The Department of French & Italian presents a Gertrude Force Weathers lecture by
Cheryl Frenck Mestre
Learning French Late: An On-line Look at the Factors that Affect Learning
Thursday, March
20, 2008
5:30 pm
Maple Room, Indiana Memorial
Union
Reception preceding the talk,
at 5:00 pm
Abstract: In the present talk I will discuss a series of recent ERP experiments performed in my laboratory on L2 syntactic processing as performed by adult native speakers of German, Spanish and English acquiring French. On the one hand, the role of the constraints of the speakers' native language will be explored. Indeed, it is not surprising that the areas of linguistic competence where even highly proficient L2 users fall short of native competence are those where the native and second language differ as concerns grammatical categories and/or how their features are parameterized. Whether the absence of a feature in the native language actually precludes the attainment of this feature in the second language or only retards its development will be addressed. On the other hand, I will attempt to delineate some of the factors over and above shared features that may play a role in acquiring grammatical competence in a late-learned language. In particular, the co-variation between morphology and phonology in French and how such may influence learning will be examined.
About the Speaker: Cheryl Frenck Mestre is Directeur de Recherche at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and head of the laboratoire Parole et Langage at the Université de Provence. She is also professor of psycholinguistics and cognitive psychology at the Université de Provence, Aix-Marseille I. She has published extensively in the fields of speech production and perception, syntax, semantic processing/lexical access, and number processing. Her most recent articles include “The effect of phonological realization of inflectional morphology on verbal agreement in French; Evidence from ERPs” (Acta Psychologica) and “The activation of semantic memory: Effects of prime exposure, prime-target relationship and task demands” (Memory & Cognition).
Part of the Gertrude Force Weathers Lecture series of the Department of French and Italian. Additional support from the Mary-Margaret Barr Koon Fund and the Departments of Linguistics and Second Language Studies.
If you have a disability and need assistance, accommodations can be made to meet most needs. Please call 855-5458.
