Week 12. Acquirers and questions

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GRS LX 700Language Acquisition andLinguistic
Theory

• Week 12.Acquirers and questions

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English wh-questions

• What will John bake?
• Two components to forming a (main clause)
  wh-question (in English)
• Move a wh-word to SpecCP.
• Move T to C (Subject-Aux InversionSAI)

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Question formation

• Declarative John will buy coffee.
• Wh-inversion What will John buy?
• Wh-fronting What will John buy?
• Yes/No-inversion Will John buy coffee?
• Greenberg (1963)
• Wh-inversion implies Wh-fronting.
• Yes/No-inversion implies Wh-inversion.

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Wh-inversion?Wh-fronting

• English, German Both.
• What will John buy?
• Japanese Korean neither.
• John will buy what?
• Finnish Wh-fronting only.
• What John will buy?
• Unattested Wh-inversion only.
• Will John buy what?

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Y/N-inversion?Wh-inversion

• English Both
• Will John buy coffee? What will John buy?
• Japanese Neither
• John will buy coffee? John will buy what?
• Lithuanian Wh-inversion only.
• John will buy coffee? What will John buy?
• Unattested Y/N-inversion only.
• Will John buy coffee? What John will buy?

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Universals and parameters

• Even if its not completely clear what accounts
  for the implicational universals, inversion and
  wh-fronting do seem to be independent.
• A kid needs to learn what his/her language does
  in each domain.
• Wh-inversion implies Wh-fronting Perhaps the
  only reason youd move T to C is to get a wh
  feature originally on T into a position where it
  can be checked by a wh-word in SpecCP
  (Wh-criterion, see Guasti).
• Y/N-inversion implies Wh-inversion ?

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Kids get these parameters down early

• Guasti (2000) Adam, Eve, and Sarah pretty much
  never left wh-words in situ, and when they did it
  was generally in a (grammatical) echo question.
• Same with inversion, there seem to be very few
  (on the order of 1) errors of non-inversion in
  German, Italian, Swedish.
• Yet Bellugi (1971)very famouslyseemed to find
  something different in English Stages
• SAI in yes-no questions, not in wh-questions
• Notice this runs counter to Greenbergs univeral.
• SAI in positive questions, not in negative
  questions.

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Kuczaj Maratsos (1983)

• Kids seem to learn auxiliaries one by one they
  appear at different times.

Form Abe Abe Ben Ben
Form Uninv Inv Uninv Inv
can 25 211 26 210
is (cop) 27 31 24 28
are (cop) 29 30 27 210
is (aux) 30 30 27 31
are (aux) 30 31 210 30
will 30 31 210 210
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Kuczaj Maratsos (1983)

• Each auxiliary seems be first used outside of
  inversion contexts, only later in inversions

Form Abe Abe Ben Ben
Form Uninv Inv Uninv Inv
can 25 211 26 210
is (cop) 27 31 24 28
are (cop) 29 30 27 210
is (aux) 30 30 27 31
are (aux) 30 31 210 30
will 30 31 210 210
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Kuczaj Maratsos (1983)

• Only correctly inverted verbs (auxiliaries)
  appear in child speech (no inversion of main
  verbs)

Form Abe Abe Ben Ben
Form Uninv Inv Uninv Inv
can 25 211 26 210
is (cop) 27 31 24 28
are (cop) 29 30 27 210
is (aux) 30 30 27 31
are (aux) 30 31 210 30
will 30 31 210 210
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A famous non-result SAI in YNQs before SAI in
whQs

• Adam At a certain point, inversion appears in
  yes-no questionsbut inversion with wh-questions
  is still infrequent. Soon afterwards, inversion
  is frequent for both types of questions.

YNQs YNQs WhQs WhQs
Inv Uninv Inv Uninv
30 0 1 0 3
35 198 7 9 22
38 33 5
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A famous non-result SAI in YNQs before SAI in
whQs

• Problem is, seems to be true of Adams files, but
  not true generally
• Several later studies with better sampling show
  no identifiable stage where yes-no questions
  invert while wh-questions dontin fact, even the
  frequency doesnt go in one direction for all
  kids.

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Stromswold (1990, table 5.5) of inversion WHQ
vs.YNQ
Child WH YN Child WH YN
Adam 88.3 96.6 Nathan 60.1 46.2
Allison 85.7 100 Nina 98.5 93.9
April 91.7 94.1 Peter 92.1 98.5
Eve 95.5 87.2 Ross 99.3 97
Mark 97.9 97.6 Sarah 92.9 91.9
Naomi 96.2 94.2 Shem 95.6 79
MEAN 93 93.7
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Conclusion really seems to be

• Kids will sometimes fail to invert.
• Kids will sometimes fail to invert more in one
  construction (e.g., wh-questions) than in another
  (e.g., yes/no-questions), but which one gets the
  advantage seems to vary by kid.

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SAI errors doubling

• A double-auxiliary error, both an inverted and an
  un-inverted auxiliary
• Why did you did scare me?
• How can he can look?
• A double-tensing error (where an auxiliary
  moves to I but the verb surfaces with tense).
• What did you bought?
• What did you did?

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Doubling errors

• Are the kids pronouncing a loud trace of
  (head-)movement? (Are they moving the auxiliary
  but failing to leave the trace unpronounced?)
  That would be interesting.
• Are they just forgetting what they are trying to
  say midway through and blending two structures?
  (one with and one without movement)

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Nakayama (1987)

• The longer the subject is, the more likely a kid
  is to make a doubling error the length of the VP
  makes no difference.
• Is the boy who is watching Mickey is happy?
• Looks like blending, rather than the (more
  interesting) loud trace idea Common error
  type
• Is the boy who is watching M, is he happy?

