The Development of Past Tense Morphology in L2 Spanish: (22 Studies in Bilingualism)

This book presents an extended analysis of the development of L2 Spanish past tense morphology among L1 English-speaking learners. The study addresses three major questions: (1) what is the developmental pattern of acquisition of past tense verbal morphology among tutored learners? (2) what are the relevant factors that may account for the particular distribution of morphological endings (especially at the beginning stages)?, and (3) how does instruction affect the movement from one stage to the next? The analysis provides a reassessment of the general claim of Andersen’s lexical aspect hypothesis and proposes minor changes that may render the hypothesis more appropriate for, especially, L2 classroom learning. The study includes an overview of theoretical positions on the notion of lexical versus grammatical aspect, and a comparison of the findings from previous empirical studies on the development of past tense verbal morphology among both classroom and naturalistic learners.

Table of Contents:
1. Acknowledgments; 2. 1. Introduction; 3. 2. Aspect; 4. 3. The development of aspect in L1; 5. 4. The development of aspect in L2; 6. 5. Research methodology in the analysis of past tense morphology; 7. 6. Analysis of data sets; 8. 7. Developmental stages in the acquisition of Spanish past tense morphology; 9. Appendices; 10. References; 11. Name Index; 12. Subject Index

Review :
This book is interesting for various reasons. It offers some good theoretical information on aspect acquisition in general; it also offers a clear and well-designed analysis based on a good knowledge of earlier studies. The development of past tense morphology in L2 Spanish is thus not strictly addressed to researchers working on Spanish but also to those focussing on other languages, especially French. It finally also provides a good example of the interaction between linguistic description and applied linguistics: a trend that is beneficial to both fields. The constitutes a very important addition to the literature on the acquisition of tense-aspect in L2. I recommend it to readers interested in tense-aspect as well as in SLA processes. It should also be useful for teachers of Spanish because the book is highly readable and aspect is one of the areas most students have difficulty with.