that the implicit negative evidence they seem to provide may not be a crucial factor.

Abstract: It has been suggested that tense and aspect distributions are very difficult to learn in a second language (L2), they are prone to fossilize universally, and their interpretive properties are subject to a critical period (Coppieters, 1987). This study focuses on the acquisition of the semantic implications of the preterite-imperfect contrast in Spanish by English-speaking individuals of very advanced proficiency in Spanish who were not living in a Spanish-speaking country. By assuming that aspect is encoded in a functional category where the features [+/-perfective] are checked, depending on the language (Giorgi & Pianesi, 1997), this study asks whether ultimate attainment in the aspectual domain is possible and whether features of functional categories not selected in early childhood are subject to a critical period, as Hawkins and Chan's (1997) Failed Formal Features Hypothesis states. Experimental evidence from two tasks probing the interpretations of perfective and imperfective aspectual forms in Spanish suggests that many learners (almost 30%) in our total subject pool (including advanced to near-native speakers) and 70% of the near-native group performed like native speakers on all sentence types in all tasks. Although aspect is certainly a difficult area to master, particularly because the meanings of the imperfect are acquired quite late, L2 learners are clearly able to overcome the parametric options of their native language. At least for this domain, it is suggested that access to Universal Grammar does not necessarily decay with age in L2 acquisition.

Abstract: This study examines the role of task-based conversation in second language (L2) grammatical development, focusing on the short-term effects of both negative feedback and positive evidence on the acquisition of two Japanese structures. The data are drawn from 55 L2 learners of Japanese at a beginning level of proficiency in an Australian tertiary institution. Five different types of interactional moves made by native speaker interlocutors during task-based interaction were identified, by way of which learners received implicit negative feedback and positive evidence about the two target structures. The relative frequency of each interactional move type was calculated, and associated changes in the learners' performance on immediate and delayed posttests were examined. It was found that, although native speaker interactional moves containing positive evidence about the two target structures were 10 times more frequent during task-based language learning than those containing implicit negative feedback, only learners who had an above-average score on the pretest benefited from the positive evidence provided. Implicit negative feedback, on the other hand, had beneficial effects on short-term development of the grammatical targets regardless of the learner's current mastery of the target structures. Moreover, recasts were found to have a larger impact than other conversational moves on short-term L2 grammatical development.

Abstract: This study investigates whether proficient second language (L2) speakers of Spanish and English use the same parsing strategies as monolinguals when reading temporarily ambiguous sentences containing a complex noun phrase followed by a relative clause, such as Peter fell in love with the daughter of the psychologist who studied in California. Research with monolingual Spanish and English speakers (e.g., Cuetos & Mitchell, 1988) has suggested that, whereas English speakers show a bias to interpret the relative clause locally (i.e., to attach the relative clause to the noun immediately preceding it), Spanish speakers reading Spanish equivalents of English sentences attach the relative clause to the first noun in the complex noun phrase (i.e., nonlocal attachment). In this study, I assess whether speakers whose native language (L1) and L2 differ with respect to processing strategies were able to employ each strategy in the correct context. To this end, L1 Spanish–L2 English and L1 English–L2 Spanish speakers read ambiguous sentences in their L1 and L2. Data collection was carried out using a pencil-and-paper questionnaire and a self-paced reading task. Analyses of both sets of data revealed that both groups of speakers favored local over nonlocal attachment when reading in their L1 and L2. The results are discussed in the context of models that assume the existence of a fixed, universal set of parsing strategies. The implications of L2 parsing research for the field of SLA are also discussed.

Abstract: A variety of studies have reported that learners of English as a second language find subject relative clauses easier to produce and comprehend than direct object relatives, but it is unclear whether this preference should be attributed to structural factors or to a linear distance effect. This paper seeks to resolve this issue and to extend our understanding of SLA in general by investigating the interpretation of subject and direct object relative clauses by English-speaking learners of Korean, a left-branching language in which subject gaps in relative clauses are more distant from the head than are object gaps. The results of a comprehension task conducted with 53 beginning and intermediate learners point toward a strong preference for subject relative clauses, favoring the structural account.

Abstract: When asked by a group of toying aristocrats whether he has an opinion about certain events in world politics, Stevens, the British butler of Kazuo Ishiguro's award-winning novel, The remains of the day, replies to one of the gentlemen in the group, “I'm very sorry, sir; but I am unable to be of assistance on this matter” (p. 195). It is the kind of indirect apology that Rosina Marquez Reiter would find delicious and perfect proof of her working thesis that British speakers (especially when compared with Uruguayan speakers) try to maintain “face” as much as possible while at the same time trying to mitigate potential threats that might arise between speakers.

