Dagmar Bittner | ZAS - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Dagmar Bittner
In the present paper, I will argue that even in a language like German, where the verb system doe... more In the present paper, I will argue that even in a language like German, where the verb system does not contain a grammaticized aspect distinction, aspectual features do underlie the early form-function-mapping of verb forms in L1-acquisition. Furthermore, it will be argued that it is not only past tense forms that may receive an aspectual interpretation in early child language but also other forms of the verbal input. In the case of German, these are the forms of the present tense paradigm and the past participle. Showing and discussing various pieces of evidence for this assumption should strengthen the "aspect before tense" or "primacy of aspect" hypothesis. In general, the paper aims at a deeper understanding of the hierarchical relation between tense and aspect whereby aspect is the basic category and, therefore, aspectual features are the inevitable starting point of the acquisition of grammar.
Folia Linguistica, 2006
The paper discusses the acquisition of pronominal forms in German-speaking children. Main emphasi... more The paper discusses the acquisition of pronominal forms in German-speaking children. Main emphasis lies on the development of the form paradigms of definite pronouns and articles which are formally identical in German (except of the genitive forms which are not acquired in the early phase) and the functional content of the contrasting definite forms in early child grammar. On the base of an analysis of various types of overgeneralizations, it is argued here that children first acquire the lexico-semantic content related to definiteness, then functional features related to case distinctions and only later on functional features related to gender distinctions. On the contrary to previous investigations, the derived hypothesis is that a uniform case paradigm is the starting point in the acquisition of the paradigmatic relations. Gender, as a productive component of paradigm structure is realized by the child only later on. In general, the observed developments confirm assumptions of Natural Morphology and other functional theoretical concepts on the principles of paradigm organization.
Ausnahmsweise handelt es sich bei diesem 31. Band der ZAS-Papers in Linguistics nicht um Ergebnis... more Ausnahmsweise handelt es sich bei diesem 31. Band der ZAS-Papers in Linguistics nicht um Ergebnisse aus der aktuellen Forschungstätigkeit des ZAS, sondern um eine schon vor der Gründung des ZAS geschriebene und verteidigte Dissertationsschrift. Ich bedanke mich sehr herzlich für die freundliche Erlaubnis den Charakter der working papers in diesem Fall durchbrechen zu dürfen. Dieser Dank geht natürlich vor allem an Manfred Krifka, den Direktor des ZAS.
The study examines the hypotheses that the acquisition of the finite verb is an indispensable and... more The study examines the hypotheses that the acquisition of the finite verb is an indispensable and linking constituent of the development of SVO utterances. Four apparently separate or at least separable processes are analysed over 6 months in one Russian and one German child: a) the emergence of verbs in the child's utterances, b) the occurrence of correctly inflected (finite) verb forms, c) the development of multi-component utterances containing a verb, and c) the emergence of (potential) subjects and objects. Russian and German exhibit rich verb morphology, and in both languages finiteness is strongly correlated with inflectional categories like person, number and tense. With both children we find a correlation in the temporal order of these four processes and -what is more relevant for our study -a dependency of a certain development on the utterance level on the emergence of finite verbs. Further, our investigation shows that language-specific development comes in to play already when children start to acquire verb inflection and becomes more contrastive when we observe the onset of the production of the SVO utterances. * We are very thankful to Jason Mattausch for his comments on this paper. 1 For this study we analysed only utterances with direct objects.
The various different occurrences of -er in the morphology of German (e.g. in agentive and instru... more The various different occurrences of -er in the morphology of German (e.g. in agentive and instrumental nouns, in comparatives, iteratives and intensifiers) are generally treated as being homonymous. In other words, just as in the case of full lexemes (e.g. Kiefer(knochen) 'jaw bone' vs. Kiefer(baum) 'fir tree'), it is assumed that different suffixes exist and that it is merely coincidental that they have an identical phonetic realisation. As far back as Germanic, the source of this identity-of-form has been taken to lie in reduction of the final syllable, whereby the process of phonological reduction has created identical suffixes from ones that were previously formally distinct. Our aim is to illustrate that in the case of nominal -er forms, there is good reason not to attribute identity of form simply to the 'blind application' of phonological rules. On the one hand, there are various aspects of the historical development which simply cannot be accounted for by recourse to phonological rules. This will be made clear through analysis of historical grammars and related literature. On the other hand, those categories that are formed with -er share common grammatico-semantic features. This too is often hinted at in the historical grammars and may be corroborated by an analysis of the grammatical features involved. Our findings thus motivate the following claim: The emergence of identical forms is not coincidental. Rather, alongside phonological rules, the emergence of identical forms is driven by more global principles of structure-formation, in particular by the principle of 'one form = one function'. Instead of different -er suffixes, there is in fact just one suffix which symbolises the iterative feature structure common to the -er marked categories.
