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How similar are adult second language learners and Spanish heritage speakers? Spanish clitics and word order

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2009

SILVINA MONTRUL
SILVINA MONTRUL*
Affiliation:
University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign
*
ADDRESS FOR CORRESPONDENCE Silvina Montrul, Department of Linguistics and Departments of Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, 4080 Foreign Languages Building, MC-176, 707 South Mathews Avenue, Urbana, IL 61801. E-mail: montrul@illinois.edu
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Abstract

Recent studies of heritage speakers, many of whom possess incomplete knowledge of their family language, suggest that these speakers may be linguistically superior to second language (L2) learners only in phonology but not in morphosyntax. This study reexamines this claim by focusing on knowledge of clitic pronouns and word order in 24 L2 learners and 24 Spanish heritage speakers. Results of an oral production task, a written grammaticality judgment task, and a speeded comprehension task showed that, overall, heritage speakers seem to possess more nativelike knowledge of Spanish than their L2 counterparts. Implications for theories that stress the role of age and experience in L2 ultimate attainment and for the field of heritage language acquisition and teaching are discussed.

Type
Articles
Information
Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 31 , Issue 1 , January 2010 , pp. 167 - 207
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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