Abstract: This study investigated whether a word-learning method in which learners infer the meaning of unknown words from the context, subsequently verify the meaning with the aid of a word list, and finally memorize the meaning (“meaning-inferred method”) leads to better retention than one in which the meaning of unknown words is given in the form of a translation so that learners can immediately start memorizing (“meaning-given method”).Additionally, the learning effect of the various stages of the meaning-inferred method (inferring, verifying, and memorizing) was investigated.In all cases the amount of time invested was recorded.The most important findings were: (a) The meaning-inferred method leads to a similar level of retention as the meaning-given method, but the former is considerably more timeconsuming and therefore less efficient; and (b) each separate stage of the meaning-inferred method leads to retention, but the learning effect of memorizing is the greatest, and the learning effect of verifying is about the same as that of inferring.

Abstract: This paper examines the nature of finite and nonfinite main declarative sentences produced by L2 child learners. It claims that two of the main proposals on the root infinitive (RI) phenomenon, the Truncation Hypothesis (TH) and the Missing Surface Inflection Hypothesis (MSIH), are not mutually exclusive in child SLA because they are hypotheses on completely different issues. According to the TH, different roots are involved: RIs are VPs underlyingly, whereas finite clauses are IPs or CPs. The MSIH claims that L2 learners have difficulties using the exact inflectional morphology, which leads them to produce verbs with an infinitival marker or no inflection at all. These so-called default forms are finite. In principle, then, an L2 learner could project truncated structure and produce default finite forms at the same time. This possibility is investigated in longitudinal data from an English-speaking child learning German. Two complementary sets of data can be accounted for by the hypotheses. Verbs bearing a nonfinite marker are restricted to nonfinite positions, which is consistent with the TH. Bare (uninflected) forms occur in the same (finite) positions as verbs inflected for person and number, which suggests that they are finite. This finding is consistent with the MSIH.

Abstract: This volume presents a series of empirical studies that reflect the editors' commitment to the exploration of pedagogic tasks from three interrelated perspectives—learning, teaching, and testing. The introductory chapter by the editors sets the tone of the volume by advocating this view of tasks and provides the basis for a definition that differs from previous, generic definitions in its emphasis on “the different purposes to which tasks are used” (p. 5). Therefore, according to the editors, tasks are inherently distinct and highly dependent on the situational context in which they develop. The departure from former task definitions aims: (a) to avoid continuous misinterpretations between the pedagogy and the research fields, (b) to create a space for understanding the purpose that tasks serve in different areas, and (c) to elude “inappropriate standards for task evaluation” (p. 12). The rest of the chapters are grouped into three sections according to area of emphasis (learning, teaching, or testing). Each section begins with a brief introduction to the chapters it includes.

Abstract: The advantages and disadvantages of wider or narrower definitions of pidginization and pidgin are reviewed to determine the differences between pidgins and naturalistically learned second languages (L2s). It is argued that a wider definition is preferred because it avoids problematic counterexamples and captures generalizations that allow us to view the difference between naturalistic L2 varieties and pidgins as one of degree, not of type. In first language (L1) acquisition, Bates and Goodman (1999) showed the link between the development of vocabulary and grammar and argued that this may be explained by, among other things, logical and perceptual bootstrapping. It is suggested that these types of bootstrapping are also relevant for explaining the pace of grammar development in pidgins and naturalistic L2 varieties. The tense-aspect system of a Spanish variety spoken by a Chinese immigrant in Spain is examined in detail. The data, taken from a 90-minute interview that yielded 602 tokens, reveal several clear traits of the informant's verbal system: (a) All nonfinite, imperfective verb forms (gerunds) correspond exclusively to Vendlerian activities; (b) all but three of the perfective nonfinite forms (past participles) correspond to telic verbs or predicates; and (c) 81% of the stative verbs appear in the third-person-singular present form. The sensitivity to aspectual distinctions in the informant's variety of Spanish is not addressed by logical and perceptual bootstrapping. Furthermore, although this sensitivity can be partially explained by language-specific considerations (i.e., transfer from Mandarin), such an explanation does not speak to precise form–function mappings found, which are best accounted for by appealing to the Primacy of Aspect and Distributional Bias hypotheses (Andersen, 1993; Andersen & Shirai, 1996).

Abstract: This edited volume contains the proceedings of a conference on the role of individual differences in instructed SLA held at Aoyama Gakuin University in 1999. It includes 11 studies as well as an introductory chapter written by the editors. The first two papers, by Yamashiro and McLaughlin and by Hiser, Croker, Kenudson, and Stribling, present multivariate statistical analyses to examine the interrelationship between motivation, second language (L2) proficiency, and other learner characteristics in Japanese student samples. Although both studies offer unique insights into the characteristics of their target population, the authors also call for methodological improvements that would go beyond the use of self-report questionnaires. Sharing a similar interest in improving motivation research methodology, another study by Hsiao explicitly sets out to test the construct validity of the most well known motivation test—Gardner's Attitude/Motivation Test Battery—in Taiwan, which is a very different learning environment from Canada, where the test was originally developed. Ozek and Williams's paper is also of interest in this respect because in their study a questionnaire survey conducted in Turkey was complemented with qualitative interviews, thereby resulting in a particularly rich database.

