Focus, prosody, and subject positions in L3 Spanish

Abstract

This paper investigates the acquisition of focus-induced word order variation by German learners of L3 Spanish, thereby comparing monolingual learners and multilinguals who speak Italian or European Portuguese (EP) as a heritage language in addition to their dominant language. Special attention is given to the position of focused subjects ([F S]) in non-complex declaratives. In accordance with Rothman’s (2010, 2011) Typological Primacy Model (TPM), we hypothesize that the multilingual learners behave more target-like than the monolinguals given that Italian and EP are typologically closer to Spanish than German and pattern with the target language with respect to the post-verbal position of [F S] in sentences lacking an overt object determiner phrase (DP). Based on elicited production data and a grammaticality judgment task, it is shown that the multilingual learners have only a slight advantage over the monolinguals, depending on their metalinguistic knowledge. This suggests that the predictions made by the TPM do not necessarily hold for the special case of foreign language learning by heritage speakers.