Heritage Languages and Syntactic Theory

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This volume explores a wide range of structural phenomena in typologically diverse heritage languages using current Minimalist theoretical approaches. Heritage languages have been the focus of extensive research in the last three decades; by virtue of their inherent diversity stemming from initial learning conditions, they pose significant challenges to traditional methods of linguistic description that rely on uniform conceptions of what ’knowledge of language’ should be. Despite the existence of inter- and intra-speaker variation in the grammars of heritage languages, there are also significant shared development trends and structural outcomes that cannot be considered to be purely circumstantial. The studies presented in this volume illustrate the practicality and usefulness of subjecting domains of heritage language syntax to rigorous formal analysis.

The chapters also have implications for theory-building efforts within the current Minimalist landscape; they force a reassessment of our understanding of the ideal speaker-hearer (Chomsky, 1965) in the context of bi- and multi-competent individuals and communities. In line with recent trends in contemporary Minimalism that largely eschew the notion of traditional parameters and an enriched view of Universal Grammar, the integration of heritage languages into syntactic theory adds an important piece of the puzzle relating to linguistic competence. The volume also in some respects calls for a re-evaluation of the prevailing stance that the syntax of heritage languages is predominantly immune to significant decay or change.

Roberta D’Alessandro, Professor of Linguistics / Syntax and Language Variation, Utrecht University, Michael T. Putnam, Professor German and Linguistics, The Pennsylvania State University, Silvia Terenghi, Assistant Professor of Multilingualism, Utrecht University

Roberta D’Alessandro is Professor of Linguistics / Syntax and Language Variation at Utrecht University. She has recently concluded an ERC project on Microcontact, from which this volume has emerged. She has published on heritage language syntax and syntactic (micro-)variation, impersonal pronouns, and the syntax-phonology interface in journals including Glossa, Theoretical Linguistics, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, and The Annual Review of Linguistics. She is currently Head of the Linguistics section at Utrecht University.

Michael T. Putnam is Professor of German and Linguistics at The Pennsylvania State University. He has published widely in generative approaches to Germanic morphology and syntax and bilingualism, with his work appearing in journals such as Bilingualism: Language and Cognition and The Journal of Comparative Germanic Linguistics. He has a special interest in heritage varieties of Germanic languages spoken throughout the world. He is currently the Director of the Linguistics Program and Associate Director of the Center for Language Science at Penn State.

Silvia Terenghi is Assistant Professor of Multilingualism at Utrecht University. She carried out her PhD research within the ERC-funded Microcontact project, where she investigated the syntax of indexicality in heritage and attrited Italo-Romance varieties, with specific reference to demonstrative forms. Her main research interest lies in syntactic variation and change in both contact contexts and diachrony and the results of her research have been presented at a range of conferences and in journals including Glossa, Journal of Historical Syntax, and Languages.