First Language, 2012
This article investigates the acquisition of pronominal resolution as a process instantiated at t... more This article investigates the acquisition of pronominal resolution as a process instantiated at the syntax–discourse interface. Based on current psycholinguistic proposals concerning the gradual development from a more context-driven towards a linguistically constrained representation of discourse referents, we conducted an experimental study investigating the impact of the antecedent properties animacy and syntactic role on the resolution of personal and demonstrative
In anaphora resolution theory, it has been assumed that anaphora resolution is based on a reverse... more In anaphora resolution theory, it has been assumed that anaphora resolution is based on a reversed mapping of antecedent salience and anaphora complexity: minimal complex anaphora refer to maximal salient antecedents. In order to examine whether and by which developmental steps German children gain command of this mapping maxim we conducted an experiment on production and comprehension of intersentential pronouns including the three pronoun types zero, personal, and demonstrative pronoun. With respect to antecedent salience, the experiment varied syntactic role (subject/object) and in/animacy. Six age groups of children (age range from 2;0 to 6;0) and an adult control group has been tested. The hypothesis arising from the mapping maxim is that zero pronoun correlates with more salient antecedents than personal and demonstrative pronoun, the latter correlating with the least salient antecedents. The results are: In production, children first establish the opposition of zero pronoun with animate antecedents vs. demonstrative pronoun with inanimate antecedents. In a next step, syntactic role comes into play and a more complex system opposing the three presented pronoun types is established. In comprehension, however, the effect of pronoun type remains weak and antecedent features remain a strong factor in reference choice. However, also adults employ pronoun type and antecedent features. The oldest children and the adults show variation in personal pronoun resolution according to the animacy pattern of the potential antecedents. In case of identical animacy features, the subject is the preferred candidate; in case of distinct animacy features, there is a tendency to choose the object antecedent.
In the present paper, I will argue that even in a language like German, where the verb system doe... more In the present paper, I will argue that even in a language like German, where the verb system does not contain a grammaticized aspect distinction, aspectual features do underlie the early form-function-mapping of verb forms in L1-acquisition. Furthermore, it will be argued that it is not only past tense forms that may receive an aspectual interpretation in early child language but also other forms of the verbal input. In the case of German, these are the forms of the present tense paradigm and the past participle. Showing and discussing various pieces of evidence for this assumption should strengthen the "aspect before tense" or "primacy of aspect" hypothesis. In general, the paper aims at a deeper understanding of the hierarchical relation between tense and aspect whereby aspect is the basic category and, therefore, aspectual features are the inevitable starting point of the acquisition of grammar.
Folia Linguistica, 2006
The paper discusses the acquisition of pronominal forms in German-speaking children. Main emphasi... more The paper discusses the acquisition of pronominal forms in German-speaking children. Main emphasis lies on the development of the form paradigms of definite pronouns and articles which are formally identical in German (except of the genitive forms which are not acquired in the early phase) and the functional content of the contrasting definite forms in early child grammar. On the base of an analysis of various types of overgeneralizations, it is argued here that children first acquire the lexico-semantic content related to definiteness, then functional features related to case distinctions and only later on functional features related to gender distinctions. On the contrary to previous investigations, the derived hypothesis is that a uniform case paradigm is the starting point in the acquisition of the paradigmatic relations. Gender, as a productive component of paradigm structure is realized by the child only later on. In general, the observed developments confirm assumptions of Natural Morphology and other functional theoretical concepts on the principles of paradigm organization.
Ausnahmsweise handelt es sich bei diesem 31. Band der ZAS-Papers in Linguistics nicht um Ergebnis... more Ausnahmsweise handelt es sich bei diesem 31. Band der ZAS-Papers in Linguistics nicht um Ergebnisse aus der aktuellen Forschungstätigkeit des ZAS, sondern um eine schon vor der Gründung des ZAS geschriebene und verteidigte Dissertationsschrift. Ich bedanke mich sehr herzlich für die freundliche Erlaubnis den Charakter der working papers in diesem Fall durchbrechen zu dürfen. Dieser Dank geht natürlich vor allem an Manfred Krifka, den Direktor des ZAS.
