Abstract

Chinese sentence final particles have long been discussed in linguistic research. However, how they are represented in L2 learners’ interlanguage(s) deserves more attention. In this seminar, I will report my ongoing PhD project which concerns this particular phenomenon through the lens of English-speaking learners’ acquisition situations. To be specific, general properties of Chinese sentence final particles will be presented, together with features of six individual ones. Some crosslinguistic comparisons between Chinese and English will also be introduced. The research design and some preliminary results from 11 Chinese native speakers will be reported as well. The seminar will conclude with identified problems in the research design and discussion of future investigation directions.