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Development of the form and meaning of defmiteness in Russian-speaking learners of Swedish

Agebjöm, Anders LU (2021) In Norsk Lingvistisk Tidsskrift 39(1). p.41-68
Abstract

The study investigates the development of defmiteness in two groups of Russian-speaking learners of Swedish, one beginner group and one more advanced group. While Russian does not have articles, Swedish expresses defmiteness through a complex noun-phrase (NP) structure. Using an oral elicitation task, the study examines the learners' ability to produce morphemes that encode (in)defmiteness, their ability to accurately choose between indefinite and definite forms, and the relationship between these two abilities. Findings include that the complex NP structure emerged gradually while there was no evident development with regard to meaning. Initially, however, learners who used the morphemes more also tended to overuse them, while later in... (More)

The study investigates the development of defmiteness in two groups of Russian-speaking learners of Swedish, one beginner group and one more advanced group. While Russian does not have articles, Swedish expresses defmiteness through a complex noun-phrase (NP) structure. Using an oral elicitation task, the study examines the learners' ability to produce morphemes that encode (in)defmiteness, their ability to accurately choose between indefinite and definite forms, and the relationship between these two abilities. Findings include that the complex NP structure emerged gradually while there was no evident development with regard to meaning. Initially, however, learners who used the morphemes more also tended to overuse them, while later in development those who produced many morphemes were also more likely to use them accurately. The paper thus demonstrates that the acquisition of a morphosyntactic form and the association of this form with its meaning are two separate processes to some extent.

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Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Articles, Morphosyntax, Noun phrase, Second language acquisition, Semantics
in
Norsk Lingvistisk Tidsskrift
volume
39
issue
1
pages
28 pages
publisher
Novus Forlag
external identifiers
  • scopus:85113980933
ISSN
0800-3076
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
54d786c2-c8e5-4d55-9dd2-999cf4cfb10f
date added to LUP
2021-09-21 14:16:23
date last changed
2023-10-11 01:22:31
@article{54d786c2-c8e5-4d55-9dd2-999cf4cfb10f,
  abstract     = {{<p>The study investigates the development of defmiteness in two groups of Russian-speaking learners of Swedish, one beginner group and one more advanced group. While Russian does not have articles, Swedish expresses defmiteness through a complex noun-phrase (NP) structure. Using an oral elicitation task, the study examines the learners' ability to produce morphemes that encode (in)defmiteness, their ability to accurately choose between indefinite and definite forms, and the relationship between these two abilities. Findings include that the complex NP structure emerged gradually while there was no evident development with regard to meaning. Initially, however, learners who used the morphemes more also tended to overuse them, while later in development those who produced many morphemes were also more likely to use them accurately. The paper thus demonstrates that the acquisition of a morphosyntactic form and the association of this form with its meaning are two separate processes to some extent.</p>}},
  author       = {{Agebjöm, Anders}},
  issn         = {{0800-3076}},
  keywords     = {{Articles; Morphosyntax; Noun phrase; Second language acquisition; Semantics}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{1}},
  pages        = {{41--68}},
  publisher    = {{Novus Forlag}},
  series       = {{Norsk Lingvistisk Tidsskrift}},
  title        = {{Development of the form and meaning of defmiteness in Russian-speaking learners of Swedish}},
  volume       = {{39}},
  year         = {{2021}},
}