Argues, from a sociolinguistic perspective, that second language (L2) research could usefully engage with some of the debates concerning postmodernity. Suggests that globalization presents an important range of empirical phenomena requiring serious L2 study. Indicates the kinds of linguistic assumptions that ideas about postmodernity draw into…

Addresses the need for replication studies in the field of second-language acquisition and discusses the problems surrounding standards of reporting research. Notes a lack of uniform standards in reporting second-language learners' proficiency levels and proposes ways to achieve more thorough reporting of research that will allow others to engage…

The Basic Variety (BV) is understood as instantiation of essential properties of human language capacity and is claimed to be a natural language in the sense that it is constrained by principles of Universal Grammar. This article raises a few points casting doubt on claim that the BV is an I-language, highlighting problem of determining the role…

Investigated judgments native speakers of German make about the decomposability of English idioms. Findings were analyzed and compared to native judgments. Introduces the Model of Dual Idiom Representation to explain the differences between the two groups. (Author/VWL)

Presents a follow-up of a study of the perceptual acquisition of Thai laryngeal contrasts by native speakers of English, which found that subjects performed better on contrasts in voice than aspiration. This study further investigated possible task effects by examining the discrimination and categorization of the same stimuli in various…

Comments on changes in the relation between experimental psychology and second language acquisition research. Notes that new themes borrowed from experimental psychology include practice effects, the power law, connectionism, implicit learning and miniature artificial languages. Argues that attempts to attribute language learning to implicit or…

Responds to an Ellis (2002), which focuses on frequency in language processing, language use, and language acquisition, Emphasizes the importance of placing frequency in an overarching theoretical framework of language acquisition. (Author/VWL)

Investigated the psychological factors that affect access to metalinguistic knowledge in second language (L2) production. A verbalization task was used to assess the metalinguistic knowledge about target uses and a judgment test was administered to determine relative prototypicality of these uses of 64 adult Chinese learners of English.…

Addresses the difficulties second language learners have using articles properly by examining the metalinguistic knowledge of the English article system that learners employ when selecting articles in a given situation. Attempts to better understand the process of "making sense" of the English article system by learners who are at different stages…

Revisits Felix's (1988) and Birdsong's (1994) theories regarding universal grammar. Birdsong's criticism of Felix is upheld by consideration of a statistical model of the data. (Author/VWL)

Suggests that language change is driven by acquisition and argues that the triggers for establishing the properties of language-specific grammars differ according to whether first language or second language acquisition is involved. Presents two case studies of Mozambican African Portuguese, a nonnative variety of Portuguese acquired during…

Analyzes the thematic structure of the method and Discussion section of biology research articles. A corpus of 30 journal articles was analyzed using the categories of systematic functional linguistics and a semantic categorization for unmarked themes realized by subject. Revealed differences in the semantic construction of the sections. (VWL)

Overviews current theory and practice and research on second language and second dialect speakers and the language of the law. Suggests most of the studies on the topic have analyzed language in courtrooms, where access to data is much easier than in other legal settings, such as police interviews, mediation sessions, or lawyer-client interviews.…

Acquisition of negation in Italian as a second language (L2) is investigated on the basis of the longitudinal data of five learners with different first languages in the framework of a functional approach focusing on the semantic and pragmatic principles governing the organization of learner varieties and the process of their complexification.…

Attempts to overcome methodological problems in studies of vocabulary size. Problems occur when trying to answer the following three questions: (1) how do we decide what to count as words; (2) how do we choose what words to test; and (3) how do we test the chosen words? (31 references) (Author/VWL)