Marsden, Heather orcid.org/0000-0002-4885-3446 (2008) Pair-list readings in Korean-Japanese, Chinese-Japanese and English-Japanese interlanguage. Second Language Research. pp. 189-226.
Abstract
In English and Chinese, questions with a wh-object and a universally quantified subject (e.g. What did everyone buy?) allow an individual answer (Everyone bought apples.) and a pair-list answer (Sam bought apples, Jo bought bananas, Sally bought...). By contrast, the pair-list answer is reportedly unavailable in Japanese and Korean. This article documents an experimental investigation of the interpretation of such questions in non-native Japanese by learners whose first languages (L1s) are Korean, Chinese or English. The results show that, regardless of L1, only a minority of advanced second language (L2) Japanese learners demonstrate knowledge of the absence of pair-list readings in Japanese. In English-Japanese and Chinese-Japanese interlanguage, L1 transfer readily accounts for this finding: the L1 grammar, which allows pair-list readings, may obstruct acquisition of the more restrictive Japanese grammar. But in Korean-Japanese interlanguage, L1 transfer predicts rejection of pair-list answers. However, in a Korean version of the experimental task, a native Korean control group robustly accepts pair-list readings, contra expectations. A proposal to account for this finding is put forward, under which the Korean-Japanese interlanguage data become compatible with an L1-transfer-based model of L2 acquisition. Moreover, the native-like rejection of pair-list readings by some advanced learners of all three L1 backgrounds is argued to imply that UG constraints operate at the L2 syntax-semantics interface.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Keywords: | L2 Japanese,pair-list readings,wh-questions,quantifier interpretation,L2 poverty of the stimulus,syntax - semantics interface,Korean,Chinese,QUANTIFIER SCOPE,WH |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of York |
Academic Units: | The University of York > Faculty of Arts and Humanities (York) > Language and Linguistic Science (York) |
Depositing User: | Pure (York) |
Date Deposited: | 21 Sep 2016 11:06 |
Last Modified: | 22 Feb 2025 00:03 |
Published Version: | https://doi.org/10.1177/0267658307086301 |
Status: | Published |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1177/0267658307086301 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:104861 |