Sources of Linguistic Knowledge and Uniformity of Nonnative Performance

Tacit linguistic knowledge derives from experience of the input data or from domain-specific principles without the interaction of experience. Recognition of constraint violations is generally deemed to call upon the second kind of knowledge source. This paper proposes that this epistemological distinction should be reflected in native speaker and nonnative speaker performance. More precisely, performance should be more uniform across the species where it engages knowledge without the interaction of experience. A review of six studies investigating nonnative speaker acceptability judgments supports the predicted asymmetry. The paper concludes that the observed asymmetry supports the modular position on nonnative linguistic knowledge.

[1]  Mark Newson,et al.  乔姆斯基的普遍语法教程 = Chomsky's universal grammar : an introduction : , 1988 .

[2]  Lydia White,et al.  Universal Grammar and second language acquisition , 1989 .

[3]  René Coppieters.  Competence Differences between Native and Near-Native Speakers , 1987 .

[4]  Annie Zaenen,et al.  A Phrase Structure Account of Scandinavian Extraction Phenomena , 1982 .

[5]  Kevin R. Gregg.  Krashen's Monitor and Occam's Razar , 1984 .

[6]  David Birdsong.  Metalinguistic Performance and Interlinguistic Competence , 1989 .

[7]  Sascha W. Felix,et al.  UG-Generated Knowledge in Adult Second Language Acquisition , 1988 .

[8]  J. S. Johnson,et al.  Critical period effects in second language learning: The influence of maturational state on the acquisition of English as a second language , 1989, Cognitive Psychology.

[9]  Wayne O'Neil,et al.  Linguistic Theory in Second Language Acquisition , 1988 .

[10]  M. Smith.  Comprehension versus Acquisition: Two Ways of Processing Input , 1986 .

[11]  Pieter Muysken,et al.  The UG paradox in L2 acquisition , 1989 .

[12]  B. D. Schwartz.  The epistemological status of second language acquisition , 1986 .

[13]  Sascha W. Felix,et al.  More evidence on competing cognitive systems , 1985 .

[14]  Noam Chomsky,et al.  Lectures on Government and Binding , 1981 .

[15]  Robert J. Matthews,et al.  Learnability and linguistic theory , 1989 .

[16]  Sascha W. Felix,et al.  The accessibility of Universal Grammar in adult language learning , 1988 .

[17]  E. Williams,et al.  Introduction to the Theory of Grammar , 1986 .

[18]  Robert Bley-Vroman,et al.  The logical problem of foreign language learning , 1989 .

[19]  T. Bever,et al.  Linguistic intuitions are the result of interactions between perceptual processes and linguistic universals , 1986 .

[20]  Susan M. Gass,et al.  Linguistic Perspectives on Second Language Acquisition: Frontmatter , 1989 .

[21]  Kenneth Wexler,et al.  Formal Principles of Language Acquisition , 1980 .

[22]  S. Pinker.  Formal models of language learning , 1979, Cognition.

[23]  Stephen Krashen,et al.  Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition , 1982 .

[24]  Geoffrey K. Pullum,et al.  The nature of syntactic representation , 1982 .

[25]  J. Hawkins.  Explaining Language Universals , 1988 .

[26]  Stephen Crain,et al.  Sentence matching and overgeneration , 1987, Cognition.

[27]  Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini,et al.  Language and Learning: The Debate Between Jean Piaget and Noam Chomsky , 1980 .

[28]  Hilda Koopman,et al.  The syntax of verbs , 1984 .

[29]  E. Mark Gold,et al.  Language Identification in the Limit , 1967, Inf. Control..

[30]  Jacquelyn Schachter,et al.  Second Language Acquisition and Its Relationship to Universal Grammar , 1988 .

[31]  B. Mclaughlin.  THE MONITOR MODEL: SOME METHODOLOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS , 1978 .

[32]  Jacquelyn Schachter,et al.  Linguistic Perspectives on Second Language Acquisition: Testing a proposed universal , 1989 .

[33]  K. Forster,et al.  The psychological status of overgenerated sentences , 1985, Cognition.

[34]  B. Vanpatten.  How Juries Get Hung: Problems with the Evidence for a Focus on Form in Teaching. , 1988 .

[35]  Steven Pinker,et al.  Language learnability and language development , 1985 .

[36]  Steven Pinker.  Markedness and Language Development , 1989 .

[37]  Jean-Yves Pollock.  Verb movement, universal grammar and the structure of IP , 1989 .

[38]  Lydia White,et al.  Island Effects in Second Language Acquisition , 1988 .