Analyticity and Syntheticity: What the Mistakes in DPs of L2 Learners Reveal about the Structure of Chinese and Czech
2014
Abstract
The chapter focuses on mistakes of Chinese learners in Czech DPs. More specifically, when modifying a noun, Chinese students use a nominal attribute instead of the correct denominal adjective.
It is claimed that the phrase structure of DPs in both languages is the same and that it is the strength and interpretability of features on functional heads that underlies the different forms and interpretations in the two languages. In this view, language variation is a matter of feature specification.
L2 acquisition thus consists of switching the analyticity/syntheticity parameter, namely resetting the parameter of feature strength and interpretability, which is responsible for, inter alia, the form of attributes in Czech and Chinese DPs.
