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Errors in Tense and Aspect in theCompositions of Secondary School Pupils
Dennis Yap Swee Beng
A thesis submitted to theNational Institute of EducationNanyang Technological University
In fulfilment of the requirement for the degree ofMaster of Arts
2006
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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Associate Professor Lubna Alsagoff, my
supervisor, for being a wonderful teacher and mentor. Her patience,
guidance and insight have made doing this thesis an enjoyable and
achievable endeavour.
To all who have encouraged me along the way and made this
journey possible.
To the One without whom nothing is possible.
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Contents
Abstract
Chapter One: Introduction 1
1.1 The Study 1
1.2 Background and Rationale of the Study 3
1.3 Significance of the Study 5
1.4 Organisation of the Thesis 6
1.5 Conclusion 9
Chapter Two: Literature Review 10
2.1 English in Singapore 10
2.1.1 Role and Status of English in Singapore Today 11
2.1.2 Approaches to Explaining Singapore English (SE) 14
2.1.3 Errors in English 19
2.2 A Study of Tense and Aspect 21
2.2.1 Overview of Tense and Aspect (Alsagoff, 2001) 21
2.2.2 Studies investigating tense and aspect in SE 22
2.2.3 Past tense marking errors in compositions of primaryschools students Yip (2004)
25
2.3 The Aspect Hypothesis 28
Chapter Three: Framework of Study and Methodology 49
3.1 The Hypothesis 50
3.2 Definitions and Classifications of Tense and Aspect 52
3.2.1 Tense 53
3.2.2 Grammatical Aspect 55
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3.2.3 Lexical Aspect 61
3.3 Data Collection 79
3.4 The Subjects 86
3.5 Statistical Methods 88
Chapter Four: Findings 91
4.1 Overview of Corpus 92
4.2 H1(a): The relationship between aspectual classes of verbs(i.e. State, Activity, Accomplishment and Achievement) and
patterns of errors in tense marking.
93
4.2.1 Analysed in terms of Telicity 97
4.2.2 Analysed in terms of Punctuality 100
4.2.3 Analysed in terms of Stativity 102
4.2.4 Analysed in terms of Agentivity 104
4.3 H1(b): The relationship between aspectual classes of verbs(i.e. State, Activity, Accomplishment and Achievement) andpatterns of errors in perfective aspect marking.
107
4.3.1 Analysed in terms of Telicity 109
4.3.2 Analysed in terms of Punctuality 111
4.3.3 Analysed in terms of Stativity 112
4.3.4 Analysed in terms of Agentivity 113
4.4 H1: The relationship between aspectual classes of verbs(i.e. State, Activity, Accomplishment and Achievement) andpatterns of errors in tense and perfective aspect marking.
115
4.2.1 Analysed in terms of Telicity 119
4.2.2 Analysed in terms of Punctuality 122
4.2.3 Analysed in terms of Stativity 125
4.2.4 Analysed in terms of Agentivity 127
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Chapter Five: Discussion of Findings 130
5.1 Summary and Discussion of Findings 130
5.2 Telicity and Completeness of Event in relation to Tense-Aspect Marking
139
5.3 Problems and Limitations of Study 148
5.4 Future Research 149
Chapter Six: Conclusion 157
6.1 Overview of Study 157
6.2 Pedagogical Implications 158
6.3 Conclusion 160
Bibliography 165
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List of Tables, Charts and Figures
Tables
Table 1: Componential analysis of how Vendlers (1967) four-way
classification is related binary semantic categories.
62
Table 2: Summary of how binary categories of lexical aspect relate toVendlers Four-Way classification.
