Second Language Knowledge of (±Past) vs. (±Finite)

In this paper I would like to consider some of the factors that have been proposed to account for variability in past tense marking, take a look at what goes into the (second language) acquisition of past tense marking in English, and ultimately attempt to examine the formal nature of the feature [±past] itself. Since each one of these goals would take us roaming all over the linguistic universe, I will focus my inquiry by addressing a particular recent perspective of the feature [±past], using data from Patty, a native Chinese speaker who has been the subject of an ongoing case study in second language acquisition (see Lardiere (1998a, forthcoming) for biographical details and information about the data collection.) The phrase marker in (1) shows one widely accepted representation of the location of [±past] in the phrase structure (of English). (Although I am making no particular commitment to the structure or categories of the left-periphery (CP), I have included some possible CP features for reasons that will become clearer in section 4.)

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