Determining the Scope, Nature and Causes of Attrition in Adult L1 Grammars

Dear Colleagues,

This special issue seeks to bring together both conceptual and methodological discussions as well as showcase new empirical data on L1 attrition among late-sequential bilinguals. The aim is to further illustrate and explore the scope of attrition in adult L1 grammars and better determine the nature and underlying causes of this phenomenon.

Whilst an increasing number of empirical studies continue to inform our understanding of the grammatical properties that may be vulnerable to attrition and further demonstrate how attrition may manifest across a range of experimental tasks, recent discussions have highlighted a lack of consensus in the field regarding two core—and to an extent interrelated—aspects of L1 attrition in adulthood. The first aspect pertains to the scope of L1 attrition; the second concerns the nature, and, by extension, the causes of changes in mature L1 grammars. Consideration of both aspects raises important conceptual, empirical and methodological questions relevant not only for L1 attrition research, but also for investigating cross-linguisitc influence (CLI) and multilingualism more broadly.

Regarding the scope of L1 attrition effects, key questions include, but are not limted to:

• Should a fundamental distinction be made between attrition, on one hand, and broader cases of CLI, resulting from bilingualism more generally, on the other? Is such a distinction not only warranted but also desirable on conceptual grounds, as argued by Gürel (2017) and Tsimpli (2017), among others? Or, as proposed by Schmid and Köpke (2017a, 2017b), should all instances CLI detectable in the L1 from the onset of L2 acquisition be considered part of the same attrition phenomenon? Is it in fact possible to make a distinction between L1 attrition and more general CLI on empirical grounds? What would constitute key evidence to this effect? What kinds of experimental designs and/or methodologies could elicit such evidence? For example, are there patterns of attrition which only obtain in the L1s of bilinguals residing in an L2-speaking country but not in those of bilinguals residing in their L1 country?
• To what extent should attrition engendered by contact with a grammatically distinct L1 variety–be this an L1 dialect or closely related variety (e.g., Domínguez, 2013; Castro, Rothman and Westergaard, 2017) or already attrited L1 speech (e.g., Köpke, 2001; Laufer and Baladzhaeva, 2015) – be considered instances of the same phenomenon as attrition found in L2 contact situations? Are the patterns of attrition found in these input contexts in any way different to attrition found in L2 contact situations? (How) can we distinguish, both conceptually and methodologically, between instances of dialect contact-induced attrition and more sociolinguistically-driven phenomena such as accommodation? (a point raised by Iverson, 2020:184).

Regarding the nature and causes of L1 attrition effects, key questions include, among others:

• To what extent is attrition affecting the L1 morphosyntax, semantics, and/or phonology of late-sequential bilinguals the result of modification to the L1 representations themselves (i.e., changes to linguistic competence), as opposed to alterations to, or difficulties with, the processing of L1 grammatical properties, which may also affect how L1 representations are accessed in attrited grammars? Must representational changes necessarily be accompanied by processing changes (e.g., Sorace, 2011); can representational changes be independent of processing changes (e.g., Iverson, 2012; Hicks and Domínguez, 2020a, 2020b); or are representations in mature L1 grammars impervious to change entirely (e.g., Chamorro and Sorace, 2019; Sorace, 2020)?
• Crucially, how can we determine whether grammatical attrition among late-sequential bilinguals is due to modification to L1 representations vs. changes to/difficulties with L1 processing, or whether both are in fact at play? For example, can this be achieved through use of certain methodologies and/or experimental designs, as suggested by Montrul (2017), among others?
• To what extent is attrition affecting mature L1 grammars permanent? Are changes in some grammatical domains/to some grammatical properties more likely to be reversed than others? Are there certain input contexts which facilitate a reversal of L1 grammatical changes? What does the permanency or reversibility of attrition tell us about the nature of such changes?

We particularly welcome contributions which consider any of the aforementioned topics and questions/related questions. Additionally, we hope to solicit studies presenting new data on understudied or not previously tested grammatical properties (morphosyntactic, semantic, and phonological), data from novel language/language variety combinations, data from novel or understudied input contexts, and studies which apply novel or rarely employed experimental designs and/or methodologies to L1 attrition in order to shed light on the scope, nature and causes of this phenomenon.   