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Inversion in negation

• Guasti, Thornton Wexler (BUCLD 1995) looked at
  doubling in negative questions.
• Previous results (Bellugi 1967, 1971, Stromswold
  1990) indicated that kids tend to invert less
  often in negative questions.
• First True?
• Second Why?

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GTW (1995)

• Elicited negative questions
• I heard the snail doesnt like some things to
  eat. Ask him what.
• There was one place Gummi Bear couldnt eat the
  raisin. Ask the snail where.
• One of these guys doesnt like cheese. Ask the
  snail who.
• I heard that the snail doesnt like potato chips.
  Could you ask him if he doesnt?

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GTW (1995)

• Kids got positive questions right for the most
  part.
• 88 of kids wh-questions had inversion
• 96 of kids yes-no questions had inversion
• Except youngest kid (38), who had inversion only
  42 of the time.
• Kids got negative declaratives right without
  exception, with do-support and clitic nt.

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GTW (1995)

• Kids got lots of negative wh-questions wrong.
• Aux-doubling
• What kind of bread do you dont like? (310)
• Neg Aux doubling
• Why cant she cant go underneath? (40)
• No I to C raising (inversion)
• Where he couldnt eat the raisins? (40)
• Not structure
• Why can you not eat chocolate? (41)

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GTW (1995)

• But kids got negative subject wh-questions right.
• which one doesnt like his hair messed up? (40)
• as well as how-come questions.
• How come the dentist cant brush all the teeth?
  (42)
• Re Not structure
• Why can you not eat chocolate? (41)
• Kids only do this with object and adjunct
  wh-questionsif kids just sometimes prefer not
  instead of nt, we would expect them to use it
  just as often with subject wh-questions.

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GTW (1995)

• So, in sum
• Kids get positive questions right
• Kids get negative declaratives right
• Kids get negative subject questions right.
• Kids get negative how-come questions right.
• Kids make errors in negative wh-questions where
  inversion is required. Where inversion isnt
  required (or where the sentence isnt negative),
  theyre fine.

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GTW (1995)

• The kids errors all seem to have the character
  of keeping negation inside the IP.
• What did he didnt wanna bring to school? (41)
• What she doesnt want for her witchs brew? (38)
• Why can you not eat chocolate? (41)
• Why cant she cant go underneath? (43)
• GTW propose that this is a legitimate option
  citing Paduan (Italian dialect) as a language
  doesnt allow neg-gtC.

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GTW (1995)

• Re subject and how come questions
• In a subject question, we dont know that the
  subject wh-word got out of IPmaybe kids left it
  in IP heck, maybe even adults do.
• Who left?
• Who did leave?
• How come questions dont require SAI in the adult
  language./?
• How come John left?
• How come did John leave?

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Auxless questions

• Guasti (2002) discusses questions like
• Where Daddy go? (Adam 23)
• What I doing? (Eve 20)
• By making some assumptions (inherited from
  Rizzi), Guasti finds these problematic.
  Wh-movement requires SAI, so what moved to C?
• Specifically, wh-movement depends on SAI, which
  happens because wh starts on T and must move
  to C so it can be in a Spec-head relation with
  the wh-word in SpecCP. Also subject questions
  need no inversion on this story.

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Auxless questions

• Auxless questions are relatively common among
  wh-questions in the 2-4 age range.
• Guasti/Rizzis suggestion An auxiliary at the
  head of the root can be null (similar to the null
  subject story). For adults, the head of the root
  is ForceP, but for kids it might be lower (FocP,
  where wh-words go).
• Kids who might otherwise say What I doing? will
  nevertheless not say Who laughing?. Subject
  wh-questions seem immune from auxiliary drop.
• The Guasti/Rizzi explanation is pretty contrived,
  actually. The aux need not proceed as high as
  FocP for subject questions, so it ends up not
  being highest.
• Not really any clear alternative, though

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Early, early wh-questions

• There may be an early formulaic stage where
  kids ask questions by just asking Wh(s) NP?.
• OGrady (1997) Because of their formulaic
  character, it seems reasonable to treat these
  utterances as instantiations of a simple template
  rather than the product of whatever mechanism
  forms wh-questions in the adult grammar.
• But why? We already have lots of reason to think
  young kids know a lot about adult grammar by
  then What is simpler about a simple template?

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Wh-subjects and wh-objects

• Is there a difference in the timing of emergence
  between subject wh-questions and object
  wh-questions? In English, there is an apparent
  difference in complexity (distance of movement,
  SAI).

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Early, early, early wh-questions

• Seidl and Hollich (2003) looked at headturn
  preferences in really young kids.
• Minimizes demands of task
• Use looking preferences to answer wh-questions.
• What hit the apple?
• What did the apple hit?
• Where is the apple?

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Seidl et al.

• Kids saw a little simplistic computer-generated
  movie where, e.g., a book hit some keys.
• Then there were two screens presented side by
  side, one with a book displayed, one with keys
  displayed.
• What hit the keys? (book)
• What did the book hit? (keys)
• Where is the book? (book)

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Seidl et al.

• Graph shows differences (target minus
  non-target).
• 20-month-olds seemed quite capable of
  comprehending all three kinds.
• 15-month-olds couldnt do objects 13-month-olds
  couldnt do any.

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Processing, structural distance

• The distance between the base and derived
  positions for an object wh-word is greater than
  the distance between the base and derived
  positions for a subject wh-word.
• Whati did IP John VP buy ti ?
• Whoi IP ti VP bought coffee ?

