Re: I'm back, sort of
| From: | BP Jonsson <bpj@...> |
|---|
| Date: | Tuesday, September 23, 2003, 9:16 |
|---|
At 11:17 22.9.2003 -0400, H. S. Teoh wrote:
>Now here's an interesting observation for you chomskians and
>anti-chomskians: although I've largely lost vocabulary of languages that I
>don't have a chance to use frequently, I still more-or-less retain a good
>grasp of the grammar. Every time I struggle to find a word, it seems like
>the grammatical structure is already correctly formed in my mind; only the
>word-slots are left empty while I grope for the words themselves.
I have experienced this too, frequently. I have also understood that I
belong to a minority. A friend of mine had a fairly large German vocabulary
but strung it together according to Swedish grammar. My fathers English
was of the same kind, notwithsatanding his mother's excellent English.
On the issue of how and if ones L1 gets hit my experience is in fact
quite different. As a child I had Swedish and German as coequal L1:s,
but upon starting school I more or less stopped actively using German
on a day-to-day basis. The result is that my German now consists of a
decent vocabulary, a near-native phonology, but a very deteriorated or
underdeveloped grammar. OTOH while I was studying on Iceland the
community of mainland Scandinavian foreign students used a mixed common
vocabulary: that is some words and phrases (e.g. _skikkelig_ "real, decent"
were always used in their Norwegian form regardless of ones L1, and
likewise some phrases were always Swedish or Danish, plus of course a good
sprinkling of Icelandic phrases. Upon returning to Sweden, or speaking
on the phone to people in Sweden, or to out-group Swedes, I had to make
an effort not to use this mixed vocabulary.
/BP 8^)
--
B.Philip Jonsson mailto:melrochX@melroch.se (delete X)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~__
A h-ammen ledin i phith! \ \
__ ____ ____ _____________ ____ __ __ __ / /
\ \/___ \\__ \ /___ _____/\ \\__ \\ \ \ \\ \ / /
/ / / / / \ / /Melroch\ \_/ // / / // / / /
/ /___/ /_ / /\ \ / /Gaestan ~\_ // /__/ // /__/ /
/_________//_/ \_\/ /Eowine __ / / \___/\_\\___/\_\
Gwaedhvenn Angeliniel\ \______/ /a/ /_h-adar Merthol naun
~~~~~~~~~Kuinondil~~~\________/~~\__/~~~Noolendur~~~~~~
|| Lenda lenda pellalenda pellatellenda kuivie aiya! ||
"A coincidence, as we say in Middle-Earth" (JRR Tolkien)