LINGUIST List 13.2493

Tue Oct 1 2002

Books: Language Acquisition: Achiba

Editor for this issue: Marisa Ferrara <marisalinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. kathryn, Language Acquisition: Achiba

Title: Learning to Request in a Second Language
Subtitle: Child Interlanguage Pragmatics
Series Title: Second Language Acquisition
			
Publication Year: 2002
			
Publisher: Multilingual Matters 
 http://www.multilingual-matters.com/
			
Author: Machiko Achiba 
				

Hardback: ISBN: 1853596124, Pages: 240, Price: EURO42.95 US$69.95 CAN$99.95
			
Abstract:

 LEARNING TO REQUEST IN A SECOND LANGUAGE
 Child Interlanguage Pragmatics

 Machiko Achiba (Tokyo Woman's Christian University)

This book is a very important analysis of the developmental course of
a seven year old's learning in a second language to make requests, a
domain of central importance in the study of pragmatics. There is a
superb survey of the literature and a subtle analysis of the issues
involved in such a study. The author finds stages in the development
of request forms, variation in forms according to addressee, and most
novel for a study of child speech, she finds that there is difference
in the developmental trajectory depending on the goals of the request.
The book is a major contribution to the fields of child language
pragmatics and second language acquisition. Susan M. Ervin-Tripp,
Professor Emeritus, Psychology Department, University of California

Key Features:

-Aimed to discover what strategies and linguistic devices a child
 second-language learner uses in making requests in English and what
 developmental path the learning process follows

-Attempts to clarify understanding of the pragmatic development of a
 learner's interlanguage

Description:

This book examines the acquisition of requests in English by a
seven-year-old Japanese girl during her seventeen-month residence in
Australia. The study focuses on the linguistic repertoire available to
the child as she attempts to make requests and vary these to suit
different goals and addressees. This book helps unravel features of
pragmatic development in the child's interlanguage, a subject about
which we yet know very little.

Contents:

Introduction; 1. Literature Review; 2. Methodology; 3. Development of
Request Realisation; 4. Requestive Hints; 5. Variation in Use:
6. Requestive Goals; 7. Variation in Use: Addressees; 8. Modification;
9. Summary and Conclusions

Author information:

Machiko Achiba is a Professor of Applied Linguistics at Tokyo Woman's
Christian University (Tokyo Joshi Daigaku) in Japan and has been
teaching for many years in the field. Her research interests are
pragmatics, second language acquisition, and the methodologies of
teaching English as a foreign language. She received her master's
degree from Southern Illinois University in the United States and
holds her doctorate from La Trobe University in Australia. She is the
mother of this study's subject.

Lingfield(s): Language Acquisition

Written In: English (Language Code: ENG)