French as cL2, 2L1 and L1 in pre-school children

Compared to monolingual first language acquisition (L1) and adult second language acquisition (aL2), relatively little research has been done on child second language acquisition (cL2). This is an unsatisfactory situation from both a practical and a theoretical point of view. The present study concerns cL2 acquisition of French and poses the question whether cL2 acquisition bears closer resemblance to L1 acquisition or to L2 acquisition. Previous studies are not conclusive on this point. To contribute to this discussion, we selected a set of four diagnostic features in French. These features are well-understood in L1 and adult L2 acquisition. We then applied these to data from three different groups of children acquiring French: child L2 learners, bilingual first language acquirers ((2)L1) and monolingual controls. In all relevant cases the “other language” is Swedish. The results show that, for the majority of the phenomena under investigation, the cL2 children reveal a pattern that is more similar to aL2 than to L1 acquisition. However it is not a question of an across-the-board difference. In fact, in some areas there are only subtle differences between cL2 and (2)L1, for example in the positioning of object clitics the simultaneous (2)L1 children display similarities with the cL2 and the aL2 learners. In the last section, we sketch a preliminary structural explanation that purports to ascertain the stage after which L1-like development is no longer possible. (Less)