A functional approach to the attainability of typological targets in L2 acquisition
This paper proposes a functional, parsing-based approach to the attainability of typological targets in L1 and L2 acquisition. Ideally, there should be a functional synchronization between the order in which principles constituting typological values emerge in learner grammars and the computational demands imposed by the simplest data instantiating a typological value. In L2 acquisition this functional synchronization is jeopardized by the possibility of L1-inspired misparses which may impute more structure to an input string than is consistent with a minimal parse. As a result, the more marked typological setting or the implicans of two grammatical principles in a relationship of logical entailment can appear first in interlanguage grammars. In L1 acquisition, on the other hand, misparses appear to be the result of assuming too little structure. Because of these differences, recovery from an inappropriate value follows different courses in L1 and L2 acquisition. It is proposed that this difference has important implications for the learn-ability of first and second languages.