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Processing, structural distance

• Re preference for subject wh-questions perhaps
  kids are sensitive to the number of phrases a
  moving wh-phrase has to escape. This also makes
  other predictions
• Whati will IP Sue VP read ti ?
• Whati will IP Sue VP talk PP about ti ?
• Whati will IP Sue VP read NP a book PP
  about ti ?

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Hildebrand (1987)

• Tested (fairly old) kids on a paradigm of
  wh-questions of varying depth to see if more
  embedded wh-words are harder.
• In a repetition task (4-10 year olds), it was
  almost uniformly true that the more deeply
  embedded the wh-word was, the more errors the
  kids made trying to repeat it.

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But wait

• So kids make more errors extracting from more
  deeply embedded structures. Is this a fact about
  the acquisition of wh-movement? Or is it just a
  fact about language processing in general?
• What do adults do?
• My guess Even for adults, the more complex
  structures are (marginally) harder to process.
  Certainly true for subject vs. object relative
  clauses (the man who _ left vs. the man who I met
  _).
• Cf. NPAH later.

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Does child wh-movement obey the adult rules for
wh-movement?

• When the kids ask wh-questions, what structures
  are they using? Are they like the adult
  structures? If not, how are they different? Are
  they performing movement? Are there traces? Do
  the movements obey constraints (e.g., wh-island,
  ECP, )?

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Do kids have wh-traces in their wh-questions?

• How do they perform on wanna-contraction?
• Who do you want to help t?
• Who do you wanna help t?
• Who do you want t to help you ?
• Who do you wanna / t help you ?
• Crain Thornton (1991) studied this

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Crain Thornton (1991)

• There are three guys in this story Cookie
  Monster, a dog, and this baby. One of them gets
  to take a walk, one gets to take a nap, and one
  gets to eat a cookie. The rat gets to choose who
  does each thing. So one gets to take a walk,
  right? Ask Ratty who he wants.
• Kid Who do you want to take a walk?

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Crain Thornton (1991)

• The kids (210 to 55) all knew the wanna
  contraction rule
• 59 of the time kids contracted to wanna with
  object questions (as allowed)
• 4 of the time kids contracted to wanna with
  subject questions (out for adult)

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The ECP and argument-adjunct asymmetries

• Moving a wh-word out of a wh-island is better or
  worse depending on whether the wh-word is an
  argument (subject or object) or an adjunct.
• How did he ask wh where to fix the car t ?
• What did he ask wh how to fix t ?

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De Villiers, Roeper, and Vainikka (1990)

• Kid takes a shortcut home, rips dress, that
  night, kid tells parent about dress
• When did she say t she ripped her dress t?
• at night that afternoon
• When did she say t wh how she ripped her dress t
  t ?
• at night that afternoon
• 3-6 year-olds allow short and long distance
  questions for complement clauses, dont like long
  distance adjunct questions out of wh-islands

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De Villiers, Roeper, and Vainikka (1990)

• And kids make the argument-adjunct distinction
  the ECP makes for adults
• No wh-island, arguments/adjuncts both take long
  distance interpretation about 30-40 the time
• Argument wh-island, neither argument nor adjuncts
  can move out (2-8 LD)
• Adjunct wh-islands, arguments can move out (30
  LD) but not adjuncts (6 LD).

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Again, kids have a lot rightbut what do they
have wrong?

• When kids make a mistake with a question like
• When did she say how she ripped her dress?
• it will often be that they answer something like
  climbing over the fenceanswering the question
  How did she say t she ripped her dress? instead.

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What are kids doing when they answer a medial
wh-word?

• Are they answering the last wh-word they saw?
• Kids dont answer medial wh-words in yes-no
  questions.
• Did Mickey tell Minnie what he bought?
• Kids dont answer wh-words in relatives.
• How did you meet the man who sang?

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German partial wh-movement?

• Kids have been observed to produce questions with
  an initial wh-word and a lower copy.
• What do you think whats in her hat?
• What do you think is in her hat?
• What do you think where the marble is?
• Where do you think the marble is?
• What do you think what Cookie Monster eats?
• What do you think Cookie Monster eats?

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German partial wh-movement?

• Was hat er gesagt wie er das Kuchen machen
  kann ?
• What has he said how he the cake make can
• How did he say he could make the cake?
• Are kids treating the upper wh-word like a scope
  marker? (Are they speaking German?)
• Hard to say with confidence, but its an
  interesting possibility. German partial
  wh-movement does have certain restrictions.
  Thornton (1990) and van Kempen (1997) showed that
  kids do this only out of finite clauses, and
  German only allows partial movement out of finite
  clauses too.

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Processing constraints?

• OGrady (last years textbook) suggests that
  another reason why kids might answer the
  intermediate wh-word is that theyve already
  forgotten the matrix clause (citing Phinney 1981,
  who found that 3-year olds often delete the
  matrix subject and verb when repeating biclausal
  sentences).
• Kids dont answer a medial wh-word in a yes-no
  question, though..?

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Speaking Irish? French?

• Another crosslinguistic analogy we could make is
  to Irish, French, and other languages that seem
  to show a certain amount of wh-agreement when a
  wh-word passes through SpecCP.
• Ceapann tú go bhuailfidh an píobare an
  t-amhrán.think you that play.fut the piper the
  songYou think that the piper will play the
  song.
• Caidé aL cheapann tú aL bhuailfidh an
  píobare?what WH think you WH play.fut the
  piperWhat do you think the piper will play?
• Je crois que Marie est partie.
• Qui crois-tu qui et partie?

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Speaking Irish? French?