72
Table 3: Summary of tests to classify verbs under Vendlers Four-Wayclassification
78
Table 4: Result of Chi Square Test for Aspectual Classes (Tense) 96
Table 5: Result of Chi Square Test for Telicity (Tense) 99
Table 6: Result of Chi Square Test for Punctuality (Tense) 101
Table 7: Result of Chi Square Test for Stativity (Tense) 103
Table 8: Result of Chi Square Test for Agentivity (Tense) 106
Table 9: Distribution of aspect marking errors across semanticcategories
107
Table 10: Result of Chi Square Test for Telicity (Aspect) 110
Table 11: Result of Chi Square Test for Agentivity (Aspect) 114
Table 12: Result of Chi Square Test for Aspectual Classes (Tense-Aspect)
118
Table 13: Result of Chi Square Test for Telicity (Tense-Aspect) 121
Table 14: Result of Chi Square Test for Punctuality (Tense-Aspect) 124
Table 15: Result of Chi Square Test for Stativity (Tense-Aspect) 126
Table 16: Result of Chi Square Test for Agentivity (Tense-Aspect) 128
Table 17: Summary of number of verbs and number errors within theforeground and background of narrative texts
143
Table 18: Result of Chi Square Test for Verbs in Foreground andBackground of Narratives
144
Table 19: Samples of Structural Variation (Mod Aux + Verb + ed/en) 152
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Figures
Figure 1: Expanding triangles of English expressions 18
Figure 2: Examples of state verbs 84
Figure 3: Examples of activity verbs 84
Figure 4: Examples of achievement verbs 85
Figure 5: Examples of accomplishment verbs 85
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Annexes
Annex A: The Corpus
Annex B: List of Tense-Aspect Errors in Corpus
Annex C: Detailed Summary of Errors in Corpus
Annex D: List of State Verbs in Corpus
Annex E: List of Activity Verbs in Corpus
Annex F: List of Accomplishment Verbs in Corpus
Annex G: List of Achievement Verbs in Corpus
Annex H: Samples from corpus used to analyse text according todiscourse structures (Foreground and Background)
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Abbreviations
SE Singapore English
SCE Singapore Colloquial English
SSE Singapore Standard English
STE Singapore Tamil English
StdBrE Standard British English
StdE Standard English
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Abstract
This thesis is an investigation of tense and aspect errors in compositions of
Singapore secondary students from a lexical semantic perspective. In
particular, it seeks to provide a systematic understanding of the differences
in the marking of tense-aspect in Singapore English writing through a
quantitative investigation that examines data in relation to the Aspect
Hypothesis (AH). The AH examines the acquisition of tense and aspect
errors in relation to the meaning of verbs, in particular, meanings which are
related to how the verb denotes an event, i.e. its lexical aspect. In
acquisition literature, it predicts that a learner will acquire and appropriately
use morphological tense-aspect marking for telic verbs (i.e. achievements
and accomplishments) before atelic verbs (i.e. states and activities)
(Salaberry and Shirai 2002, Andersen and Shirai 1996, Bardovi-Harlig
2000). From this, it was extrapolated that as learners first acquire the use
of past marking and/or perfective marking on telic verbs, learners will less
frequently make errors in past and perfective marking among telic verbs.
Conversely, learners are expected to make past and perfective marking
errors more frequently among atelic verbs. In this study, we formulate and
test the hypothesis that aspectual classes of verbs can explain patterns of
errors in past tense and perfective marking.
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The following are the research questions to the study.
1. What are the patterns of errors in tense and aspect in the
compositions of secondary school students?
2. What are the possible explanations to these errors in tense and
aspect?
3. What are the pedagogical implications for teachers in Singapore in
view of these types of errors in tense and aspect in the compositions
of secondary school students?
The results of the study were positive, with both sub-hypotheses (H1a) and
(H1b) being validated and the main hypothesis (H1) has been validated
with clear significance. What this means is that aspectual classes of verbs
(i.e. State, Activity, Accomplishment and Achievement) can explain the
patterns of errors in tense and perfective aspect marking.
This study is significant for a number of reasons. First, it demonstrates that
what has often been attributed to L1 influence is actually universal in
pattern. Secondly, the study demonstrates that the variation is consistent
i.e. that pupils are making systematic errors related to a universal tendency
to equate meaning with structure. Thirdly, the study has vast pedagogical
implications.
