The L2 Acquisition of English and Spanish Causative Structures

The L2 acquisition of argument structure has attracted the attention of several researchers in the field of Second Language Acquisition in the last decade. Previous studies on the L2 acquisition of English and Spanish causative structures have given somehow contradictory accounts as to the mechanisms at play. Some of these studies account for the phenomenon as a case of access to Universal Grammar with some verb classes and as transfer of L1 properties with others. Taking as a point of departure the analysis of different syntactic properties of English and Spanish causative structures, the present studies explore the role of transfer in the L2 acquisition of this area of argument structure. Two bidirectional experimental studies involving English and Spanish in adult acquisition are reported. It is concluded that L2 learners transfer different properties of their L1 depending on their proficiency. Less marked properties seem to be used in early stages, while more language specific ones are accessed later on. This book should be of special interest to researchers and graduate students in the fields of Linguistics, Hispanic Linguistics, and Language Acquisition.

M¿nica Cabrera, Ph.D. in Linguistics, with specialization in Hispanic Linguistics, University of Southern California. Assistant Professor at the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, California.