Article published in:
Advances in Spanish as a Heritage Language
Edited by Diego Pascual y Cabo
[Studies in Bilingualism 49] 2016
► pp. 99–124

Losing your case? Dative experiencers in Mexican Spanish and heritage speakers in the United States

| University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
This chapter examines the gradual loss of dative case marking with dative experiencer verbs among Spanish heritage speakers of Mexican-American origin, first generation adult immigrants from Mexico, and two control groups of Spanish native speakers from Mexico tested in Mexico. According to the results of the written production task, heritage speakers and adult immigrants tend to omit the “a” with gustar-type verbs whereas the native speakers from Mexico do not omit a-marking in written production. Interestingly all bilingual groups, and even several native speakers from Mexico accepted ungrammatical sentences without a-marking in the acceptability judgment task. These results suggest that the erosion of dative case marking with dative experiencer subjects is a tendency already present in the monolingual variety. Although incomplete acquisition and attrition due to insufficient input and use may lead to an eventually different grammar in first and second generation immigrants, the results of this study support the claim that a language contact situation accelerates changes already in progress in monolingual varieties (Silva-Corvalán, 1994). ungrammatical sentences without a-marking in the acceptability judgment task
Published online: 20 July 2016
https://doi.org/10.1075/sibil.49.06mon
References
Amaral, L., & Roeper, T
(2014) Multiple grammars and second language representations. Second Language Research, 30, 3–36. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Belletti, A., & Rizzi, L
(1988) Psych-Verbs and θ-Theory. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory, 6, 291–352. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Benmamoun, E., Montrul, S., & Polinsky, M
(2013a) Keynote article. Heritage languages and their speakers: Opportunities and challenges for linguistics. Theoretical Linguistics, 39, 129–181. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2013b) Defining and “ideal” heritage speaker: Theoretical and methodological challenges. Reply to peer commentaries. Theoretical Linguistics, 39, 259–294. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bowles, M
(2011) Measuring implicit and explicit linguistic knowledge: What can heritage language learners contribute? Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 33, 247–272. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bruhn de Garavito, J
(2003) Knowledge of clitic doubling in Spanish. Evidence against pattern learning. In R. Slabakova, S. Montrul, & P. Prévost (Eds.), Inquiries in linguistic development. In honor of Lydia White (pp. 305–333). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Butt, M
(2006) Theories of Case. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, N
(1981) Lectures on Government and Binding. Dordrecht: Foris.Google Scholar
Dvorak, T., & Kirschner, C
(1982) Mary likes fishes: Reverse psychological phenomena in New York Puerto Rican Spanish. Bilingual Review, 9, 59–65.Google Scholar
Eythórsson, T
(2000) Dative vs. nominative: Changes in quirky subjects in Icelandic. In D. Nelson & P. Foulkes (Eds.), Leeds Working Papers in Linguistics, 8, 27–44.Google Scholar
Flege, J., Mackay, I., & Piske, T
(2002) Assessing bilingual dominance. Applied Psycholinguistics, 23, 567–598. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Huffines, M
(1989) Case usage among the Pennsylvania German sectarian and nonsectarians. In N. Dorian (Ed.), Investigating obsolescence. Studies in language contraction and death (pp. 211–226). Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Larmouth, D
(1974) Differential interference in American Finnish cases. Language, 50, 356–66. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Lightfoot, D
(1991) How to set parameters. Arguments from language change. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
(1999) The development of language: Acquisition, change, and evolution. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
In press). Imperfect transmission and discontinuity. In A. Ledgway & I. Roberts (Eds.) Cambridge handbook of historical syntax Cambridge CUP
Maandi, K
(1989) Estonian among immigrants in Sweden. In N. Dorian (Ed.), Investigating Obsolescence. Studies in Language Contraction and Death (pp. 227–242). Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
MacWhorter, J
(2007) Language interrupted. Signs of non-native acquisition in standard language grammars. Oxford: OUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Masullo, P
(1992) Incorporation and case theory in Spanish. A crosslinguistic perspective. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. The University of Washington, Seattle.Google Scholar
Meisel, J. Elsig, M., & Rinke, E
(2013) Language acquisition and change. A morphosyntactic perspective. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Moag, R
(1995) Semi-native speakers. How to hold and mold them. In V. Gambhir (Ed.), The teaching and acquisition of South Asian languages (pp. 168–181). Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Montrul, S