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Chapter One
Introduction
1.1 The Study
This thesis is an investigation of tense and aspect errors in compositions of
Singapore secondary students from a lexical semantic perspective. In
particular, it seeks to provide a systematic understanding of the differences
in the marking of tense-aspect in Singapore English writing through a
quantitative investigation that examines data in relation to the Aspect
Hypothesis (AH). The AH examines the acquisition of tense and aspect
errors in relation to the meaning of verbs, in particular, meanings which are
related to how the verb denotes an event, i.e. its lexical aspect. In
acquisition literature, it predicts that a learner will acquire and appropriately
use morphological tense-aspect marking for telic verbs (i.e. achievements
and accomplishments) before atelic verbs (i.e. states and activities)
(Salaberry and Shirai 2002, Andersen and Shirai 1996, Bardovi-Harlig
2000).
The AH therefore suggests that the distribution of tense errors can be
predicted on the basis of lexical aspect where we would expect a higher
occurrence of tense-aspect errors with verbs whose lexical aspects are
atelic, i.e. states and activities, than verbs whose lexical aspects are telic,
i.e. achievements and accomplishments. In this study, we formulate and
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test the hypothesis that aspectual classes of verbs can explain patterns of
errors in past tense and perfective marking.
The following are the research questions to the study.
1. What are the patterns of errors in tense and aspect in the
compositions of secondary school students?
2. What are the possible explanations to these errors in tense and
aspect?
3. What are the pedagogical implications for teachers in Singapore in
view of these types of errors in tense and aspect in the compositions
of secondary school students?
The present study is primarily motivated by an earlier study by Yip (2004)
along these same lines of investigation. Yips work however, revealed that
no significance in the patterns of tense and aspect errors along the line of
lexical aspect could be made. In this thesis, we aim to improve on this
study by
(a) Changing the corpus to a secondary school corpus to ensure that
the learners investigated are more stable language learners. This is
because Lenneberg (1967) proposed that there is a critical period
for language learning, he reasoned that lateralization for language
takes place by puberty and the brains left hemisphere is no longer
able to acquire language.
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(b) Enlarging the corpus considerably to yield more dependable results.
(c) Narrowing the focus of the study so that more attention is placed on
the statistical significance of lexical aspect.
1.2 Background and Rationale of the Study
According to Corders classic work (1981), studies concerning the teaching
of modern languages show that authors cursorily deal with the question of
learners errors and their correction simply as the unavoidable by products
of the process of learning a language. Corder (1981) noted three reasons
why the study of learners errors is important. Firstly, the study of errors is
significant to educators as it indicates how far toward the goal the learner
has progressed and what remains for the learner to learn. Secondly, the
study of errors is also significant as it provides evidence of how language is
learned and acquired. Finally, the study of errors is also important from the
perspective of the learner as learners can regard the making of errors as a
device to learn the language.
Corder (1981) also noted that much of linguistic and psychological theory
when applied to the study of language learning attributes learners errors in
language acquisition primarily to the interference in the learning of a
second language from the habits of the first language. Many studies
concerning Singapore English (SE) also attribute variations in grammar to
influences of base languages such as Malay, Chinese or even Singapore
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Colloquial English (Poedjosoedarmo 2000 and Deterding 2000, Gupta
1994 among many others).
One of the variations in grammar of SE that is well documented in the
literature is the absence of verbal morphology in the marking of tense and
aspect (Alsagoff 1998, 2001, Platt & Weber 1980, Tay 1979, Saravanan
1989, Ho & Platt 1993, Ho 2003 and many others). The lack of tense and
aspect marking in SE is usually attributed to the lack of verbal morphology
employed in the home or first languages (Platt & Weber, 1980 and Tay,
1979).
