Publication details
Non-target do-constructions in the L2 Italian of adult migrants
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| Year of publication | 2021 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
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| Description | In the recent migration towards Europe, adults’ low-/non-literacy/schooling is a significant factor. Moreover, migrants experience social marginalisation and, hence, they are low-exposed to the target language. Whether these sociolinguistic variables produce differences in L2 acquisition still needs to be verified, since research on migrants’ L2s (in particular morphosyntax) is still peripheral. This lack of attention not only deprived second language acquisition of the social relevance that characterised its beginnings (Young-Scholten 2013), but is also problematic at the theoretical level, as working with convenience samples undermines the reliability of the research results (Tarone et al. 2009). Against this background, a longitudinal data collection was conducted at the Palermo University (Italy, 2018-2019) which involved the recording and transcription of 20 West African migrants’ speech. Data analysis, conducted in Klein/Perdue’s (1997) functionalist framework, brought to light non-target constructions involving overgeneralisation of items learners are in the process of acquiring (e.g. auxiliaries), to cover the functional spaces of other forms not yet acquired. The attention is focus on a do-construction that so far has escaped the attention of the specialists: io fare:INF cucinare:INF ‘I do cook’. I propose that fare ‘do’ expresses ‘activity’/‘verbiness’ instead of the lacking target morphosyntax. Similar constructions were observed in L2 Dutch and English (Starren 2001; Vainikka et al. 2017). This specific pattern would remain unnoticed by analysing only language classes or, in general, highly educated learners. |