Morphology & Pragmatic acquisit ion

6th LectureMs.Hajar ALmansour

Developing Morphology Morphology : a branch of linguistics that studies and

describes patterns of word formation, including inflection, derivation, and compounding of a language.

A morpheme : is the smallest meaningful unit in the grammar of a language.

By the time a child is two-and-a-half years old, he or she is going beyond telegraphic speech forms and incorporating some of the inflectional morphemes that indicate the grammatical function of the nouns and verbs used.

Developing Morphology-Ing form

- The first inflection to appear is usually the -ing form in expressions such as :

cat sitting and mommy reading book

REGULAR PLURALS:The next morphological development is typically the marking of

regular plurals with the –s form, as in boys and cats The acquisition of the plural marker is often accompanied by a

process of overgeneralization.OVERGENERALIZATION: The child overgeneralizes the

apparent rule of adding –s to form plurals and will talk about foots and mans.

When the alternative pronunciation of the plural morpheme used in houses

)i.e. ending in [-əz])comes into use, it too is given an overgeneralized application and forms such as boyses or footses can be heard.

IRREGULAR PLURALS: At the same time as this overgeneralization is

taking place, some children also begin using irregular plurals such as men

quite appropriately for a while, but then try out the general rule on the forms, producing expressions like some mens and two feets , or even two feetses .

FORMS OF VERB ‘TO BE’

At about the same time, different forms of the verb‘ to be’, such as are and was , begin to be used. The appearance of forms such as was , and at about the same time, went and came should be noted. These are irregular past-tense forms that we would not expect to hear before the more regular forms.

Adding –s & -ed:

The use of possessive ‘s’ appears example :‘mommy’s bag’

The –ed for past tense appears and it is also overgeneralized as in ‘goed’ or holded’

Finally –s marker for 3rd person singular preset tense appear with full verbs first then with auxiliaries (does-has)

Developing Pragmatics :The acquisition of pragmatics involves

developing competence in the communicative uses of sentences, especially in speech acts, conversations, speech registers, and extended speaking turns, or “discourse.” Children learn to create “texts,” sequences of at least two related sentences through the experience of scaffolded conversations in the context of action. Their texts become progressively more decontextualized, referring to others’ reactions, intentions and interpretations of events (Theory of Mind), as well as the events themselves .

Research on the acquisit ion of pragmatics in f irst language learning focuses on four major

aspects of communicative competence :

1. Developing speech acts or the communicative functions of sentences in conversation. For example, using utterances to report events, to make statements (or declarations) about the world, to request information or action, or to prohibit an action .

2. Emerging conversational skill : in face-to-face verbal interaction. These include knowing when and how to take a turn in conversation; how to initiate, elaborate, or terminate a topic; and how to respond to a speaker in keeping with the pragmatic constraints set by the preceding utterance (e.g., direct question forms demand answers; indirect questions [“can you pass the salt?”] demand actions). They also include skills in detecting the presence and source of any breakdown in communication and knowing how to repair such breakdowns.

3. Adjusting one’s language to fit the social context of the conversation in keeping with cultural conventions and social roles . These involve issues of politeness, formality, and the age or status of one’s listener in what have been called “styles” or “registers” of speech.

4. Taking an extended turn to tell a story (narration), explain an event, give directions for how to make something or how to get somewhere, or to persuade one’s listener in an argument (exposit ion). These are referred to as different “genres” of extended discourse and require the organization of utterances into coherent and cohesive messages.

Developing Semantics

During the two-word stage children use their limited vocabulary to refer to a large number of unrelated objects.

Overextension: overextend the meaning of a word on the basis of similarities of shape, sound, and size.e.g. use ball to refer to an apple, and egg, a grape and a ball.

This is followed by a gradual process of narrowing down.