Chapter 6. Formal Approaches To Sla

Comparing Texts
Gass, S. M., & Selinker, L,.(2008)
SUMAYA P. ABDULWAHAB
JHEOMAR COLING
MAT - English
Introduction
The relationship on the area of
research that has dominated the
theoretical study of second language
acquisition over the year, Universal
Grammar.
What is
UNIVERSAL
GRAMMAR?
Universal GRAMMAR
● The system of categories, operations, and
principles shared by all human languages and
considered to be innate.(Chomsky,1975, p.7)
● UG is a theory in linguistic, usually credited to
Noam Chomsky, proposing that the ability to
learn grammar is hard-wired into the brain.
● How does UG related to SLA?
The unconscious linguistic
Initial state knowledge that learners have before
receiving L2 input.
Fundamental Access to UG
Difference Hypothesis Hypothesis
 The claim that child first  The claim that the innate
language and adult language facility is operative
second language in second language learners.
acquisition are
different.
INNATE LANGUAGE CATEGORIES
What is the different of

these two categories?
Lexical Categories
&
Functional Categories
L1 as the base
1. Full Transfer/Full Access 2. Minimal Trees Hypothesis
This position assumes that the starting Minimal Tress Hypothesis also maintains
point is the L1 grammar, but that there is that both L1 and UG are available
full access to UG during the process of concurrently (Vainikka and Young-
acquisition.(Schwartz, 1998; Schwartz and Scolten,1994,1996a, 1996b).
Sprouse, 1994,1996,2000; Whong-Barr,
2005)
3. Valueless Features
This is the most technical of the

hypotheses and will be dealt with in the
least detail. In essence, the claim is that
there is weak transfer(Eubank
1993,1993/1994,1996).
L2 UG-BASED
4. The Initial Hypothesis of Syntax 5. Full access/No Transfer
This position maintains that, as
in child language acquisition, This position maintains that, as
the starting point for acquisition in child language acquisition,
is UG. the starting point for acquisition
is UG.
Universal Grammar is a set of
principles that are the properties
of all languages.
The principles contain parameters

in limited choice of setting
depending on the language
involved.
PRINCIPLES
and
PARAMETERS
Reconceptualization of UG (1981)
-White (1989) reported on the
study by Otsu and Naoi (1986)
Dealing with the principle of
structure dependence.
-The basic concept behind this

UG Principles
principle is that linguistic
principles operates on
syntactic(or structural) units.
work hard
Verb Phrase always
has a verb as head
smart girl on time

Noun Phrase always Prepositional Phrase
has a noun as always has a
head preposition as
head
UG PARAMETERS
Example
In ENGLISH  Head direction in
She [calls you] languages; which
is the head-initial
In FRENCH
Elle [t’apelle] or head-final.
PRO-DROP ITALIAN ENGLISH
PARAMETER
a. The omission She is going to the movies this
Table of Contents
of subject
Va al cinema stasera.
evening.
pronouns. (Goes to the movies
this evening)
Comparing Poetry Ideas and Purpose

b. The inversion È arrivata Laura. Laura has arrived.
01 and YouIscan
of subjects describe
arrived Laurathe topic 02
*has arrived Laura
You can describe the topic
of the section here of the section here
verbs in
declarative
sentences.
Argumentative Texts Simple Sentences
03
c. That-trace effects- You Chai
canhai detto che
describe
that is, the extraction of the section here
theètopic
venuto? 04
Whom did you You
say came?
can describe the topic
of the section here
of a subject out of a Who you said that is come?
clause that contains *whom did you say that came?
a complementizer.
Falsification
-Kaleidoscope factor-
Assume a non-access to UG position, as we have seen with

regard to the Fundamental Difference Hypothesis.
Attribute the results to methodological problems.
Attribute the result to an undefined performance component.
Attribute the results to mapping factors or; Assume the theory is
false.
CONCLUSION
• This Universal Grammar is the way to
explain how humans acquire language
if the brain is already primed to
understand certain sentence
structures, it explains how children can
understand and speak sentence that
they never heard before.
• UG to SLA
THANK YOU!
Do you have any
questions?

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Comparing Texts

Gass, S. M., & Selinker, L,.(2008)

What is the different of

This is the most technical of the

The principles contain parameters

-The basic concept behind this

smart girl on time

Comparing Poetry Ideas and Purpose

Assume a non-access to UG position, as we have seen with

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