The study examines the hypotheses that the acquisition of the finite verb is an indispensable and... more The study examines the hypotheses that the acquisition of the finite verb is an indispensable and linking constituent of the development of SVO utterances. Four apparently separate or at least separable processes are analysed over 6 months in one Russian and one German child: a) the emergence of verbs in the child's utterances, b) the occurrence of correctly inflected (finite) verb forms, c) the development of multi-component utterances containing a verb, and c) the emergence of (potential) subjects and objects. Russian and German exhibit rich verb morphology, and in both languages finiteness is strongly correlated with inflectional categories like person, number and tense. With both children we find a correlation in the temporal order of these four processes and -what is more relevant for our study -a dependency of a certain development on the utterance level on the emergence of finite verbs. Further, our investigation shows that language-specific development comes in to play already when children start to acquire verb inflection and becomes more contrastive when we observe the onset of the production of the SVO utterances. * We are very thankful to Jason Mattausch for his comments on this paper. 1 For this study we analysed only utterances with direct objects.
The various different occurrences of -er in the morphology of German (e.g. in agentive and instru... more The various different occurrences of -er in the morphology of German (e.g. in agentive and instrumental nouns, in comparatives, iteratives and intensifiers) are generally treated as being homonymous. In other words, just as in the case of full lexemes (e.g. Kiefer(knochen) 'jaw bone' vs. Kiefer(baum) 'fir tree'), it is assumed that different suffixes exist and that it is merely coincidental that they have an identical phonetic realisation. As far back as Germanic, the source of this identity-of-form has been taken to lie in reduction of the final syllable, whereby the process of phonological reduction has created identical suffixes from ones that were previously formally distinct. Our aim is to illustrate that in the case of nominal -er forms, there is good reason not to attribute identity of form simply to the 'blind application' of phonological rules. On the one hand, there are various aspects of the historical development which simply cannot be accounted for by recourse to phonological rules. This will be made clear through analysis of historical grammars and related literature. On the other hand, those categories that are formed with -er share common grammatico-semantic features. This too is often hinted at in the historical grammars and may be corroborated by an analysis of the grammatical features involved. Our findings thus motivate the following claim: The emergence of identical forms is not coincidental. Rather, alongside phonological rules, the emergence of identical forms is driven by more global principles of structure-formation, in particular by the principle of 'one form = one function'. Instead of different -er suffixes, there is in fact just one suffix which symbolises the iterative feature structure common to the -er marked categories.
First Language, 2012
This article investigates the acquisition of pronominal resolution as a process instantiated at t... more This article investigates the acquisition of pronominal resolution as a process instantiated at the syntax–discourse interface. Based on current psycholinguistic proposals concerning the gradual development from a more context-driven towards a linguistically constrained representation of discourse referents, we conducted an experimental study investigating the impact of the antecedent properties animacy and syntactic role on the resolution of personal and demonstrative
In anaphora resolution theory, it has been assumed that anaphora resolution is based on a reverse... more In anaphora resolution theory, it has been assumed that anaphora resolution is based on a reversed mapping of antecedent salience and anaphora complexity: minimal complex anaphora refer to maximal salient antecedents. In order to examine whether and by which developmental steps German children gain command of this mapping maxim we conducted an experiment on production and comprehension of intersentential pronouns including the three pronoun types zero, personal, and demonstrative pronoun. With respect to antecedent salience, the experiment varied syntactic role (subject/object) and in/animacy. Six age groups of children (age range from 2;0 to 6;0) and an adult control group has been tested. The hypothesis arising from the mapping maxim is that zero pronoun correlates with more salient antecedents than personal and demonstrative pronoun, the latter correlating with the least salient antecedents. The results are: In production, children first establish the opposition of zero pronoun with animate antecedents vs. demonstrative pronoun with inanimate antecedents. In a next step, syntactic role comes into play and a more complex system opposing the three presented pronoun types is established. In comprehension, however, the effect of pronoun type remains weak and antecedent features remain a strong factor in reference choice. However, also adults employ pronoun type and antecedent features. The oldest children and the adults show variation in personal pronoun resolution according to the animacy pattern of the potential antecedents. In case of identical animacy features, the subject is the preferred candidate; in case of distinct animacy features, there is a tendency to choose the object antecedent.