However, studies of tense and aspect errors, which include the Aspect
Hypothesis, suggest that the patterns of acquisition of tense and aspect
morphology are universal, systematic and predictable regardless of the
target language (Andersen & Shirai 1996, Bardovi-Harlig 2000, Salaberry &
Shirai 2002). Such studies have shown that languages as diverse as
Chinese, French, Russian, Italian and many others, demonstrate similar
patterns of acquisition in relation to tense and aspect. This study is
undertaken to determine if errors in tense and aspect marking of student
learners of English in Singapore are consistent with such universality
patterns as predicted in the Aspect Hypothesis. This study is a timely one
because a survey of local research literature reveals the lack of research
done on errors in tense and aspect marking in student writing other than
attributing such variation to verbal morphology to influence of the home or
first languages.
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There are, however, considerable amount of work done concerning the
writing of composition among student learners, phonological features of
speakers of English in Singapore, the teaching of spoken and oral English.
1.3 Significance of the Study
The study of grammar and semantics in English Language has traditionally
been modular in nature, where the study of grammar is confined to looking
at structure without considering semantic properties of words. This study is
significant because it attempts to explain a structural problem as in errors
in tense-aspect marking in compositions of secondary school students by
looking at the semantic properties of verbs in terms of their lexical aspect.
This study attempts to show that tense-aspect marking errors made by
students in the writing of English compositions are not simply due to the
interference or influence of the home or first languages but due to certain
inherent lexical semantic properties of verbs.
It is an empirical piece of research basing findings on a corpus of data
collected from a Singapore secondary school. The value of such an
approach is that it is able to concretely substantiate or refute claim made
by previous researchers of SSE about the tense and aspect errors. Thus,
in addition to the hypothesis made in this thesis, we are also able to assess
whether or not it can be definitely said that tense and aspect errors are a
result of home or first language interference.
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Patterns of errors discovered in this study will also have significant
pedagogical implications. This is because when learners are made aware
of errors made, these errors can serve as a device to learn the target
language (Corder, 1981). This is important because learners are
unconscious of their own errors. In the literature, errors in grammar (in this
case, in verbal morphology) are considered to be the incorrect use of
grammatical structures, unconscious to the learner, while mistakes are
regarded as slips that a learner makes during the production (usually
spontaneous) of language. When a mistake or slip is made, the speaker
would usually correct himself.
The patterns of errors discovered in this thesis can serve as a basis for the
systematic teaching of grammar focussing on areas where learners are
most likely to encounter problems.
1.4 Organisation of the Thesis
This thesis will be organised into six chapters. The present chapter,
chapter 1 introduces the study and provides the background and rationale
of the research as well as the significance of the study.
Chapter 2 is a review of the relevant literature. It first presents a discussion
of the role and status of the English Language in Singapore, followed by a
presentation of how various researchers have developed approaches to
explain SE, in particular, the Lectal Continuum (Platt & Weber, 1980),
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Diglossia (Gupta, 1994) and Expanding Triangles of English Expressions
(Pakir, 1995) models will be discussed. How variations in grammar of SE
are treated will also be discussed. An overview of what is tense and aspect
following the work of Alsagoff (2001) will also be presented. This is
followed by a review of studies related to tense-aspect marking in SE
(Saravanan, 1989, Ho, 2003 and others) as well as a recent study by Yip
(2004) who, among other approaches, also studied the past tense marking
errors of primary school students from a lexical semantic perspective. This
naturally leads to the review of the aspect hypothesis (Andersen & Shirai,
1996). Included in this review are its development, methods used for data
collection and analysis as well as other views concerning acquisition of
tense and aspect. This is important as this study examines data from the
perspective of the Aspect Hypothesis.