Abstract: This paper presents a study that attributes verb serialization in the interlanguage of Vietnamese-speaking ESL learners to language transfer and, furthermore, puts forward the view that such transfer bears a resemblance to substrate influence in creoles with serial verb constructions (SVCs). In a task that elicited English causatives through pictures representing the causation of events, a subset of the Vietnamese-speaking participants in this study produced a number of serial-type constructions that reflected lexicosemantic aspects of causative SVCs in Vietnamese. Speakers of Hindi-Urdu, a nonserializing language used for comparative purposes, did not produce any equivalents. Additionally, serial-type constructions with second verbs (V2s) representing a result (e.g., cook butter melt) predominated at lower levels of lexical proficiency, whereas serials with make and a result (e.g., make broken) were more evenly distributed across proficiency levels. One inference based on the results is that certain serials are eliminated early in the acquisition process through positive evidence obtained via English input, whereas others continue to appear beyond the elementary level because of misleadingly similar constructions in the input. A comparison of the proficiency-based transfer of “cook butter melt” serials in this study and the inferred transfer of SVCs in creolization suggests that, whereas transfer processes in the two contexts are congruent in certain ways (often resulting from the exigencies of communication, limited access to the TL, and linguistic convergence), the processes diverge because of differences in target norms and input conditions. The latter two factors provide one explanation for why SVC-related transfer effects were limited to a subgroup of Vietnamese-speaking participants in this study.

Abstract: In some ways the preface to this volume, by Chris Candlin, preempts this review. He makes some insightful points that a dutiful reviewer would otherwise have made. This volume of original chapters reflects Breen's concern for the learner as a cognitive, human, and social being. As Candlin rightly points out, the volume provides a positive and creative accommodation of research paradigms that come from both cognitive and social traditions such that the volume constitutes a so-called sociocognitive position: “the interplay between communication as both a socially and a cognitively strategic act” (p. xix).

Abstract: There are still people, including some who should know better, who believe that American Sign Language is in some sense not a “real” language. Such a position, though perhaps at least debatable 40 years ago, is simply no longer credible. There has been a vast amount of very sophisticated and competent linguistic, psycholinguistic, and sociolinguistic research conducted on American Sign Language since the publication of William Stokoe's landmark book, Sign language structure (1960/1992). Although there are many areas of debate about specific features of the phonology, morphology, syntax, and so on of American Sign Language, as indeed is the case with every language, its fundamental status as a fully developed human language is now well beyond reasonable doubt. Since its first edition appeared in 1992, Valli and Lucas's Linguistics of American Sign Language: An introduction has been the premier work for students of the structure of American Sign Language. Written for students of linguistics who already have at least some knowledge of American Sign Language, this third edition includes sections introducing students to basic linguistic concepts, phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics as well as issues related to language change, language variation, bilingualism, discourse, language contact, and “language as art.” Each section is designed to provide students with a general introduction to the linguistic concepts and then to the specific case of American Sign Language, including exercises focusing on American Sign Language. Finally, more than half of the volume is devoted to both classic and recent seminal articles about different aspects of the linguistics of American Sign Language. As has been true of both of the earlier editions, this third edition is accompanied by a well-made videotape providing additional support for the written text.

Abstract: This discussion of second language (L2) phonological development is rooted in what the author refers to as the three features of interlanguage (IL): native language (L1) contribution (as positive or negative transfer to the L2), L2 input, and universal language principles not subsumed by either language.

Abstract: Contrastive rhetoric—an analytical framework for the study of second language writing—has had incredible staying power. Since Kaplan's (1966) original paper, this framework has been used in dozens of studies that compare the rhetorical organizations of written texts produced by writers from different cultures and native languages (L1s). Additionally, the framework has been elaborated and refined considerably to account for the extensive range of linguistic variability found among written texts from different text types; more recent treatments include Grabe and Kaplan (1996, chap. 7) and Connor (1996).

Abstract: Preservice kindergarten through university teachers will benefit from these books' overview of the field and their carefully weighed claims about what counts as literacy practices in language arts and English classrooms. Though geared more toward a general audience of literacy teachers, the books do have sections and chapters that would appeal to preservice second language teachers. The straightforward writing in both books will be easily accessible to students for whom this may be the first encounter with literacy and classroom research. Taking different tacks on literacy research, the books complement each other well: Where Kucer's survey stops, the Comber and Simpson collection picks up.