(1996) Clitic-doubled dative subjects in Spanish. In K. Zagona (Ed.), Grammatical theory and Romance languages (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 133) (pp. 183–195). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(1997) On the parallels between diachronic change and interlanguage grammars: the L2 acquisition of the Spanish dative case system. Spanish Applied Linguistics, 1, 87–113.Google Scholar
(2004) Subject and object expression in Spanish heritage speakers: A case of morpho-syntactic convergence. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 7, 125–142. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2008) Incomplete acquisition in bilingualism. Re-examining the age factor (Studies in Bilingualism 39). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2011) Morphological errors in Spanish second language learners and heritage speakers. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 33, 155–161. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2014) Searching for the roots of structural changes in the Spanish of the United States. Lingua, 151, 177–196. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2016) The acquisition of heritage languages. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Montrul, S., & Bowles, M
(2009) Back to basics: Differential object marking under incomplete acquisition in Spanish heritage speakers. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 12, 363–383. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2010) Is grammar instruction beneficial for heritage language learners? Dative case marking in Spanish. The Heritage Language Journal, 7(1), 47–73.Google Scholar
Montrul, S., & Sánchez-Walker, N
(2013) Differential object marking in child and adult Spanish heritage speakers. Language Acquisition, 20, 109–132. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Montrul, S., Bhatt, R., Bhatia, A
(2012) Erosion of case and agreement in Hindi heritage Speakers. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 2, 141–176. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Montrul, S., Bhatt, R., & Girju, R
(2015) Differential object marking in Spanish, Hindi and Romanian as heritage languages. Language, 91(3), 564-610. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Montrul, S., Foote, R., & Perpiñán, S
(2008) Gender agreement in adult second language learners and Spanish heritage speakers: The effects of age and context of acquisition. Language Learning, 58(3), 503–553. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Otheguy, R., & Zentella, A.C
(2012) Spanish in New York. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Pascual y Cabo, D
(2013) Agreement reflexes of emerging optionality in heritage speaker Spanish. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. University of Florida.Google Scholar
Pires, A., & Rothman, J
(2009) Disentangling sources of incomplete acquisition: An explanation for competence divergence across heritage grammar. International Journal of Bilingualism, 13(2), 1–28. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Polinsky, M
(2006) Incomplete acquisition: American Russian. Journal of Slavic Linguistics, 14, 191–262.Google Scholar
de Prada Pérez, A., & Pascual y Cabo, D
(2011) Invariable gusta in the Spanish of heritage Speakers in the U.S. In J. Hershenschon & D. Tanner (Eds.), Proceedings of the 11th Generative Approaches to Second Language Acquisition (GASLA). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project.Google Scholar
Rothman, J
(2007) Heritage speaker competence differences, language change and input type: Inflected infinitives in heritage Brazilian Portuguese. International Journal of Bilingualism, 11(4), 359–389. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Schmidt, A
(1985) Young People's Dyirbal. An Example of Language Death from Australia. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar
Silva-Corvalán, C
(1994) Language contact and change: Spanish in Los Angeles. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Song, M., O’Grady, W., Cho, S., & Lee, M
(1997) The learning and teaching of Korean in community schools. In Y.-H. Kim (Ed.), Korean language in America 2 (pp. 111–127). Honolulu, HI: American Association of Teachers of Korean.Google Scholar
Toribio, A.J., & Nye, C
(2006) Restructuring of reverse psychological predicates. In New perspectives on Romance linguistics, Vol.1: Morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 275) (pp. 263–277). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Woolford, E
(2006) Lexical case, inherent case and argument structure. Linguistic Inquiry, 37, 111–130. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Zobolou, K
(2011) Attrition in Greek diaspora: Grammars in contact or incomplete acquisition? In K. Ihemere (Ed.), Language contact and language shift: Grammatical and sociolinguistic perspectives (Lincom Studies in Language Typology 17). Munich: Lincom.Google Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Coskun Kunduz, Aylin & Silvina Montrul
2022. Sources of variability in the acquisition of Differential Object Marking by Turkish heritage language children in the United States. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition ► pp. 1 ff. Crossref logo
Pascual y Cabo, Diego
2020. Examining the role of cross-generational attrition in the development of Spanish as a heritage language. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 10:1 ► pp. 86 ff. Crossref logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 30 march 2022. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.