Chapter 3 will elaborate on the framework of this study as well as the
research methodology. In this chapter, the hypothesis for this study will be
first presented. This is followed by the introduction of the theoretical
framework used to analyse the data in this thesis. Here, how tense and
aspect are defined and classified is elaborated and discussed. Concepts
concerning grammatical and lexical aspect will also be explained and
discussed. Following this, tests used to classify lexical aspect are also
explained. Discussions as to how, where and from whom data is collected
and analysed in this thesis will also be presented. The statistical method
used in this study will also be explained in this chapter.
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Chapter 4 will provide an analysis of the data collected as well as a report
on the findings. The findings will include patterns of, 1) errors in tense-
aspect marking, 2) errors in past tense marking and 3) errors in perfective
aspect marking in terms of aspectual classes of verbs. Included in this
chapter are reports of the statistical significance to each finding.
Chapter 5 presents a discussion of the findings. This followed by exploring
the effects of telicity and completeness in relation to tense-aspect marking.
Here the study of tense-aspect errors is extended by looking at discourse
structures of narrative texts and its findings are compared with the findings
of the main study to arrive at a fuller explanation to variations in tense-
aspect marking in SE. Problems and limitations of the study are also
highlighted for the benefit of future research. The section recommending
future research includes a presentation of observable patterns of verbal
morphology variations from the corpus, which are not related to this study
but would be of interest to researchers.
The concluding chapter, Chapter 6, follows this where an overview of the
study and a special focus on the pedagogical implications to English
Language teaching in Singapore schools in the light of the findings will be
presented, followed by the conclusion.
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1.5 Conclusion
In summary, this chapter sought to present the background and rationale of
this study by situating it in the current studies concerning tense-aspect
morphology. The research questions as well as the significance of this
study were also presented. It is hoped that this study will reveal findings
that will give researchers as well as educators a fresh perspective to the
explanation of tense and aspect errors in SE.
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Chapter Two
Literature Review
2.0 Overview
In this chapter, a review of literature relevant to the current study will be
done. This chapter first focuses on English in Singapore. The chapter will
then go on to give an overview of studies related to the study of tense and
aspect in Singapore English. To situate this current study within the wider
language acquisition research community, we review literature on the
acquisition of tense and aspect. In particular, the Aspect Hypothesis
(Andersen & Shirai, 1996) will be discussed, as it will form the theoretical
basis of the framework adopted for this study as well as the analysis of
findings presented in chapters 3 and 4 respectively.
2.1 English in Singapore
In this section, a brief overview of the role and status of English in
Singapore will be presented. Also presented in this section, are
approaches pertaining to the study of the variation of Singapore English.
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2.1.1 Role and Status of English in Singapore Today
English has been called the de factonational language of Singapore and is
also seen as the main working language of the government, judiciary,
education and international business in Singapore (Llamzon 1977, Kuo
1988; Bloom 1986, Foley 1988, 2001). This has arisen from the rapid
globalisation of the world economy and the need for Singapore to be
plugged into the global economy. In order to participate in the global
economy, the ability to transcend cultures and communicate is especially
important (Heller 1999, Wee 2003). The English Language being spoken in
so many parts of the world is seen as the language that will give speakers
the natural edge in gaining access to the world (Foley 2001).
Singapores language policy adopts a pragmatic view. As Singapore does
not possess any natural resources, its survival depends on foreign
investments and gaining competitive edge in science and technology.
Therefore, English Language proficiency is seen as necessary for
attracting foreign investment and providing access to scientific and
technological know-how (Wee 2003). This view was also expressed by the
then Prime Minister of Singapore, Mr Lee Kuan Yew as captured by Chua
(1995:65):
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Without the English Language, we might not have succeeded in
teaching so quickly a whole generation of the knowledge and skills
which made them able to work the machines brought in from the
industrialized countries of the West.
This view is also reflected in the national syllabus for English Language in
Singapore, which recognises English as the language of public
administration, education, commerce, science and technology, and global
communication, and it has become the medium by which most
Singaporeans gain access to information and knowledge from around the
world. The ability to speak and write English effectively, therefore, has
become an essential skill in the workplace, and a mastery of English is vital
to Singapores pupils (Singapores Ministry of Education English Language
Syllabus, 2001:2).
