Insights into the lexicon-syntax interface in italian learners english. A generative framework for a corpus-based analysis

The main research issues of the present study are grounded in two productive strands in the fields of formal linguistics and L2 acquisition: the role of Universal Grammar (UG) in interlanguage and the role of computer methodologies in empirical studies based on the analysis of language data. Corpus data elicited from a group of Italian EFL learners have been incorporated in a generative grammar framework as an attempt to analyse the lexicon–syntax interface in the process of foreign language acquisition. The first part of the present study deals with the main concepts of those theories concerning second language learning which have paid particular attention to the acquisition of syntax and lexicon and to the fundamentals of syntactic theory necessary to explain the different syntactic structures that occur in most natural languages and their implications for lexis. In the second part of the book a sample of data from the University of Salerno Learner Corpus (UNISALC) is examined, paying particular attention to the structure of the Noun Phrase (NP) and the Prepositional Phrase (PP) recurring in learners’ interlanguage.Rita Calabrese teaches English Language at the University of Salerno. She researches and publishes in the areas of Second Language Acquisition, Interlanguage Analysis, and distance learning. She is the author of a number of publications on the use of English as the medium of instruction in non–language subjects (Content and Language Integrated Learning) in both school and academic contexts (L’apprendimento dell’Inglese come Lingua Veicolare, Loffredo, 2004) and the use of corpora technology to study interlanguage (La Linguistica dei Corpora e l’Inglese come Lingua Straniera, Massa, 2004).