Abstract: This volume's study of academic literacy practices in higher education is about the writing games we play in the academy. This is not a cynical exploration of such games that assumes the giving up of one's voice to join a discourse community; Casanave's metaphor suggests negotiation in writing games that shapes us, for better or for worse. From Casanave's opening chapter discussing the book's framework to her conclusion, the book is rich in insights about the nature of literacy practices among undergraduate students, Master's students, doctoral students, and faculty.

Abstract: In this volume Brumfit provides a detailed, yet highly readable, analysis of many problems that at least partially arise from viewing language as a static code. He describes language as a dynamic force that interacts with other social forces and practices and as a process that is permeable, variable, and useful. He argues that the best way to teach, research, and plan language policy is to recognize and enhance the users' abilities to use language for their own permeable, variable, and unpredictable purposes.

Abstract: This paper synthesizes research on the acquisition of linguistic variation by learners of French as a second language—an overview that, to our knowledge, is the first of its kind. It also presents a case study on French immersion students' acquisition of the pronouns nous and on “we,” an alternation in many varieties of spoken French. The study shows that the students use the mildly marked variant on slightly more often than the formal variant nous but much less often than native speakers (who use it almost categorically) and immersion teachers (who strongly favor it). Female and middle-class students favor nous, students with greater extracurricular French language exposure favor on, and students who speak a Romance language at home favor nous. Various explanations are proposed for these correlations. Finally, the students, like L1 Francophones, favor on in linguistic contexts in which the referent is both nonspecific and unrestricted.

Abstract: To contribute to a better understanding of second language (L2) sentence processing, the present study examines how L2 learners parse temporarily ambiguous sentences containing relative clauses. Results are reported from both off-line and on-line experiments with three groups of advanced learners of Greek whose native languages (L1s) were Spanish, German, or Russian as well as from corresponding experiments with a control group of adult native speakers of Greek. We found that, despite their nativelike mastery of the construction under investigation, the L2 learners showed relative-clause attachment preferences that were different from those of the native speakers. Moreover, the L2 learners did not exhibit L1-based preferences in their L2 Greek, as might be expected if they were directly influenced by L1 attachment preferences. We suggest that L2 learners integrate information relevant for parsing differently from native speakers, with the L2 learners relying more on lexical cues than the native speakers and less on purely structurally based parsing strategies.

Abstract: This study deals with the development and recoverability of word-final codas in Chinese-Swedish interlanguage. The relation between consonant deletion and vowel epenthesis is investigated from both ...

Abstract: This article discusses how research on language transfer in the field of SLA can help to explain the origins of substrate influence in creoles and provide answers to more difficult questions concerning the distribution and verification of substrate features. First, it argues against the view that both SLA and transfer are not involved in the genesis of pidgin and creole languages. Then the view is presented that, as described in the SLA literature, transfer is not just a consequence of second language learning but also of second language use, and it serves as a communication strategy when the need arises. Such a strategy may be used by speakers of either a prepidgin or an already established pidgin when its functional use is being rapidly extended. Sociolinguistic perspectives on transfer in SLA, described next, throw some light onto the question of why substrate features remain in pidgins and creoles. Research on transfer in SLA also provides important insights into the specific factors that may have affected substrate influence in creoles. Evidence is presented that some transfer constraints discovered in SLA research—rather than other proposed factors such as so-called functional expendability—still provide the best explanation for the absence of particular substrate features in creoles. Finally, it is shown that tests proposed for verifying instances of L1 influence in interlanguage could be adapted for verifying instances of substrate influence in creoles.

Abstract: This study compares patterns of consonant-to-consonant timing at word boundaries in English and Russian and investigates the roles of transfer and the emergence of linguistic universals in second language (L2) articulation. Native Russian speakers learning English and native English speakers learning Russian produced phrases in English and Russian contrasting VC#CV, VC#V, and V#CV sequences. The duration of all stop closures was measured as well as the percentage of consonant sequences in which the first consonant was audibly released. In their native language (L1), Russian speakers had a higher percentage of released final consonants than did English speakers in their L1 as well as a higher ratio of sequence-to-singleton duration. Examination of the timing patterns across different clusters revealed different articulatory strategies for the two languages. The native Russian pattern transferred to L2 English, but the native English pattern did not transfer to L2 Russian. Evidence was found for both articulatory transfer and the emergence of a default pattern of articulation, characteristic of neither L1 nor L2.

Abstract: This paper reErlamviews studies that have contrasted the effectiveness of structured-input instruction with output-based instruction. It then presents results from a study comparing the relative effects of structured-input and output-based instruction on students' ability to comprehend and produce direct object pronouns in second language French. Three classes of students (N = 70) were assigned to three groups: structured-input instruction, output-based instruction, and control. Students were assessed on listening comprehension, reading comprehension, written production, and oral production tasks. All but one of these language measures required a pressured response. Overall, the results showed greater gains for the output-based instruction group.