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Developmental dynamics in L1 and L2 acquisition: Processability Theory and generative entrenchment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 May 2003

MANFRED PIENEMANN
MANFRED PIENEMANN
Affiliation:
Australian National University
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Abstract

This paper has two major objectives: (1) to summarise Processability Theory, a processing-oriented approach to explaining language development and (2) to utilise this theory in the comparison of development in LI and L2 acquisition. Proponents of the Fundamental Difference Hypothesis (between L1 and L2) assume that L1 development can be explained with reference to Universal Grammar (UG) which, in their view, is inaccessible to L2 learners. Instead, they claim that a second language develops on the basis of language processing strategies.

I will show that the fundamentally different developmental paths inherent in first and second language acquisition can both be explained on the basis of the same language processing mechanics (as specified in Processability Theory). I will demonstrate that the developmental differences between L1 and L2 are caused by the qualitatively different early structural hypotheses which propagate through the acquisition process. The concept of “propagation of structural features” will be viewed as “generative entrenchment,” a logical-mathematical concept, which has proved to be highly productive in examining other kinds of developmental processes.

Type
Keynote Article
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 1 , Issue 1 , April 1998 , pp. 1 - 20
Copyright
© 1998 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

I would like to thank Avery Andrews, Bruno Di Biase, Gisela Håkansson, Malcolm Johnston, Jürgen Meisel, Bonnie Schwartz and four anonymous reviewers for their invaluable input into this paper. Any remaining errors are mine. I gratefully acknowledge the financial assistance from the Australian Research Council which I received for the research presented in this paper.