• So, perhaps the kids non-adult use of
  intermediate wh-words is actually a mis-analysis
  of English.
• First, they suppose it is Irish, and the
  intermediate wh-words are the pronunciations of
  agreeing complementizers.
• A medial wh-word is never a whole wh-phrase. A
  head?
• Then, they suppose it is French, and limit the
  agreement to subject wh-words.
• Sometimes production goes from SO medial
  wh-questions to just S.
• Then, they get to English.

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Other constraints on wh-movement from 3-5 year
olds

• They reject adjunct extraction from NP
• Howi did the mother see his riding ti?
• But they allow argument extraction?
• Whoi did the mother show his copying ti ?
• This is de Villiers example seems ambiguous to
  me between extraction and non-extraction
  readings. Better might be What did the mother
  show his eating?
• They reject adjunct extraction from rel. clause
• Howi did the woman who knitted ti swim?
• And reject extraction from temporal adjuncts
• Who did the elephant ask before helping ti ?

52
Superiority 3-5

• Adults
• Whoi ti slept where?
• Wherei did who sleep ti ?
• And the kids seem to have that down cold. (Kid
  Its better if I start.)
• (from deVilliers and Plunkett, unpublished as of
  1995?)

53
That-trace?

• Who did the pig believe that swam in the pond?
• Kids opt for the interpretation where the
  questions asks which, of the animals the pig
  believes, swam.
• Kids dont go at all for the interpretation which
  entails a violation of that-trace (the pig
  believed that who swam)
• (Phinney 1981)
• This is sort of mysterious, since languages
  differ as to whether they respect the that-trace
  filter.

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That-trace?

• Some conflicting results?
• Thornton (1990), production experiment found
  that-trace violations 18 of the time subject
  wh-questions were used.
• McDaniel, Chiu and Maxfield (1995) found an
  acceptance rate of 24 for that-trace effects.

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Grammar vs. Preferences

• These experiments are really testing preferences
  not grammaticality. If they prefer the that-less
  variant, we wont see that-trace violations even
  if they are strictly grammatical for the kid.
• Just because a structure is dispreferred (for
  whatever reasonfrequency, difficulty, etc.) does
  not mean that it is ungrammatical in the childs
  grammar.
• Preferences are not the best route to discovering
  the properties of child grammar, though its hard
  to design grammaticality judgment experiments..

56
Questioning out of quotations

• Adult languages generally can not question out of
  a quotation
• Whati did the boy say Can I bring ti ?
• But English, French and German kids (3-6 years)
  seem to allow it.
• Why?

57
Correlates to questioning out of quotations

• Kids may not quite grasp the quotation yet.
• A significant proportion of kids around the same
  age range allow co-reference between a pronoun in
  the quotation and the subject
• Hei can sit here said Mickeyi.
• Perhaps, it has more to do with the fact that it
  requires getting into someone elses head

58
False beliefs

• Kids before a certain age (usually before 4) seem
  unable to take another persons perspective
• Little rabbit puts carrot in red basket, leaves.
  Mother rabbit comes in, moves carrot to blue
  basket. Little rabbit comes back. Where does he
  look for the carrot?
• Some kids will answer the blue basketunable to
  see that the little rabbit shouldnt have known.

59
False beliefs quotations

• Those same kids who answered blue basket were
  also those who would do this
• Mother bought cake, but wanted to surprise girl.
  When asked, mother claimed to have bought paper
  towels.
• What did Mother say she bought?
• The blue basket kids answer cake.

60
False beliefs quotations

• So, perhaps it is understanding what a quotation
  is that is allowing kids to extract from
  themthey treat a quotation as a regular clausal
  complement.

61
Weak islands

• In the adult language, there is a certain
  configuration which seems to create an island for
  movement of wh-adjuncts, which arguably has to do
  with the logical meaning.
• Coming by train is a subset of the events coming.
• John said Mary was coming by train implies John
  said Mary was coming.

62
Weak islands

• In weak islands the implication fails
• Negation
• John didnt say Mary was coming by train.
• John didnt say Mary was coming.
• Factives
• John forgot Mary was coming by train.
• John forgot Mary was coming.
• With quantificational adverbs
• John often eats grapes with a fork.
• John often eats grapes.

63
Weak islands

• And in those cases, you cant extract wh-adjuncts
  in the adult language.
• Whyi did John say (ti) that Mary left (ti)?
• Whyi did John forget (ti) that Mary left (ti)?
• Whyi didnt John say (ti) that Mary left (ti)?
• Whyi does John often say (ti) that Mary left
  (ti)?

64
Weak islands

• Four-year-olds have been observed to fail on the
  implication
• Jim forgot that his aunt was arriving by train,
  so he went to the bus station to pick her up Did
  Jim forget that his aunt was coming?
• Yes!
• Guess They havent gotten the implication
  pattern down for these non-monotonic-increasing
  environments.

65
Weak islands

• Now If kids havent gotten the implication
  pattern, and if the implication pattern is
  implicated in the islandhood, do kids fail to
  observe weak islands just when they also fail on
  the implication pattern?
• Philip and de Villiers (1992) looked into this

66
Philip and de Villiers (1992)

• Kids never allow LD association out of a
  wh-island (they obeyed the purely syntactic
  constraint).
• Whyi did the mother ask what he made ti ?
• The other facts were generally in support(de
  Villiers 1995) of the conclusion that where kids
  fail to make the inferences required by
  non-monotone-increasing environments, they also
  fail to treat them as movement islands.