The importance of English is evidenced by the fact that English is
considered to be first language (L1) of instruction of every student in
Singapore since 1966, with students studying a second language (L2) in
either Mandarin (for Chinese students), Malay (for Malay students) and
Tamil (for Indian students) and these L2 languages are collectively called
Mother Tongue (MT) languages in Singapore schools (Gopinathan, 1998).
The role of such MT languages, as opposed to the English Language, is to
provide a link to Singaporeans traditional cultures and values and counter
any undesirable effects of Westernisation (Wee, 2003).
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English has become an important instrument for Singaporeans to gain
access to the world while the MT languages provide a link to ancient
cultures and values (Wee 2003). With this much value placed on English,
Foley (2001) noted that individuals in Singapore recognise that being
competent and fluent in English has its benefits, especially economically.
English has become an instrument for social mobility, as proficiency in
English would translate into getting better jobs and acquiring more
economic goods (Foley 2001).
With English Language being seen as such an important language, the
dominant perspective of English in Singapore, from the point of view of
business, government and education, is that it is the first language (L1) of
the people. English is also seen as a first language in Singapore because
English is the first medium of instruction in Singapore Schools.
Furthermore, L1 pedagogies are adopted in the national school system to
teach the English Language (Foley 2001). However, can and should the
prevalent view, both by society and the government, that English language
is first language in Singapore be translated into English Language being
seen as the first language of the people in terms of language acquisition?
Foley (2001) pointed out that the growing level of language proficiency in
English in society may lead to the establishment of a standard form of the
local variety. Furthermore, he put forward the argument that the developing
standard variety of English is being established primarily through the
school system. However, this is not something that will happen at a
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predetermined time, but will eventually emerge from the community itself.
Until such a standard emerge, this thesis takes the view that where English
is acquired as a first language by Singapore children, it is actually
Singapore Colloquial English (SCE) that is acquired rather than Standard
English (Gupta, 1994). Therefore, although the English Language is
perceived to be the first language of the nation in terms of it being the main
working language and the way it is taught in schools, English (i.e. Standard
English) will not be seen as the first language in terms of language
acquisition in this thesis. In the following section, whether or not learners of
English in Singapore are considered as first language (L1) or second
language (L2) learners will be further clarified with the analysis of the
various approaches to studying SE.
This has great impact on the study because whether English is seen as a
first or second language will affect the way the data is analysed and
pedagogies recommended to help students acquire target standard of
English.
2.1.2 Approaches to Explaining Singapore English (SE)
The view that English in Singapore can be viewed differently is something
that has been proposed by a number researchers. In this section, I will
consider the three primary models of the description of SE.
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- Lectal Continuum (Platt and Weber, 1980)
In this approach, variation within Singapore English (SE) is treated as
dependent on the social status and level of education of the speaker.
Whether or not an utterance or sentence is standard is judged against the
Standard British English (StdBrE) (Alsagoff 1998). According to Platt and
Weber (1980), SE can be divided into different levels. The most prestigious
being the acrolect, next being mesolect and the lowest being basilect. Platt
and Webers (1980) model, places speakers of SE along a scale according
to a range of linguistic features, correlating to the lectal continuum set up
by their education and socio-economic status. This approach does not
emphasise the internal rule-governed system of SE as it considers SE as a
non-native variety of English and focuses on how it differs from StdBrE
(Alsagoff, 1998). In this approach of analysis, learners are considered to be
second language learners of Standard English.
- Diglossia (Gupta, 1994)
The diglossic view of the English Language in the context of Singapore is
conceptually more appealing than the lectal continuum view (Bao, 2001).
