Age factors in Heritage Language Acquisition: notes on Montrul 2008, Chapter 1

Sophia A. Malamud

February 5, 2011

1 Compare and contrast cases

To set up her point, that age matters not just in SLA, but also in HLA, Montrul gives several cases of language-learning:

age of ultimate proficiency L1 L2 exposure L1 L2 Kevin, 25 English Spanish & about 18 native basic French Caroline, 35 Spanish English 13 (school); native advanced 24 (immerse) Francesco, 45 Italian Spanish 30 (immerse) native (-) native-like Kristi, 38 Chinese English 2 (adopted) nill (?) native Elena, 24 Russian & French(L1) ≈6 (interrup) advanced(?) native French Carlos, 29 Spanish English 9 (immerse) native(?) native(?) Alicia, 24 & Spanish English 4 (immerse) advanced(??) native Beatriz, 22 &2(immerse) Preliminary conclusion: age matters for L1 loss in early bilingualism. Since we’re looking for different outcomes in SLA and HLA, we need a definition of the ”target” attainment. Some established facts:

• Normally developing monolingual children acquire basic grammar of L1 by 3-4 years:

– phonology – morphosyntax – semantics – aspects of pragmatics and sociolinguistc conventions

• L1 acquisition is, generally, uniform: learners converge on the grammar of others in the speech community (example: *What did you ask who Patricia gave?)

• L1 attainment in uninterrupted monolingual situations is native (complete).

1 • In the course of L1 acquisition, the attainment is incomplete - speakers make errors and lack some aspects of knowledge. This goes away.

Montrul argues (uncontroversially) that, with linguistic foundations of L1 competence in place by age 3-4, acquisition continues:

• literacy schooling raises metalinguistic awareness

• vocabulary expands

• more complex and varied structures are learned

• multiple social situations, genres, and registers are mastered

• diglossic competence

Why this is important: We need to understand what parts of language-learning hinge on what social and age variables: so, incomplete acquisition is perfect to tell us that.

2 Critical Period Hypothesis

NATURE: The innateness view: language-learning is an innately pre-wired, separate module in the brain, based on innate structural principles that are ”set” or triggered by the environment. NURTURE: The emergentist view: language-learning is part of general cognitive abilities, based on largely from experience.

The Critical Period hypothesis can be illustrated by this diagram (taken from Hyltenstam and Abrahamsson 2003):

A refinement - Critical Periods hypothesis: different ages of onset/offset of sensitivity for dif- ferent components of language.

Montrul reviews evidence for a critical/sensitive period for (first) language acquisition from delay of language acquisition in cases of deprivation (Genie vs. Isabel), and in the deaf, as well as from creole formation.

2 2.1 Evidence from deaf learners of sign language Newport’s (1990) study of congenitally deaf children of hearing parents: • Three groups: native = birth-3yrs, early learners = 4-6yrs, late learners = after 12 yrs • All had minimum of 30 years of daily exposure to ASL (age at time of study 35-70yrs) • All did well with word order • Clear age effect for morphology: native were accurate, early learners good but some errors, while late learners’ were quite bad.

2.2 Creole genesis Pidgin: make-shift communication system, with unstable lexicon, simple syntax (no embedding, lots of ellipsis of arguments and verbs), no or almost no inflectional morphology. • Children whose only linguistic input is pidgin - don’t get grammatical input during the critical period. • Children create a more complex grammar: turn lexical/content items into grammatical/function ones. • Why are they doing it? – nature - they’re innately prewired to add structure vs. – nurture - they are exposed in some degree to the languages from which the pidgin is composed, so they could be borrowing from those A good test case: emergence of sign languages, where nothing other than the impoverished, pidgin-like input is present. Montrul briefly reviews the case of the Nicaraguan Sign Language (ISN), but see also Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language (ABSL). For references and additional information about ISN, see the Morgan and Kegl 2006 article on LATTE, Ann Senghas’s publications, or 60 minutes on ISN. • In Nicaragua pre-1970s, deaf people remained isolated, each with their own home sign sys- tem (even less language-like than pidgins) • After the revolution, a school for the deaf began a speech community: the children formed a pidgin (Montrul claims spoken Spanish as a superstrate, but it’s not clear how that influence would have been exherted, since the children had no spoken Spanish) • Subsequent cohorts of deaf children developed a creole (the Nicaraguan Sign Language) with full linguistic complexity: – Children younger than 7yrs of age were able to extend the system beyond the impov- erished input pidgin – Children between 7 and 16 years were able to learn the existing system, but did not extend it. • This serves as evidence for critical period, and perhaps innateness, since younger children seem particularly susceptable to developing grammars, even in the absence of grammatical stimulus!

3 3 Bilingual acquisition

Two parameters of variation:

(1) age of acquisition (early = pre-puberty vs. late)

(2) order of acquisition (simultaneous vs. succesive/sequential)

Simultaneous early bilingualism is also called ”bilingual L1 acquisition. Sequential bilingualism can be either early or late. The age boundaries in bilingual acquisition are set as follows: Age Label stages of L1 acquisition at onset of L2 0-2 Simultaneous, bilingual L1 before the linguistic foundations are in place 4-6 Early sequential, early child L2 spoken language fully developed but no formal schooling 7-10 Early sequential, late child L2 formal instruction in one or two languages 12+ Late sequential, adult L2 L1 fully acquired, only vocabulary size can increase Two other factors that vary: proficiency (level of attainment in each language), and balance (relative proficiency and use of the two languages). The single most important predictor of proficiency of L2 is age of acquisition.

4 Incomplete acquisition

Definition: a mature linguistic state, the outcome of language acquisition that is not complete, or of attrition in childhood. Attrition will be considered, but it is not going to be a big factor, because the property must reach complete acquisition and remain stable for a while before it can begin to be lost through attrition (for Montrul). Age, and critical period hypothesis plays a crucial role in L1 loss/maintenance: late L2 learners are less likely to acquire L2 completely, but very likely to maintain full proficiency in L1; child L2 learners are more likely to acquire L2 completely, but very likely to lose ability in L1. Factors besides age that affect L1 maintenance/loss: motivation, language identity, education, peer pressure etc. (these play more of a role for children than for adults).

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