67
Multiple questions

• A fair amount of theoretical work has concerned
  the treatment of multiple wh-questions.
• E.g., the wh-typology English (move one) vs.
  Japanese (move none) vs. Bulgarian (move all).
• What do kids do with them?
• Well, but thats lunacyadults barely use them,
  how are we going to find out about kids?

68
Grebenyova (2005)

• Russian as a multiple-movement language
• chto kuda Smurf polozhil?What where S put?
• Interpretation
• PL (Pair-list) Who invited who for dinner?
• SP (Single pair) Which diplomat invited which
  journalist? Who invited the roommate of who for
  dinner?
• Who invited who for dinner?
• English, Russian PL, SP
• Serbo-Croatian, Japanese PL, SP

69
Grebenyova (2005)

• Ok, lets check CHILDES (parental speech).
  Varvara (17-211).
• 737 single questions.
• 1 multiple question.
• kto tebe chto podaril ?Whonom you whatacc gave?
• Not very much input here.

70
Grebenyova (2005)

• Attempts to elicit multiple interrogatives.
• Story 3 characters each hide a different thing.
• Characters and items not in a natural category
• Avoiding Which x hid which Y? Who hid which X?
  Which x hid what?
• Add a character who doesnt hide anything (and
  pointing that out).
• Avoiding What did everyone hide?
• Not mentioning the names of the characters in the
  lead-in
• Avoiding What did they hide?
• First time single question. Decide to ask a more
  difficult question next time.

71
Grebenyova (2005)

• And it worked Kids (and adult controls) produced
  multiple wh-questions in PL contexts (but not SP
  contexts) about a third of the time in English,
  about half the time in Russian.
• Syntax English kids did it like adults. Russian
  kids 15 of the time did it like English
  kids/adults
• Kto sprjatal chto?Who hid what

72
Grebenyova (2005)

• Tried non-subjects and adjuncts to figure out
  more about the syntax
• Who hid what?
• Who did Lizard give what?
• Who did the dog find where?
• Found some wh-in-situ for kids, both notably both
  for kids and adults found about two-thirds
  multiple fronting and one-third partial fronting
• Kogo sobaka gde nashia?Who dog where found
• Perhaps (for wh-in-situ but partial fronting?)
• Acquisition of focus?
• Mixed/confusing input (which phrases can stay in
  situ)?

73
?

• ? ?
• ?
• ? ?
• ? ?
• ?
• ?

74
Stepping back a bit

• Lets take some time to look at a few results
  coming out of an earlier tradition, not strictly
  Principles Parameters (and not covered by
  White) but still suggesting that to a certain
  extent L2 learners may know something (perhaps
  unconsciously) about what Language is like
  (which is a certain way we might characterize the
  content of UG).

75
Typological universals

• 1960s and 1970s saw a lot of activity aimed at
  identifying language universals, properties of
  Language.
• Class of possible languages is smaller than you
  might think.
• If a language has one property (A), it will
  necessarily have another (B).
• AB, AB, AB but never AB.

76
(Typological) universals

• All languages have vowels.
• If a language has VSO as its basic word order,
  then it has prepositions (vs. postpositions).

VSO? Adposition type Yes No
Prepositions Welsh English
Postpositions None Japanese
77
Markedness

• Having duals implies having plurals
• Having plurals says nothing about having duals.
• Having duals is markedinfrequent, more complex.
  Having plurals is (relative to having duals)
  unmarked.
• Generally markedness is in terms of comparable
  dimensions, but you could also say that being VSO
  is marked relative to having prepositions.

78
Markedness

• Markedness actually has been used in a couple
  of different ways, although they share a common
  core.
• Marked More unlikely, in some sense.
• Unmarked More likely, in some sense.
• You have to mark something marked unmarked is
  what you get if you dont say anything extra.

79
Unlikeliness

• Typological / crosslinguistic infrequency.
• VOS word order is marked.
• More complex constructions.
• ts is more marked than t.
• The non-default setting of a parameter.
• Non-null subjects?
• Language-specific/idiosyncratic features.
• Vs. UG/universal features?

80
Berlin Kay 1969 Color terms

• (On the boundaries of psychophysics, linguistics,
  anthropology, and with issues about its
  interpretation, but still)
• Basic color terms across languages.
• It turns out that languages differ in how many
  color terms count as basic. (blueish,
  salmon-colored, crimson, blond, are not basic).

81
Berlin Kay 1969 Color terms

• The segmentation of experience by speech symbols
  is essentially arbitrary. The different sets of
  words for color in various languages are perhaps
  the best ready evidence for such essential
  arbitrariness. For example, in a high percentage
  of African languages, there are only three color
  words, corresponding to our white, black, red,
  which nevertheless divide up the entire spectrum.
  In the Tarahumara language of Mexico, there are
  five basic color words, and here blue and
  green are subsumed under a single term.
• Eugene Nida (1959)

82
Berlin Kay 1969 Color terms

• Japanese (Japan)
• Korean (Korea)
• Pomo (California)
• Spanish (Mexico)
• Swahili (East Africa)
• Tagalog (Philippines)
• Thai (Thailand)
• Tzeltal (Southern Mexico)
• Urdu (India)
• Vietnamese (Vietnam)

• Arabic (Lebanon)
• Bulgarian (Bulgaria)
• Catalan (Spain)
• Cantonese (China)
• Mandarin (China)
• English (US)
• Hebrew (Israel)
• Hungarian (Hungary)
• Ibibo (Nigeria)
• Indonesian (Indonesia)

83
Eleven possible basic color terms

• White, black, red, green, yellow, blue, brown,
  purple, pink, orange, gray.
• All languages contain term for white and black.
• Has 3 terms, contains a term for red.
• Has 4 terms, contains green or yellow.
• Has 5 terms, contains both green and yellow.
• Has 6 terms, contains blue.
• Has 7 terms, contains brown.
• Has 8 or more terms, chosen from purple, pink,
  orange, gray

84
Color hierarchy

• White, black
• Red
• Green, yellow
• Blue
• Brown
• Purple, pink, orange, gray
• Even assuming these 11 basic color terms, there
  should be 2048 possible setsbut only 22 (1) are
  attested.

