讲座题目：The effect of computational complexity on L1 transfer: evidence from L2 Chinese attitude-bearing wh-questions
讲座人：袁博平教授（剑桥大学）
讲座时间：2015年3月24日（周二）下午16：10-17:40
地点：北京外国语大学东院 逸夫楼503

讲座人简介：
袁博平教授，剑桥大学丘吉尔学院院士、学术督导，剑桥大学东方研究院博士生导师，为剑桥大学首位来自中国大陆的院士。他的研究方向为英语语言学和语言学及应用语言学，是对外汉语教学及研究方面的专家，在剑桥大学从事汉语教学及研究工作已有10多年，为欧洲第二语言习得协会会员、英国语言学会会员、剑桥大学语言研究会会员，并担任剑桥大学出版社和牛津大学出版社特约编辑及《第二语言习得》等国际学术刊物的编委。

讲座内容：
This talk reports on an empirical study of attitude-bearing wh-questions in English speakers’ second language (L2) Chinese. Although English and Chinese wh-questions are different in that the wh-word in the former moves to the sentence initial position while that in the latter stays in situ, the two languages share some characteristics in their attitude-bearing wh-questions. It is widely assumed in L2 research that first language (L1) structures similar to or the same as those in the target language can facilitate the course of L2 acquisition but L1 structures which are different from the target language interfere with successful L2 acquisition. However, the findings in this study show that wh-movement in English wh-questions is not transferred into their L2 Chinese and that the similarities between English and Chinese have very limited facilitating functions in English speakers’ handling of Chinese attitude-bearing wh-questions. The findings here support Yuan’s (2001) argument that L1 transfer is a relative phenomenon in L2 acquisition and can be accounted for on the basis of Prévost et al.’s (2014) analysis that computation complexity can override L1 influence.
 

中国外语教育研究中心办公室
2015年3月9日