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The Syntax-Phonology Interface in Native and Near-Native Korean The Syntax-Phonology Interface in Native and Near-Native Korean The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Bae, Sun Hee. 2015. The Syntax-Phonology Interface in Native and Near-Native Korean. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:23845482 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA The Syntax-Phonology Interface in Native and Near-Native Korean A dissertation presented by Sun Hee Bae to The Department of Linguistics in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the subject of Linguistics Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts September 2015 © 2015 Sun Hee Bae All rights reserved. Dissertation Advisor: Maria Polinsky Sun Hee Bae The Syntax-Phonology Interface in Native and Near-Native Korean Abstract In this thesis, two types of non-native speakers are examined to advance our understanding of the language faculty. Filling a gap in literature, a production study of heritage language speakers of Korean and a comprehension study of heritage and non-heritage language speakers of Korean and of English for phenomena at the syntax-phonology interface are conducted. In the production study, narrative data collected from American heritage language speakers of Korean from the lower end to the higher end of the proficiency spectrum are examined for error analysis. Various tactics are used in dealing with unfamiliar vocabulary (extending their morphological knowledge of Korean and/or English, circumlocution, asking for the corresponding vocabulary in English, code-switching between Korean and English, and literal translations from English); sentence connections are less than fluent; sentence-level errors are observed with honorifics and with inanimate subjects, along with morpho-syntactic errors concerning misuse of particles (locatives and passives/causatives). Even at the lower-proficiency level, few difficulties in the realm of syntax-phonology interface, or prosody, are observed, motivating the next study. The comprehension study investigates the issues in the context of prosody and information structure. Information structure in Korean is surveyed, with a proposal laying out the environment in which the otherwise optional case and information-structural particles are iii mandatory, based on recoverability. A series of listening experiments with seven-point acceptability rating scores as the dependent variable are conducted to answer the following questions about language spoken by non-native speakers: (i) Do non-heritage and heritage learners acquire prosodic information conveying information structure? (ans heritage: yes, non- heritage: no), (ii) Does Sorace & Filiaci's (2006) Interface Hypothesis, which proposes that phenomena involving the interface of syntax and other areas (pragmatics) are less likely to be learned for very advanced learners, extend to the syntax-phonology interface? (ans no). The current study demonstrates how heritage language study may contribute to our understanding of the language faculty that other types of acquisition studies cannot. iv Table of Contents Acknowledgments ........................................................................................................................ vii Glossary of Abbreviations .......................................................................................................... viii 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 1 1.1 Language learners at both ends of the proficiency spectrum ....................................... 2 1.2 The syntax-phonology interface in language learning ................................................. 3 1.3 The Korean language ................................................................................................... 4 1.4 Second Language Acquisition (SLA) .......................................................................... 5 1.5 Dissertation goals and structure ................................................................................... 7 2. Non-native speakers of Korean ........................................................................................... 10 2.1 Non-heritage learners ................................................................................................. 11 2.2 Heritage speakers ....................................................................................................... 11 3. Production of narratives ...................................................................................................... 14 3.1 Method ....................................................................................................................... 16 3.1.1 Participants ..................................................................................................... 16 3.1.2 Materials ........................................................................................................ 18 3.1.3 Procedure ....................................................................................................... 20 3.2 Error Analysis ............................................................................................................ 21 3.2.1 Dealing with unfamiliar vocabulary............................................................... 21 3.2.2 Connecting sentences ..................................................................................... 28 3.2.3 Sentence level ................................................................................................ 32 3.2.4 Misusing particles .......................................................................................... 35 3.3 Discussion .................................................................................................................. 49 v 4. Comprehension of prosodic cues in information structure .............................................. 51 4.1 Contrastive focus in English ...................................................................................... 53 4.1.1 Experiment 1: Contrastive focus in English ................................................... 54 4.2 Information structure of Korean ................................................................................ 65 4.2.1 Topic .............................................................................................................. 65 4.2.2 Contrastive focus............................................................................................ 71 4.2.3 Omission of particles and recoverability........................................................ 74 4.2.4 Experiment 2: Contrastive focus in Korean ................................................... 77 4.3 Indefinites and wh-words in Korean .......................................................................... 94 4.3.1 Experiment 3: Indefinites and wh-words in Korean....................................... 98 4.4 Summary of Experiments 1, 2, and 3 ....................................................................... 111 5. Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 112 References ................................................................................................................................... 114 Appendix A. Stimuli for the experiments ................................................................................ 130 Appendix B. Summaries of the linear mixed model fit ........................................................... 137 vi Acknowledgments I owe a debt of gratitude to Maria Polinsky, C.-T. James Huang, and Michael Kenstowicz, who were kind enough to serve on the dissertation committee. Masha has given me constant support and guidance with lots of patience throughout my graduate life; Jim has been a fatherly figure whose advice and insights have always been inspirational; and Michael was generous enough to read and comment on multiple versions of the draft, which has substantially improved my thesis. I am incredibly lucky and honored to have had them on the committee. Outside of the committee, I especially thank Lilith Haynes for leading me through the CI- TESOL program and Daniel Donoghue for sitting with me every week to discuss the history of the English language. Special thanks to Adam Albright, Michael Becker, Youngjoon Jang, Sun- Ah Jun, Susumu Kuno, Oksana Laleko, Ju Eun Lee, Shigeru Miyagawa, Andrew Nevins, and Kevin Ryan for allowing me to engage in fruitful linguistic discussions with them. I am also grateful to Eunjin Oh, Hye-Won Choi, and Sung-Hyuk Park at Ewha Womans University for introducing me to the world of linguistics and preparing me for a successful graduate school life. Friends and colleagues at the Linguistics at Harvard also deserve appreciation. I would especially like to mention Dorothy Ahn, Gasper Begus, Jelena Borise, Laurence B-Violette, Yujing Huang, Sverre Johnsen, Jenny Lee, Daphne Liao, Louis Liu, Marek Majer, Hiroki Narita, Edwin Tsai, and Yimei Xiang. This project would not have been possible without the financial support from the National Heritage Language
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