85
Color terms

• BW Jalé (New Guinea) brilliant vs. dull
• BWR Tiv (Nigeria), Australian aboriginals
  in Seven Rivers District, Queensland.
• BWRG Ibibo (Nigeria), Hanunóo (Philippines)
• BWRY Ibo (Nigeria), Fitzroy River people
  (Queensland)
• BWRYG Tzeltal (Mexico), Daza (eastern Nigeria)
• BWRYGU Plains Tamil (South India), Nupe
  (Nigeria), Mandarin?
• BWRYGUO Nez Perce (Washington), Malayalam
  (southern India)

86
Color terms

• Interesting questions abound, including why this
  order, why these elevenand there are potential
  reasons for it that can be drawn from the
  perception of color spaces which we will not
  attempt here.
• The point is This is a fact about Language If
  you have a basic color term for blue, you also
  have basic color terms for black, white, red,
  green, and yellow.

87
Implicational hierarchy

• This is a ranking of markedness or an
  implicational hierarchy.
• Having blue is more marked than having (any or
  all of) yellow, green, red, white, and black.
• Having green is more marked than having red
• Like a set of implicational universals
• Blue implies yellow Brown implies blue
• Blue implies green Pink implies brown
• Yellow or green imply red Orange implies brown
• Red implies black Gray implies brown
• Red implies white Purple implies brown

88
L2A?

• Our overarching themeHow much is L2/IL like a
  L1?
• Do L2/IL languages obey the language universals
  that hold of native languages?
• This question is slightly less theory-laden than
  the questions we were asking about principles and
  parameters, although its similar
• To my knowledge nobody has studied L2
  acquisitions of color terms

89
Question formation

• Declarative John will buy coffee.
• Wh-inversion What will John buy?
• Wh-fronting What will John buy?
• Yes/No-inversion Will John buy coffee?
• Greenberg (1963)
• Wh-inversion implies Wh-fronting.
• Yes/No-inversion implies Wh-inversion.

90
Eckman, Moravcsik, Wirth (1989)

• L1 Korean (4), Japanese (6), Turkish (4)
• L2 English
• Note L1s chosen because they are neither/neither
  type languages, to avoid questions of transfer.
• Subjects tried to determine what was going on in
  a scene by asking questions.

91
Eckman, Moravcsik, Wirth (1989)

• Example Y/N Qs
• Did she finished two bottle wine?
• Is Lou and Patty known each other?
• Sue does drink orange juice?
• Her parents are rich?
• Is this story is chronological in a order?
• Does Joan has a husband?
• Yesterday is Sue did drink two bottles of wine?

92
Eckman, Moravcsik, Wirth (1989)

• Example Wh-Qs
• Why Sue didnt look solution for her problem?
• Where Sue is living?
• Why did Sue stops drinking?
• Why is Pattys going robbing the bank?
• What they are radicals?
• What Sue and Patty connection?
• Why she was angry?

93
Eckman et al. (1989)wh-inv?wh-fronting?result
s
Whinv Whfr
SM K 25 NO 100 YES
UA T 54 NO 100 YES
TS J 70 NO 100 YES
MK K 80 NO 100 YES
RO J 88 NO 100 YES
KO J 95 YES 100 YES
MH J 95 YES 100 YES
NE T 95 YES 100 YES
SI J 95 YES 100 YES
G T 100 YES 100 YES
MA T 100 YES 100 YES
ST J 100 YES 100 YES
TM K 100 YES 100 YES
YK J 100 YES 100 YES
94
Eckman et al. (1989)YN-inv.? wh-inv.?results
YNinv WHinv
SM K 8 NO 25 NO
MK K 38 NO 80 NO
YK J 51 NO 100 YES
TS J 67 NO 70 NO
TM K 83 NO 100 YES
RO J 85 NO 88 NO
BG T 86 NO 100 YES
MA T 88 NO 100 YES
UA T 91 YES 54 NO
KO J 93 YES 95 YES
MH J 95 YES 95 YES
NE T 100 YES 95 YES
SI J 100 YES 95 YES
ST J 100 YES 100 YES
95
Eckman, Moravcsik, Wirth (1989)
Yes/no inversion Wh-inversion Yes (VS) No (SV)
Yes (VS) 5 4
No (SV) 1 4
96
Eckmans Markedness Differential Hypothesis

• Markedness. A phenomenon or structure X in some
  language is relatively more marked than some
  other phenomenon or structure Y if
  cross-linguistically the presence of X in a
  language implies the presence of Y, but the
  presence of Y does not imply the presence of X.
• Duals imply plurals.
• Wh-inversion implies wh-fronting.
• Blue implies red.
• (but what counts as a phenomenon or structure?)

