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SUMMARY:`What on earth’ in Chinese Speakers' L2 English Grammars - Bopin
 g Yuang (University of Cambridge)
DTSTART:20140313T160000Z
DTEND:20140313T173000Z
UID:TALK50115@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Madeleine Forbes
DESCRIPTION:Adopting a decompositional approach to items in the lexicon\, 
 this talk reports on an empirical study investigating Chinese speakers’ 
 second language (L2) acquisition of English wh-on-earth questions (i.e. qu
 estions with phrases like what on earth or who on earth). \n\nAn acceptabi
 lity judgment task\, a discourse-completion task and an interpretation tas
 k were used in the study\, and the results indicate that in Chinese speake
 rs’ L2 English\, the form of wh-on-earth can be learned and stored nativ
 e-like\, but without being endowed with a fully elaborated features. \n\nA
  distinction between active features and dormant features in L2 lexicon is
  made in the analysis\, and it is argued that features transferred from le
 arners’ L1 to their L2 are likely to lose their vigour and vitality in t
 heir L2 lexicon and become dormant if there is no evidence in the target l
 anguage input to confirm or disconfirm them. \n\nA typical consequence of 
 a dormant feature is random behaviours of a related structure in L2 learne
 rs’ production and interpretation. The results of the study show that se
 mantic features\, discourse features as well as morphosyntactic features c
 an become dormant in L2 lexicon.
LOCATION:Lecture Block\, Room 1\, Sidgwick Site
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