We request that, prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 400–600 words summarising their intended contribution. Please send these to the Guest Editors (lewis.baker@tu-braunschweig.de) or to the Languages Editorial Office (languages@mdpi.com). Abstracts will be reviewed by the Guest Editors for the purposes of ensuring proper fit within the scope of the special issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer-review.

Tentative completion schedule

• Abstract Submission Deadline: 29/12/2024
• Notification of Abstract Acceptance: 31/01/2025
• Full Manuscript Deadline: 01/08/2025

References:

Castro, T., Rothman, J. and Westergaard, M. (2017) ‘On the Directionality of Cross-Linguistic Effects in Bidialectal Bilingualism’, Frontiers in Psychology, 8(1382). doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01382.

Chamorro, G. and Sorace, A. (2019) ‘The Interface Hypothesis as a framework for studying L1 attrition’, in Schmid, M. S. and Köpke, B. (eds) Oxford Handbook of Language Attrition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 25–35. doi: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198793595.013.42.

Domínguez, L. (2013) Understanding Interfaces: Second language acquisition and first language attrition of Spanish subject realization and word order variation. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi: 10.1075/lald.55.

Gürel, A. (2017) ‘Is every bilingual an L1 attriter? The unbearable complexity of defining L1 attrition’, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 7(6), pp. 696–699. doi: 10.1075/lab.00007.gur.

Hicks, G. and Domínguez, L. (2020a) ‘A model for grammatical attrition’, Keynote Article in Second Language Research, 36(2), pp. 143–165. doi: 10.177/0267658319862011.

Hicks, G. and Domínguez, L. (2020b) ‘Modelling L1 grammatical attrition through language acquisition: A reply to comments’, Second Language Research, 36(2), pp. 231–239. doi: 10.177/026765831989785.

Iverson, M. (2012) Advanced language attrition of Spanish in contact with Brazilian Portuguese. PhD thesis. University of Iowa.

Iverson, M. (2020) ‘Unbridled attrition?’, Second Language Research, 36(2), pp. 183–186. doi: 1.o0r.g1/107.171/0772/6072675685381391898833926.

Köpke, B. (2001) ‘Quels changements linguistiques dans l’attrition de la L1 chez le bilingue tardif? [What are the linguistic changes in the L1 of late bilinguals?]’, TRANEL (Travaux neuchâtelois de linguistique), 34/35, pp. 355–368. doi: 10.26034/tranel.2001.2565.

Laufer, B. and Baladzhaeva, L. (2015) ‘First language attrition without second language acquisition’, International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 166(2), pp. 229–253. doi: 10.1075/itl.166.2.02lau.

Montrul, S. (2017) ‘Developmental continuity in morphosyntactic attrition’, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 7(6), pp. 739–743. doi: 10.1075/lab.00016.mon.

Schmid, M. S. and Köpke, B. (2017a) ‘The relevance of first language attrition to theories of bilingual development’, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 7(6), pp. 763–770. doi: 10.1075/lab.17058.sch.

Schmid, M. S. and Köpke, B. (2017b) ‘When is a bilingual an attriter?’, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 7(6), pp. 763–770. doi: 10.1075/lab.17059.sch.

Sorace, A. (2011) ‘Pinning down the conecept of “interfaces” in bilingualism’, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 1(1), pp. 1–33. doi: 10.1075/lab.1.1.01sor.

Sorace, A. (2020) ‘L1 attrition in a wider perspective’, Second Language Research, 36(2), pp. 203–206. doi: 10.1177/0267658319895571.

Tsimpli, I. M. (2017) ‘Crosslinguistic influence is not necessarily attrition’, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 7(6), pp. 759–762. doi: 10.1075/lab.00021.tsi issn 1879–9264/e-issn 1879–9272.

Dr. Lewis Baker
Prof. Dr. Laura Domínguez
Dr. Glyn Hicks
Guest Editors

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• L1 attrition
• L2 acquisition
• bilingualism
• cross-linguistic influence
• linguistic input
• processing
• experimental design/methodology
• morphosyntax
• semantics
• phonology