97
Markedness Differential Hypothesis

• MDH The areas of difficulty that a second
  language learner will have can be predicted on
  the basis of a comparison of the NL and TL such
  that
• Those areas of the TL that are different from the
  NL and are relatively more marked than in the NL
  will be difficult
• The degree of difficulty associated with those
  aspects of the TL that are different and more
  marked than in the NL corresponds to the relative
  degree of markedness associated with those
  aspects
• Those areas of the TL that are different than the
  NL but are not relatively more marked than in the
  NL will not be difficult.
• Notice that this is assuming conscious effort
  again. Perhaps it need not, depending on how you
  interpret difficulty but it seems like Eckman
  means it this way.
• Another possible way to look at it is in terms of
  parameter settings and (Subset Principle
  compliant) defaults, coupled with a FT/FA type
  theory

98
MDH exampleWord-final segments

• Voiced obstruents most marked Surge
• Voiceless obstruents Coke
• Sonorant consonants Mountain
• Vowels least marked Coffee
• All Ls allow vowels word-finallysome only allow
  vowels. Some (e.g., Mandarin, Japanese) allow
  only vowels and sonorants. Some (e.g., Polish)
  allow vowels, sonorants, but only voiceless
  obstruents. English allows all four types.

99
Eckman (1981)
Spanish L1 Spanish L1 Mandarin L1 Mandarin L1
Gloss IL form Gloss IL form
Bob b p Tag tæg
Bobby b bi And ænd
Red r?t Wet w t
Wet w t Deck d?k
Sick sIk Letter l?t r
Bleeding blidIn
c
e
c
e
e
e
e
100
MDH exampleWord-final segments

• Voiced obstruents most marked Surge
• Voiceless obstruents Coke
• Sonorant consonants Mountain
• Vowels least marked Coffee
• Idea Mandarin has neither voiceless nor voiced
  obstruents in the L1using a voiceless obstruent
  in place of a TL voiced obstruent is still not L1
  compliant and is a big markedness jump. Adding a
  vowel is L1 compliant. Spanish has voiceless
  obstruents, to using a voiceless obstruent for a
  TL voiced obstruent is L1 compliant.

101
MDH and IL

• The MDH presupposes that the IL obeys the
  implicational universals too.
• Eckman et al. (1989) suggests that this is at
  least reasonable.
• The MDH suggests that there is a natural order of
  L2A along a markedness scale (stepping to the
  next level of markedness is easiest).
• Lets consider what it means that an IL obeys
  implicational universals

102
MDH and IL

• IL obeys implicational universals.
• That is, we know that IL is a language.
• So, we know that languages are such that having
  word-final voiceless obstruents implies that you
  also have word-final sonorant consonants, among
  other things.
• What would happen if we taught Japanese L2
  learners of English onlyand at the outsetvoiced
  obstruents?

103
Generalizing with markedness scales

• Voiced obstruents most marked Surge
• Voiceless obstruents Coke
• Sonorant consonants Mountain
• Vowels least marked Coffee
• Japanese learner of English will have an easier
  time at each step learning voiceless obstruents
  and then voiced obstruents.
• Butif taught voiced obstruents immediately, the
  fact that the IL obeys implicational (markedness)
  universals means that voiceless obstruents come
  for free.

104
Nifty!

• Does it work? Does it help?
• Answers seem to be
• Yes, it seems to at least sort of work.
• Maybe it helps.
• Learning a marked structure is harder. So, if you
  learn a marked structure, you can automatically
  generalize to the less marked structures, but was
  it faster than learning the easier steps in
  succession would have been?

105
The Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy

• Keenan Comrie (1977) observed a hierarchy among
  the kinds of relative clauses that languages
  allow.
• The astronaut (that) I met yesterday.
• Head noun astronaut
• Modifying clause(that/who) I met yesterday.
• Compare I met the astronaut yesterday.
• This is an object relative because the place
  where the head noun would be in the simple
  sentence version is the object.

106
The Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy

• There are several kinds of relative clauses,
  based on where the head noun comes from in the
  modifying clause
• The astronaut
• I met yesterday object
• who met me yesterday subject
• I gave a book to indirect object
• I was talking about obj. of P
• whose house I like Genitive (possessor)
• I am braver than obj. of comparative

107
The Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy

• Turns out Languages differ in what positions
  they allow relative clauses to be formed on.
• English allows all the positions mentioned to be
  used to make relative clauses.
• Arabic allows relative clauses to be formed only
  with subjects.
• Greek allows relative clauses to be formed only
  with subjects or objects.

108
Resumptive pronouns

• The guy who they dont know whether he wants to
  come.
• A student who I cant make any sense out of the
  papers he writes.
• The actress who Tom wondered whether her father
  was rich.
• In cases where relative clause formation is not
  allowed, it can sometimes be salvaged by means of
  a pronoun in the position that the head noun is
  to be associated with.

109
NPAH and resumptive pronouns

• Generally speaking, it turns out that in
  languages which do not allow relative clauses to
  be formed off a certain position, they will
  instead allow relative clauses with a resumptive
  pronoun in that position.
• Arabic allows only subject relative clauses. But
  for all other positions allows a resumptive
  pronoun construction, analogous to
• The book that John bought it.
• The tree that John is standing by it.
• The astronaut that John gave him a present.

110
NPAH

• The positions off which you can relativize
  appears to be an implicational hierarchy.

Lang. SUB DO IO OP GEN OCOMP
Arabic
Greek ? ?
Japanese /
Persian ()
111
Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy

• More generally, there seems to be a hierarchy of
  difficulty (or (in)accessibility) in the
  types of relative clauses.
• A language which allows this
• Subj gt Obj gt IO gt OPrep gt Poss gt OComp

112
Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy

• More generally, there seems to be a hierarchy of
  difficulty (or (in)accessibility) in the
  types of relative clauses.
• A language which allows this
• Will also allow these.
• Subj gt Obj gt IO gt OPrep gt Poss gt OComp

113
Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy

• More generally, there seems to be a hierarchy of
  difficulty (or (in)accessibility) in the
  types of relative clauses.
• A language which allows this
• Will also allow these. But not these
• Subj gt Obj gt IO gt OPrep gt Poss gt OComp

114
Relation to L2A?

• Suppose that KoL includes where the target
  language is on the NPAH.
• Do L2ers learn the easy/unmarked/simple relative
  clauses before the others?
• Do L2ers transfer the position of their L1
  first?
• Does a L2ers interlanguage grammar obey this
  typological generalization (if they can
  relativize a particular point on the NPAH, can
  they relativize everything higher too?)?

