1. What are the contributions in this paper?
The authors introduce empirical work on Romance language acquisition with respect to the interfaces of syntax with other modules of grammar ( internal interfaces ) and other domains of cognition ( external interfaces ).. The authors do so by choosing specific phenomena within the following interfaces: syntax-morphology, syntax-semantics and syntax-pragmatics.. In the domain of syntax-morphology the authors focus on grammatical gender, with respect to the syntax-semantics interface they focus on adjectival placement ( preand post-nominal ) and with regard to the syntax-discourse/pragmatics interface they review work on the null/overt subject distribution.. Finally, the authors summarize research on articles, suggesting that articles represent a multiple interface.. The authors provide examples from different types of learners and across the four major Romance languages French, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish.. While their central goal is to summarize and generalize across major findings, the authors will also point to potential problems concerning the interface approach, e. g. the association of particular phenomena with a specific interface and the assumption that internal interfaces are less problematic than external ones.
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