Papers by Marcela Cazzoli
Creative Multilingualism, Sep 30, 2020
is an AHRC funded postgraduate student at the Universities of Cardiff and Exeter where she is stu... more is an AHRC funded postgraduate student at the Universities of Cardiff and Exeter where she is studying for her doctorate in Hispanic Studies. Her research area is contemporary Spanish cinema. She has previously worked as a project assistant for Routes into Languages Cymru.
The Language Learning Journal
Durham Working Papers in Linguistics, 2004
This study focuses on the second language acquisition of non-nominative subjects by adult speaker... more This study focuses on the second language acquisition of non-nominative subjects by adult speakers of English. Non-nominative subjects are a very common feature of the Spanish language and of other Romance languages and they typically appear with unaccusative verbs and in dethematized and impersonal constructions. They can be dative, accusative, or locative, and all function as subject of predication evincing properties of canonical subjects. Masullo (1992 & 1993) proposes a parameter which predicts the languages that allow non-nominative subjects, with the positive setting applying to both Spanish and Italian and the negative one applying to English and French. In this paper we will argue that the unmarked value of the Non-Nominative Subject Parameter is positive: children exposed to any language start out producing utterances with Non-Nominative Subjects. With respect to second language acquisition, learners of Spanish with a negative setting will need to reset the parameter to the positive value. In order to test this, data were collected from 20 English university learners using three different tasks: an aural grammaticality judgement test, an elicited imitation task and a picture description test. So far, the results seem to indicate that the learners did not reset the parameter by the time they graduated from university.
New directions in language acquisition: Romance languages in the generative perspective, 2012
Bilingual Youth: Spanish in English-speaking societies , 2011
Whether an individual’s L1 syntax is affected by the acquisition of an L2 in adulthood is under d... more Whether an individual’s L1 syntax is affected by the acquisition of an L2 in adulthood is under debate. Also debated are the drivers of language change at the community level. Under strict generative views (e.g. Lightfoot 1999), change is led by children when they receive input different from the previous generations. Under other views, the grammars of individuals can change across the lifespan. We address these issues by looking at the knowledge and use of sentence-initial non-nominative constructions by first-generation adult immigrants to the UK from Spanish-speaking countries. Judgement/preference task and production data indicate monolingual-divergent use regardless of intensity of contact with English, and monolingual-divergent syntax when level of contact with English is high (and Spanish continues to be spoken). However because in the UK neither first nor second generation Spanish-speaking immigrants live in ethnic communities, the second generation is less likely than their US counterparts to use the parental language beyond early childhood. This in turn suggests that any psycho-social variables involved in heritage language maintenance are not applicable in the UK. This leads to the prediction that despite indications of individual syntactic attrition by first generation speakers, because the second generation does not actively use Spanish, the emergence of new varieties at the community level will not occur in the UK.
Books by Marcela Cazzoli
(Re)Creating Modern Languages Conversations about the Curriculum in UK Higher Education, 2020
With the situation facing Modern Languages at national level, it is crucial to focus on a review ... more With the situation facing Modern Languages at national level, it is crucial to focus on a review of
the curriculum that ensures an understanding of Modern Languages (MLs) as an integrated
disciplinary field, with its own identity and underlying methodological framework. While an
understanding of the field’s intellectual and pragmatic engagement with global practices is key,
any review of current teaching needs to place students’ needs and expectations at the core,
while safeguarding the opportunities that a degree in MLs can provide in terms of intercultural
awareness and adaptability in a global context.
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Papers by Marcela Cazzoli
Books by Marcela Cazzoli
the curriculum that ensures an understanding of Modern Languages (MLs) as an integrated
disciplinary field, with its own identity and underlying methodological framework. While an
understanding of the field’s intellectual and pragmatic engagement with global practices is key,
any review of current teaching needs to place students’ needs and expectations at the core,
while safeguarding the opportunities that a degree in MLs can provide in terms of intercultural
awareness and adaptability in a global context.
the curriculum that ensures an understanding of Modern Languages (MLs) as an integrated
disciplinary field, with its own identity and underlying methodological framework. While an
understanding of the field’s intellectual and pragmatic engagement with global practices is key,
any review of current teaching needs to place students’ needs and expectations at the core,
while safeguarding the opportunities that a degree in MLs can provide in terms of intercultural
awareness and adaptability in a global context.