This is because it overcomes the difficulty of setting the boundaries of the
various lects. This is especially so for mesolects. The diglossia approach,
put forward during the late 80s and early 90s, sees SE as a post Creole
continuum and views SE as a native variety and as a result, SE should be
analysed as an autonomous linguistic system (Alsagoff, 1998). It classifies
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the acrolect into the H form, which is also known as Standard Singapore
English (SSE), while basilectal and mesolectal varieties (also known as
SCE) are classified as the L form. As SE is viewed as a post Creole
continuum, there is a large group of people who command both SCE and
SSE. While SSE is used in formal contexts, SCE performs the different
function of socialisation and building camaraderie among friends.
This approach sees English as the L1 of the people and SE is made up of
SSE and SCE. For some, their L1 is SSE while for others the SCE is their
L1. Gupta (1994) notes that Singapore Colloquial English (SCE) is the
main variety of English at the home and in casual situations and that even
for children, who have acquired English from birth, are likely to have SCE,
instead of Standard English (Gupta, 1994:7). For those whose L1 is SCE,
they are considered to be L2 learners of English and SSE is the target
language.
- Expanding Triangle of English Expressions (Anne Pakir,
1991, 1995)
One problem with the diglossic view is that it does not allow the possibility
of differing levels of proficiency among speakers of the language (Bao,
2001). While accepting the diglossic view, Pakirs (1995) notion of the
expanding triangles put forward the view that within the lectal varieties
under the continuum view, there can be different proficiency level.
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According to Pakir (1995), SE speech continua are formed along two
dimensions: the cline of formality and the cline of proficiency. The cline of
formality ranges from Singapore Standard English (SSE) on the upper end
to SCE on the lower end. SSE is used for formal contexts while SCE is
used for informal situations. The cline of proficiency is divided into different
grades and these grades correlate with number of years of contact with
English in a formal setting such as a school.
The widespread use of English as a working language in Singapore has
produced a population that knows English at varying proficiency levels
(Pakir, 1995). Speakers who have lower proficiency of English (thus, low
on the cline of proficiency) will also find it difficult to move up the cline of
formality. Such speakers will continue to use the non-standard variety even
when the formality of the situation demands that SSE be used. Therefore,
they form smaller triangles. Speakers who are high on the cline of
proficiency, on the other hand, will have little difficulties adjusting their
speech to the different levels of formality as these speakers have full grasp
of the SSE as well as the knowledge of SCE. As proficiency increases,
bigger triangles are possible with shifts made for corresponding formality
levels (See figure 1 on page 18).
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SSE
Formal Advanced
Careful Adept
Consultative Intermediate
Casual Basic
Intimate CSE Rudimentary
Figure 1: Expanding triangles of English expressions
These speakers tend to be highly educated users of English and are found
at the top ends of both speech clines. Their movement along the clines is
fluid and far-ranging as compared to others less proficient. They are
capable of moving along the whole diglossic continuum, from top to bottom,
and yet cross over to the proficiency continuum, often remaining at the top
end and occasionally stretching down to the intermediate level or even
lower (Pakir, 1995:4).
The three views of SE presented above are relevant to this thesis because
they show how the study of SE has been done, both historically and
currently. Furthermore, it also clarifies how learners of English in
Singapore should be viewed. Under the lectal continuum model, the
comparative approach to the study of SE is used (Patt & Weber, 1980).
This approach compares SE with StdBrE and see how SE deviates from
StdBrE. Therefore, SE is seen as unsuccessful copies of StdBrE. In this
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case learners are considered to be L2 learners of SSE. Whereas, Guptas
(1994) Diglossia and Pakirs (1991, 1995) Expanding Triangles of English
Expressions see SE as an autonomous system, deserving to be analysed
in its own right. However, some learners are considered to be L2 learners
of SSE as their L1 is SCE instead of SSE while others are L1 speakers of
SSE with the ability to move along the cline of proficiency and formality
effortlessly (Pakir, 1991, 1995). For L1 speakers of SSE, variations in
spoken informal settings are treated as register and socio-linguistic shifts.
