SLA Models and Issues: Acquisition of Semantics

Abstract

Semantic aspects of learner varieties have only recently gained the interest of second language acquistion [SLA] researchers. This is partly a consequence of some shifts in SLA theory and partly due to the discussion of “form” and “function” and the notions “pragmatics” and “semantics” in linguistic theory. There are two corollaries in recent SLA research: interlanguages should be described on the basis of their use in real communication situations, and the process of learning (strategies and stages in course of acquisition) should be the focus of empirical work. (For a discussion ofprocessandproductcf., Dittmar 1984.) As a matter of fact, the present standard paradigm in SLA is the description of learner varieties “outside the classroom” with a focus on “learning without explicit teaching” (also known by the somewhat misleading term undirected learning ) under natural conditions of communication with an emphasis on cross-sectional studies in the seventies (cf., Klein and Dittmar 1979) and on longi- tudinal research in the eighties (cf., Perdue 1982).