Linguistic theory in second language acquisition Edited by Suzanne Flynn and Wayne O'Neil (review)

Abstract

202LANGUAGE, VOLUME 68, NUMBER 1 (1992) to another discussion in Aitchison's chapter on psycholinguistics. The chapter on sociolinguistics by James Milroy & Leslie Milroy does not cross-reference the chapter by Martin Durrell on dialectology, and vice versa. These are minor flaws, though, in a very useful and welcome contribution to the basic reference literature. REFERENCES Bright, William (ed.) 1992. Oxford international encyclopedia of linguistics. 4 vols. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press. Crystal, David. 1987. The Cambridge encyclopedia of language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hanks, William F. 1989. Texts and textuality. Annual Review of Anthropology 18.95— 127. Newmeyer, Frederick J. (ed.) 1988. Linguistics: The Cambridge survey. Vol. I, Linguistic theory: Foundations; vol. II, Linguistic theory: Extensions and implications ; vol. IH, Language: Psychological and biological aspects; vol. IV, Language: The sociocultural context. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ogden, C. K., and I. A. Richards. 1956. The meaning of meaning. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Department of Anthropology[Received 24 January 1991 ; University of Arizonarevision received 12 March 1991.] Tucson, AZ 85721 Linguistic theory in second language acquisition. Edited by Suzanne Flynn and Wayne O'Neil. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1988. Pp. xii, 443. Cloth $79.00. Reviewed by Sara Thomas Rosen, University of Kansas Linguistic theory in second language acquisition (LTSLA) contains papers presented at the Conference on Linguistic Theory and Second Language Acquisition held at MIT in the Fall of 1985. The purpose of the conference, and of the book, was to relate the principles and parameters view of the representation of language to the representation and acquisition of a second language. The value of the book lies in placing the field of second language acquisition within theoretical linguistics. On a strong theory of the innateness of the principles of grammar (as espoused in, e.g., Chomsky 1986), much knowledge of language is not, and indeed cannot be, learned: because the core universal principles of grammar are part of our biological endowment, they need not be learned and cannot be broken or violated. Further, what is learned includes the settings ofa limited number ofparameters. Thus, a major portion oflearning a first language consists of determining the correct values of innately defined parameters. The main questions addressed in LTSLA concern the availability of this innate universal core to an adult second language learner. Is universal grammar (UG) available in any form to the second language learner, or must the learner resort to nonlinguistic cognitive mechanisms in order to learn a second language? The reader quickly finds that the answers to these questions are quite subtle and complex, and the evidence does not resoundingly favor one view or the other. REVIEWS203 In the introductory chapters to the book, Flynn & O'Neil, Ken Hale, and Frederick J. Newmeyer & Steven H. Weinberger outline the main questions the field of second language acquisition has faced and place them within a UG framework. The two prominent theories for addressing these questions are (i) contrastive analysis, which posits the transfer offeatures or parametric settings from the speaker's first language (Ll) to the second language (L2), and (ii) creative construction, which holds that the L2 learner reverts to UG and creates from scratch the features or parameter settings of the second language. Most chapters in LTSLA examine these two hypotheses (e.g. the papers by Flynn, Harald Clahsen, Irene Mazurkewich, Lydia White, Michael Sharwood Smith, Juana M. Liceras, J. W. Gair, Liliane Haegeman, Sascha W. Felix, Ellen Broselow, and Barbara Lust). The general approach is to choose a parameter P of UG for which the setting differs in speakers' Ll and L2, and to examine the L2 acquisition of constructions affected by P. With respect to the two prevailing theories of L2 acquisition, the various authors consider whether the L2 acquirer copies the setting of P from Ll to L2 (contrastive learning, or transfer), or whether the acquirer reverts to the unmarked setting of P, and proceeds from there (creative construction). In studying the availability of UG to the L2 learner, Flynn examines the acquisition of the values of the head parameter and of anaphora, Mazurkewich and White each argue for a markedness hierarchy in L2 acquisition similar to that in Ll acquisition. Clahsen presents evidence from word order in German...