8 - Language acquisition and language socialization

Summary

This chapter takes an interdisciplinary, international perspective, focusing on studies with cross-linguistic and culturally embedded approaches to how children learn language and culture. It provide a selective review emphasizing a number of themes: effects of variable language structures and of variable interactional styles on the acquisition of language, socialization through language into culturally shaped ways of thinking and feeling, and some methodological considerations in studying child language socialization. The chapter reviews two kinds of differences in the environments in which children learn language differences in the language they are learning and differences in the input speech they hear around them and considers their potential impact on language acquisition. It offers methodological observations in three realms especially pertinent to the field of language socialization: the importance of focusing on children's role in socialization, breadth versus depth in language acquisition and socialization research, and individual case studies versus comparative studies.