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Article published In:
Pedagogical Linguistics
Vol. 4:1 (2023) ► pp.98–117

Teaching English to Arab learners

The role of abstract linguistic knowledge

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Both ‘Educational Linguistics’ and ‘Pedagogical Linguistics’ have demonstrated the importance of linguistic knowledge in teaching/learning second/foreign languages. More recently, there have been concrete proposals that insights from formal linguistics and theoretical acquisition research may also play a role in pedagogy. Indeed, many observed difficulties in L2 can be traced back to lack of knowledge, on the part of teachers, of certain abstract linguistic concepts. In this paper, two English constructions (constructions with Object pronouns and DP-internal concord) claimed to be problematic for the learner/teacher in the absence of any linguistic knowledge will be investigated in terms of their abstract properties. The implication is that such linguistic knowledge will speed up the process of learning. This will be supported by previous findings on aspectual contrasts in English and Arabic where such knowledge clearly obtains, causing the learning process to be relatively rapid. Evidence for the presence of this knowledge in the learners comes from observation of the transitional stages in the learning process which indicate that the learner is on the right track to learning. The research hypothesis will be argued to have significant implications for teaching, and thus, if correct, will corroborate some recent findings.

Keywords: aspectual contrasts, DP-internal concord, L1 Arabic, L2 English, object pronouns, pedagogy
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The Linguistics of English Object Pronouns and their L2 Acquisition
    • 2.1Description, Features and Learning Tasks
  • 3.The Linguistics of English DP-Internal Concord and its acquisition
    • 3.1Description
    • 3.2Analysis
    • 3.3Features and Learning Tasks
  • 4.Evidence for the proposed analysis: Present tense aspectual contrasts in English and Arabic
  • 5.Implications for language pedagogy as contributed by formal Linguistics and research on the acquisition of grammar
    • 5.1Teaching English object pronouns to native speakers of Arabic
    • 5.2Teaching English DP-internal concord to native speakers of Arabic
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 25 May 2021
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https://doi.org/10.1075/pl.21007.che
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