Language Processing in Bilingual Children

Abstract

Abstract. Feeling schizophrenic about how to unite second language (L2) acquisition and<br>bilingualism on the one hand and psycholinguistic description of first language (Ll)<br>proficiency on the other. Ellen Bialystok compiled this volume. This book is, in large, a<br>collection of a number of seminal papers presented in the symposium "Language<br>acquisition and implications for processing in bilingual children" hosted by the Society<br>for Research in Children Development. Distinguished scholars from highly reputed<br>universities such as Harvard, Oxford, Stanford, Yale, University ofCalifomia. Berkeley,<br>and York (Ontario) were invited to examine language acquisition as a process and relate<br>it to language as used by bilingual children. A new tradition in the area of psychology<br>and education emerged out of that meeting. The study of the cognitive ability and<br>linguistic achievement of bilingual children no more possesses educational complexity,<br>and L2 acquisition is not merely a substitution of Ll forms and structures. On the basis<br>of the Chomskyan notion of government and binding (GB) and linguistic innateness,<br>first, second, and third language are acquired by means of setting parameters in the<br>language acquisition device (LAD). This and other GB findings are documented by<br>means of ten empirical studies undertaken in this book. <br>