Chapter 10. The acquisition of polar questions in Chinese learners of English as a foreign language

Abstract

This chapter investigates the acquisition of English polar questions in a cross-sectional study of nine Chinese junior high school learners acquiring English as a Foreign Language in Inner Mongolia (China). Conducted within a Processability Theory framework, in particular the recently proposed Prominence Hypothesis, the study focuses on analytical issues, presenting a descriptive account of the structures learners produce when asking polar questions. These include intonation questions with canonical word order, the use of single and multi-word question markers, prefabricated patterns, and questions with non-canonical word order. Results are consistent, overall, with the predictive schedule for ESL/EFL as formulated in the Prominence Hypothesis. However, the data also contains questions consisting of a prefabricated pattern followed by a noun phrase, which do not fit either with the Lemma access stage or the Canonical word order stage. The authors argue that this type of question represents a separate stage between these two early stages.