115
NPAH and L2A?

• Probably The higher something is on the NPAH,
  the easier (faster) it is to learn.
• So, it might be easier to start by teaching
  subject relatives, then object, then indirect
  object, etc. At each step, the difficulty would
  be low.
• But, it might be more efficient to teach the
  (hard) object of a comparisonbecause if L2ers
  interlanguage grammar includes whatever the NPAH
  describes, knowing that OCOMP is possible implies
  that everything (higher) on the NPAH is possible
  too. That is, they might know it without
  instruction. (Same issue as before with the
  phonology)

116
NPAH in L2A

• Very widely studied implicational universal in
  L2Amany people have addressed the question of
  whether the IL obeys the NPAH and whether
  teaching aa marked structure can help.
• Eckman et al. (1989) was about this second
  question

117
Change from pre- to post-testEckman, Bell,
Nelson (1988)
118
Transfer, markedness,

• Do (2002) looked at the NPAH going the other way,
  English?Korean.
• English Relativizes on all 6 positions.
• Korean Relativizes on 5 (not OCOMP)

S SU do IO OP GE
13
14 -
16 - -
29 - - -
31 - - - -
20 - - - - -
119
Transfer, markedness,

• The original question Do was looking at was Do
  English speakers transfer their position on the
  NPAH to the IL Korean?
• But look If English allows all 6 positions, why
  do some of the learners only relativize down to
  DO, some to IO, some to OPREP?
• It looks like they started over.

120
Subset principle?
A tempting analogy in some cases, parameters
seem to be ranked in terms of how permissive each
setting is.
I
E

• Null subject parameter
• Option (a) Null subjects are permitted.
• Option (b) Null subjects are not permitted.
• Italian option a, English option b.

121
Reminder Subset Principle

• The idea is
• If one has only positive evidence, and
• If parameters are organized in terms of
  permissiveness,
• Then for a parameter setting to be learnable, the
  starting point needs to be the subset setting of
  the parameter.
• The Subset principle says that learners should
  start with the English setting of the null
  subject parameter and move to the Italian setting
  if evidence appears.

I
E
122
Reminder Subset Principle

• The Subset Principle is basically that learners
  are conservativethey only assume a grammar
  sufficient to generate the sentences they hear,
  allowing positive evidence to serve to move them
  to a different parameter setting.
• Applied to L2 Given a choice, the L2er assumes
  a grammatical option that generates a subset of
  the what the alternative generates.
• Does this describe L2A?
• Is this a useful sense of markedness?

123
Subset principle and markedness

• Based on the Subset principle, wed expect the
  unmarked values (in a UG where languages are
  learnable) to be the ones which produce the
  smallest grammars.
• Given that in L1A we dont seem to see any
  misset parameters, we have at least indirect
  evidence that the Subset principle is at work. Is
  there any evidence for it in L2A? Do these NPAH
  results constitute such evidence?

124
Subset vs. Transfer

• The Subset Principle, if it operating, would say
  that L2A starts with all of the defaults, the
  maximally conservative grammar.
• Another, mutually exclusive possibility
  (parameter by parameter, anyway) is that L2A
  starts with the L1 setting.
• This means that for certain pairs of L1 and L2,
  where the L1 has the marked (superset) value and
  L2 has the unmarked (subset) value, only negative
  evidence could move the L2er to the right
  setting.
• Or, some mixture of the two in different areas.

125
NPAH and processing?

• At least a plausible alternative to the NPAH
  results following from the Subset Principle is
  just that relative clauses formed on positions
  lower in the hierarchy are harder to process.
  Consider
• The astronaut
• who IP t met me yesterday SUB
• who IP I VP met t yesterday DO
• who IP I VP gave a book PP to t IO
• who IP I was VP talking PP about t OPREP
• whose house IP I VP like DP t s house GEN
• who IP I am AP brave degP -er thanP than t
  OCOMP

126
NPAH and processing?

• If its about processing, then the reason L2ers
  progress through the hierarchy might be that
  initially they have limited processing
  roomtheyre working too hard at the L2 to be
  able to process such deep extractions.
• Why are they working so hard?
• (Well, maybe L2A is like learning history?)

127
NPAH and processing?

• Is the NPAH itself simply a result of processing?
• The NPAH is a typological generalization about
  languages not about the course of acquisition.
• Does Arabic have a lower threshhold for
  processing difficulty than English? Doubtful.
• The NPAH may still be real, still be a markedness
  hierarchy based in something grammatical, but it
  turns out to be confounded by processing.
• So finding evidence of NPAH position transfer is
  very difficult.

128
Subset problems?

• One problem, though, is that many of the
  parameters of variation we think of today dont
  seem to be really in a subset-superset relation.
  So there has to be something else going on in
  these cases anyway.
• V?T
• Yes vSVAO, SAVO
• No SVAO, vSAVO
• Anaphor type
• Monomorphemic vLD, Non-subject
• Polymorphemic LD, vNon-subject

129
?

• ? ?
• ?
• ? ?
• ? ?
• ?
• ?