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Article published In:
Pragmatics & Cognition
Vol. 24:2 (2017) ► pp.212–262

From conceptualization to constructions in Finnish as an L2

A case study

| University of Jyväskylä | University of Groningen
| University of Jyväskylä
| University of Groningen
| University of Groningen | University of Pannonia

This study traces the individual learning trajectories of an adult beginner L2 Finnish learner in expressing the extralinguistic concept of evaluation from a dynamic usage-based perspective. Our results provide support for the view of learner language as a dynamic system in which patterns wax and wane and in which a change in one component has the potential to affect the whole system. In the early stages of learning there was a strong preference to use lexical verbs first, and then adjectives. The study also shows that variability plays a role. Finally, the study confirms that the learning of L2 constructions is in some cases item based. However, another highly frequent and superficially similar verbal construction in our data did not develop from a fixed formula. The role of instruction and the learner’s explicit knowledge as well as possibly input frequencies may have played a role in the different developmental trajectories.

Keywords: second language development, usage-based approach, conceptualizations, dynamic systems, constructions
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The language of evaluation in Finnish
  • 3.L2 development from a usage-based perspective
  • 4.L2 development from a dynamic usage-based perspective
  • 5.The study
  • 6.Method
    • 6.1Participant
    • 6.2Data collection
    • 6.3Data selection
    • 6.4Normalizing
    • 6.5Analysis
  • 7.Results
    • 7.1The dynamics of evaluation constructions over time
    • 7.2Diversification
    • 7.3Development of the haluta and tykätä constructions: Item-based construction growth
      • 7.3.1The haluta construction
      • 7.3.2The tykätä construction
  • 8.Discussion
  • 9.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 19 October 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/pc.17016.les
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