Sociolinguistic Variation in the Speech of Learners of Chinese as a Second Language

Abstract

With Chinese native-speaker data as the baseline, this study investigates the use of the morphosyntactic particle DE ( ) by learners of Chinese as a second language. The general patterns are as follows: (a) DE tends to be deleted more in informal speech than in formal settings; (b) higher proficiency and longer residence in China-more interactions with native speakers-promote DE deletion; and (c) females tend to adopt more formal language style and use DE more than males. The study also found that teachers and textbooks use DE much more often than native speakers. Learners' patterns of DE use closely follow those of their teachers and textbooks, suggesting the necessity of explicit instruction in sociolinguistic variants in L2 classrooms.Keywords sociolinguistic variation; Chinese as a second language; sociolinguistics; second language acquisition; Chinese morphosyntactic particle It is not uncommon to find that even after many years of classroom language learning experiences, second language (L2) learners often find it difficult to produce sociolinguistically appropriate speech in authentic situations. Therefore, in recent decades, the development of L2 learners' sociolinguistic competence-"the ability to recognize and produce contextually appropriate language" (Lyster, 1993, p. 36)-has become a key issue and various sociolinguistic approaches, including the variationist approach, have increasingly attracted the attention of scholars in second language acquisition (SLA). Variationist researchers have convincingly argued that the acquisition of patterns of target language variation is an indispensable part of sociolinguistic I would like to thank Dr. Robert Bayley for his constant support and valuable comments on this project. Thanks also go to the College of Arts and Letters of Michigan State University for the funding on the writing-up of this article. I also thank the anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments. All of the errors remain mine.

An Investigation Into Second Language Aptitude for Advanced Chinese Language Learning

“…Such information may have implications for pedagogy. Chinese instruction for native English speakers could focus more on non‐L1‐like, Chinese conceptual patterns and ways of thinking that are different from English, in particular, explicit instruction on L2 speech and writing patterns in Chinese that have been shown to be extremely difficult for nonnative speakers of English to acquire because they do not conform to any rules or sequential patterns present in English (Li, , ). It has been proposed that profiling aptitudes could help match learners to instructional options and pedagogical tasks that would improve comprehension and production (Robinson, , ).…”

Comprehension of conversational implicature in L2 Chinese

“…However, only a few studies have examined pragmatics among L2 learners of Chinese (Hong 2011;Li S. 2012;Li, X. 2010;Zhang and Yu 2008).…”

Patterns of sociolinguistic variation in teacher classroom speech

“…Li () investigated the use of standard emphatic particle DE in the in‐class speech of Mandarin‐as‐a‐second‐language teachers. She found that the teachers used DE more frequently than did a small group of Mandarin native speakers recorded during semi‐directed informal interviews, reflecting the greater level of formality associated with the classroom context.…”

“…What the above research indicates is that some studies have begun to consider the connection between the teachers’ out‐of‐class frequency of variant use and the global frequencies found in the general population (Gervais et al., ; Poplack, ) and other studies have begun to investigate variant choice by language teachers in the classroom (Jia & Bayley, ; Li, ). However, other than our previous research, none of these studies has examined teachers’ variant choice in reference to the social marking of the variants in the wider community—they simply used global frequencies or no norms of reference at all.…”

“…The present study examines sociolinguistic variation in the in‐class speech of teachers, a topic examined by only a small number of variationist studies (see Jia & Bayley, ; Li, ; Mougeon & Rehner, , ). The teachers under study are native speakers of French and teach in the French‐medium secondary schools of four of Ontario's Francophone communities.…”