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Abstract
The aim of this article is to analyse the acquisition of object-verb/verb-object word order in Spanish and Basque by monolinguals (L1), early simultaneous bilinguals (2L1) and successive bilinguals, exposed to their second language before ages 5-6 (child L2). In this study, the second language (child L2) is acquired naturalistically, in a preschool setting with no formal instruction for the Basque L2 speakers and by environmental contact for the Spanish L2 speakers. Spanish and Basque are differentiated by their canonical word order as subject-verb-object and subject-object-verb, respectively. In Spanish, the subject-verb-object order is predominant (almost exclusive) in narrative contexts, whereas in Basque, both object-verb and verb-object word orders are possible in these contexts for pragmatic reasons, with a similar use in everyday language. The productions of a few L1 and 2L1 subjects are analysed longitudinally within the 1;06-3;00 age span. Cross-sectional data from 49 subjects who developed a child L2 are analysed at ages 5 and 8. The results reveal that the bilingual children apply the same syntactic patterns as the monolinguals in their respective languages independently of 2L1 or child L2 acquisition.
Keywords
child L2 acquisition, cross-linguistic influence in child L2 acquisition, early simultaneous bilingualism (2L1), influence of age of onset in child L2 acquisition, influence of length of exposure in child L2 acquisition, object-verb/verb-object word order acquisition
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Introduction
During the past decades, the long-lasting discussion referring to the possible fusion or separation of linguistic codes in bilingual first-language acquisition (BFLA) seems to have faded away. Gradually, the separation hypothesis has gained ground, reinforced by a variety of studies on early bilingualism in different languages: Dutch and English (De Houwer, 1995), German and French (Meisel, 1994, 2001), French and English (Genesee, Nicoladis, & Paradis, 1995), English and Spanish (Deuchar & Quay, 2000), Norwegian and English (Lanza, 1997), Catalan and Spanish (Bel, 2001) and Basque and Spanish (Almgren & Barreña, 2001; Ezeizabarrena, 1996).
However, the classical opposition between single code and separation of codes has also been somewhat reconsidered, bringing about a change in approach concerning concepts such as cross- linguistic influence or transfer, which are not necessarily interpreted as an inevitable fusion or code mixing. As pointed out by Lanza (1998) and Müller (1998), such phenomena in bilingual...