First Language Acquisition – Acquisition and interfaces

The course focuses on the acquisition of constructions in which several grammar components are involved. The aim is to discuss relations between syntax, discourse and morphology in determining acquisition paths and triggering relations for the following topics:

a)         Head-movement and verbal inflection: Triggering relations between head-movement and verbal inflection will be discussed. Conflicting evidence from production and comprehension will be discussed.

Crosslinguistic differences between paths of development in the acquisition of V-to-I and I-to-C will be discussed in order to establish the role played by morphological cues in parameter setting.

b)         Focus and word order. In several languages, word order and focus marking are related. Prosodic effects are always involved in focus marking. The role played by prosody and word order will be studied.

c)         Clitics. Like other elements related to the clause functional domain, clitics are acquired late in some languages. Different patterns of development of clitics will be studied.