Language-specific factors in first language acquistion : the expression of motion events in French and German / Anne-Katharina Harr.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Harr, Anne-Katharina.

Series:

Studies on language acquisition

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Language acquisition.

French language--Acquisition.

French language.

German language--Acquisition.

German language.

Children--Language.

Children.

Semantics, Comparative.

Physical Description:

xiii, 388 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Boston ; Berlin : De Gruyter Mouton, 2012.

Summary:

The morphosyntax and semantics of motion events have been described in a typological perspective and a growing number of studies have begun to examine the influence of language-specific factors on language acquisition. During, language acquisition. German children from six years on use structures that ate similar to those of adults in their language group and also encode all semantic components from an early age on. In striking contrast, French children up to ten years have difficulties producing some of the complex structures that are necessary for the simultaneous expression of several semantic components. Nonetheless, in addition to these striking cross-linguistic differences, the results also clearly show similar developmental progressions in other respects, suggesting the impact of general developmental determinants. The Series: Studies On Language Acquisition, Language acquisition is a human endeavor par excellence. As children, all human beings learn to understand and speak at least one language: their mother tongue, it is a process that seems to take place without any obvious effort. Second language learning, particularly among adults, causes more difficulty. The purpose of this series is to compile a collection of high-quality monographs on language acquisition. The series serves the needs of everyone who wants to know more about the problem of language acquisition in general and/or about language acquisition in specific contexts. Book jacket.

Contents:

Introduction ; Why space? ; Space across languages ; A developmental perspective ; The organization of the book

State of the art. Language and cognition; Convergences of the notions language and cognition: Language: Cognition; The relation between language and thought: Language is thought: Language and thought do not influence each other: Thought influences language: Language influences thought: Conclusion ; Linguistic determinism and "thinking for speaking"; Linguistic determinism; "Thinking for speaking"; Implications for language acquisition; Are we on the wrong track?; Conclusion ; The relation between language and cognition in different language acquisition theories; Nativism: Basic assumptions of nativism about first language acquisition: Criticism and further development of the nativist position; Cognitivism: Piaget's theory of cognitive development and his assumptions about first language acquisition: Criticism and further developments of Piaget's theory; Constructivism: Construction Grammar and usage-based approaches to first language acquisition: Criticism of constructivist and usage-based research; Conclusion ; Selected aspects of spatial cognition in children; The emergence of spatial cognition; Spatial relations; Motion; Causality; Summary ; Verbalizations of motion events; A typological approach to the expression of motion events : Talmy's framework; Variability in the expression of motion events and its cognitive implications : Slobin's assumptions; Motion events in child language: Semantic components: Syntactic complexity: Co-verbal gestures; Motion events in German; Motion events in French ; General assumptions

Experimental study on the expression of motion events in French and German. Methodology; Participants; Material: Voluntary Motion: Caused Motion; Procedure; Transcription; Coding System: General coding principles: Basic coding lines: Synthetic coding lines ; Specific hypotheses; Density and Information Focus; Information Locus; Global Architecture; Qualitative analyses ; Results : Voluntary Motion; Density: Density as a function of target items: Density in control items; Information Focus: Information Focus in target items : Up-events : Down-events : Across-events: Information Focus in control items; Information Locus: Information Locus in target items : Up-events : Down-events : Across-events: Information Locus in control items; Global Architecture: Global Architecture in target items : Up-events : Down-events : Across-events: Global Architecture in control items; Qualitative Analyses: Verbs: Satellites: Periphery ; Results : Caused Motion; Density: Density as a function of language and age: Density as a function of Manner of action: Density as a function of Path; Information Focus: Information Focus as a function of language and age: Information Focus as a function of Manner of action: Information Focus as a function of Manner of the object's motion: Information Focus as a function of Path; Information Locus: Information Locus as a function of language and age: Information Locus as a function of Path; Global Architecture: Global Architecture as a function of language and age: Global Architecture as a function of Path; Qualitative Analyses: Verbs: Satellites: Periphery

Discussion. Discussion of the results and further research directions; The expression of motion events in French and German; General developmental versus language-specific determinants in children's verbalizations of motion events; Limitations of the present study and future research directions

Appendix. Methodology; Material: Items : Voluntary motion: Items : Caused motion ; Results : Voluntary motion; Information Locus; Global Architecture; Verb forms in French; Verb forms in German; French constructions with faire + X ; Results : Caused motion; French verb types; German verb types

References

Subject index

Author index.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [359]-382) and indexes.

ISBN:

9781614512264

1614512264

OCLC:

820775965