MORPHOLOGICAL ERROR ANALYSIS OF THE M2/L2 ACQUISITON OF
ADULT LEARNERS OF GERMAN SIGN LANGUAGE
Introduction: This paper focuses on the morphological errors made by
learners of German Sign Language (DGS) as L2, Previous studies in L2
acquisition of ASL suggest that difficulties in the production of signs occur in
the areas of spatial information and classifier constructions (Wilcox & Wilcox,
1991; Locker, McKee & McKee, 1992). Specifically, two questions are
addressed: (1) What kind of errors in the morphological inflection of DGS do
the L2/M2 learners make? (2) From a developmental perspective, what kind
of trends appear in these errors?
Methodology: Three groups of L2/M2 university students of DGS took the
DGS-SRT test (German Sign Language Sentence Reproduction Task), which
consisted of 30 sentences. The three groups were, respectively, first-semester
(n=10), third-semester (n=11) and fifth-semester (n=10) students of a
bachelor’s program in sign language interpreting. Subjects were asked to
reproduce the sentences without any modification.
Findings:
With respect to numeral incorporation, there are three types of
errors: (i) phonological errors, (ii) lexical substitution for a part of an
incorporated sign and (iii) no incorporation. The students made less errors
with this process compared to other morphological processes. For example,
two students (one student each in the first semester and third semester)
produced two morphemes separately instead of combining them through
numeral incorporation (i.e. ONE WEEK instead of ONE-WEEK).
Three error types are observed in the aspectual modulations: (i)
dropping the aspectual modulation, (ii) substitution of the aspectual
modulation for another (i.e. iterative instead of continuative) and (iii) confusion
of the iterative aspectual modulation with the exhaustive person morpheme
(i.e. 1BESUCHx (iterative-singular) “visit” versus 1BESUCHx,y,z (plural
distributive)). The most frequent error type is dropping the aspectual
modulation, but such errors were made less frequently by the students in their
fifth semester.
The error types in verb agreement are classified as: (i) agreement
drop, (ii) person feature error (i.e. using ‘first to non-first’ instead of ‘non-first to
non-first’) and (iii) reversion of f‘first‘ and ,non-first‘ (i.e. xBEZAHLENy “pay”
versus yBEZAHLENx.). Like in the error analysis in aspectual modulations,
the most frequent error type isagreement drop, but the students in their third
and fifth semester did not make this error as often compared to students in
their first semester.
As for errors in classifier constructions, the students in their first
semester made much more morpho-phonological errors. Moreover, the
students in their fifth semester made much less errors including (i) substitution
of entity classifiers for one another (i.e. using the entity classifier for
‘motorcycle’ instead of using one for ‘automobile’), (ii) dropping the nondominant hand, which had additional meaning and (iii) using a lexeme instead
of a classifier construction (lCOLLECT instead of PICK-FLOWER-CL)
Discussion: Based on findings we argue that each morphological property has
unique error types. The acquisition of morphology isassociated with two
modality-specific characteristics: (i) morphological complexity and (ii) use of
space.
Appendix: The types of morphological errors
1 sem.
(n=10)
3 sem.
(n=11)
5 sem.
(n=10)
3
1
-
3
2
2
1
1
-
4
2
2
15
12
3
0
1
0
1
1
1
Other errors
2
1
0
Lexical omission (negative evidence)
26
15
7
10
2
4
3
3
2
2
4
2
4
0
1
20
6
2
SASS/Entity hand conf. errors
THICK (G handshape) -> THICK (flat bent)
17
13
12
LOC errors
MOTORCYCLE (h1) AUTO (h2) -> AUTO (h1) MOTORCYCLE (h2)
15
8
7
18
4
6
3
4
0
4
2
0
Lexical substitution instead of classifier predicates
JUMP-CL -> UNDER
5
6
0
Omission (negative evidence)
60
59
27
Type of error
Numeral Incorporation
Parametrical error
5-HOURS (circular) – 5-HOURS (arc)
Lexical substitution
(i.e. 1-WEEK -> 1-THOUSAND)
No incorporation
10-THOUSAND -> 10 THOUSAND
Lexical omission (negative evidence)
Aspectual Modulations
Omission of aspectual morpheme
CELEBRATE (cont.) -> CELEBRATE
Aspectual morpheme substitution
WRITE (cont.) -> WRITE (iterative)
Plural instead of Aspect
(1VISITx (iterative) -1VISITx,y,z (pl. dist.)).
Agreeing verbs
Agreement drop
xTEACH1 -> TEACH
Person reversion
xTEACH1 -> 1TEACHx
Wrong person use
xPROTESTy -> 1PROTESTx
Lexical substitution
xPAMy -> PERSON
Lexical omission (negative evidence)
Classifier predicates
MOV errors
SKYSCRAPERS (alternating) -> SKYSCRAPERS (symmetric)
Entity substitutions
MOTORCYCLE (h1) AUTO (h2) -> MOTORCYCLE (h1)
MOTORCYCLE (h2)
Nondominant hand drop
BCYCLE(2h) -> BCYCLE (1h)