Same difference? L1 influence in the use of initial adverbials in English novice writing

Abstract

This paper examines the use of clause-initial adverbials in English novice writing. Previous research has identified frequent use of such adverbials as characteristic of Dutch EFL writing. Our contrastive corpus analysis of novice writing by Dutch and Francophone learners as well as native speakers allows us to determine whether this use of initial adverbials is (a) a V2 transfer effect, (b) a general interlanguage feature, independent of learners’ L1, or (c) a characteristic of novice writing in general, holding true for both native and non-native writers. We will show that both learner groups are ‘equally different’ from the native-speaker novice writers in their frequent use of initial adverbials, but appear to have distinct underlying reasons for this linguistic behaviour: Francophone writers place adverbials in initial position more often for stylistic purposes, while Dutch writers have a stronger tendency to use initial adverbials for local discourse linking.

Grammatical and Lexical Patterning of Make in Asian Learner Writing: A Corpus-Based Study of ICNALE

“…In fact, in the causative make construction with adjective supplement become is redundant, in that it is intrinsic to and semantically covered by the adjective. This redundancy may be in response to interlanguage phenomenon, including L1 transfer, preference for verbosity, linguistic inadequacies and/or misconceptions (Liu & Shaw, 2001;Selinker, 2014;Van Vuuren & Berns, 2018).…”

Does it ‘feel’ non-native?

“…Often they have a cohesive function by "using some information given in the previous discourse as the starting point for the next sentence" (Biber et al, 1999, p. 809), a function labelled 'local anchoring' by Los and Dreschler (2012). Van Vuuren and Berns (2017), however, found that native speakers of English only use 9% of initial place adverbials for this purpose, as opposed to 25% in Dutch learner English (p. 23). This high frequency is likely to result from information-structural transfer, since the multifunctional preverbal slot made available by V2 syntax facilitates local anchoring.…”