This article identifies empirical evidence (Dao, 2007; in preparation) conflicting with Processability Theory's (PT) prediction that in acquisition of English as a second language (ESL), plural-marking emerges first in bare nouns and only later in numeric expressions. Specifically, it presents results from Dao's (2007) cross-sectional study of ESL in 36 Vietnamese learners, which was designed to test PT's predictions that inflections emerge in lexical contexts before agreement in phrasal contexts, but found that emergence occurred in the reverse order. The article explores whether Dao's findings invalidate PT's crosslinguistic principles or whether there is a problem in applying these to language-specific empirical contexts. The exploration reveals weaknesses in the description of PT's principles, as these are based on implicit assumptions, which may be invalid in specific first language / second language (L1/L2) typological contexts and thus lead to incorrect predictions. The findings are explained by reference to L1 transfer represented in the framework of one of PT's feeder theories: Levelt's (1989) Theory of Speaking as modelled in Weaver++ (Levelt et al., 1999). Our L1 transfer account is in line with PT's Developmentally Moderated Transfer Hypothesis. Keywordsacquisition of ESL nominal plural, English second language acquisition, acquisition of plurality, acquisition of number, cognitive linguistics

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Research by Miriam Meyerhoff, Elaine Ballard, Helen Charters, Alexandra Birchfield and Catherine I. Watson examines the impact of migration on the phonology of Auckland English, focusing on the variable realisation of the definite article in New Zealand’s largest and most multicultural city. Their research is based on conversational data from 70 people, male and female, younger and older, from three ethnographically distinct areas of the city. Their pronunciation of the was tested before a following vowel, in stressed or non-stressed NPs, to see if the standard [ði] was used rather than [ðɘ]. Multivariate analysis showed that [ɘ] is becoming more typical before vowel-initial NPs in all three areas of Auckland, even more so in South Auckland, which has been most ethnically diverse for the longest. Evidence also suggests [ɘ] is spreading rapidly among younger speakers in the other two communities. These pronunciation changes are thus associated with migration and higher levels of multilingualism in the community and support the claim that high levels of diversity in communities favour the emergence of new and distinct regional features.

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