2.1.3 Errors in English
Under these three approaches, grammatical variations analysed in SE are
usually attributed to the interference and influence of base languages such
as Chinese, Malay and even SCE (Tay 1979, Gupta, 1994,
Poedjosoedarmo 2000, Deterding 2000 and others). However, Alsagoff
(2001) highlights the comments of Thomas (1996) in his observations that
learners of English tend to omit tense and agreement markings, whatever
their first or background language is. Thomas (1996) also notes that there
are dialects of British English, which do not mark, in a regular fashion, the
third person present tense. Thomas (1996) comment that learners of
English tend to omit tense and agreement markings, whatever their first or
background language is, suggests that the lack of tense marking in
students compositions, when the situation requires it, may be due to some
other factors other than interference from their first or background
language.
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This study aims to demonstrate that the patterns of errors committed by
students in Singapore are similar to the general patterns of acquisition of
tense and aspect morphology among learners of other languages, as
explained from the perspective of the Aspect Hypothesis (Andersen and
Shirai, 1996, Bardovi-Harlig 2000, Salaberry and Shirai 2002 and others).
In this thesis, variations in SE are seen as systematic creations of students
because SE is an autonomous linguistic system and SE is also made up of
SCE and SSE, both being at the extreme ends of a cline (Gupta, 1994,
Pakir, 1995). As this study focuses on formal written English (in students
compositions) and not spoken English, any variations that might occur in
students writings will be seen as errors. This is because in the formal
education context, SSE is the target. SSE is no different from the variety
used by educated speakers of English internationally (Pakir, 1995). As
students are taught SSE in the formal context, they are expected to
produce SSE in their compositions. In the context of this study, the corpus
is obtained from a neighbourhood school. Therefore, these students are
considered to be learners of English whose L1 is SCE and they are L2
learners of SSE and errors that occur might be strongly influenced by SCE.
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2.2 A Study of Tense and Aspect
In this section, an overview of tense and aspect will first be presented. This
overview includes literature on how tense and aspect is represented
morphologically in StdE and how morphological representation of tense
and aspect in SE differs from StdE. Studies related to tense and aspect in
SE is also discussed in this section.
2.2.1 Overview of Tense and Aspect (Alsagoff, 2001)
Alsagoff (2001) conducted a non-empirical survey of tense and aspect and
provided an overview of how tense and aspect are represented in Standard
English (StdE) and how tense and aspect marking in Singapore Colloquial
English (SCE) differs from StdE. Alsagoff pointed out that in English, tense
is different from aspect. This is because even when aspect remains the
same, tense can differ. Alsagoff also suggests that tense in SCE is very
different from SSE. Verbs in SCE tend to appear mostly in their bare form
without any overt tense marking and there is no morphological marking to
indicate past time (Alsagoff, 2001). The time and aspectual information that
the verbal inflection in StdE carries, is instead often borne by a time
adverbial, e.g., yesterday(Alsagoff, 2001).
In SCE, the use of time adverbials is also preferred over the morphological
marking of perfective aspect (Alsagoff, 2001). However, Alsagoff (2001)
noted that morphological markings for perfective aspect are not completely
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absent. It is also common for speakers of CSE to mark the perfective
aspect with a past tense verb followed by the adverbial already (Alsagoff,
2001).
Alsagoffs (2001) survey of tense and aspect in SE also noted the
systematic absence of tense and perfective marking while the progressive
marking is usually present. Alsagoff (2001) noted that even though tense
and perfective aspect tend not to be morphologically marked, the
progressive aspect is commonly marked in SCE. The main difference
between SCE and StdE is that SCE does not use the progressive auxiliary
be. However, the main verb is marked with theingsuffix.
Alsagoffs (2001) study of tense and aspect will serve as a springboard as
to how tense and aspect will be defined and analysed in this thesis. These
differences and approaches to studying tense and aspect will be further
elaborated and discussed in chapter three.
2.2.2 Studies investigating tense and aspect in SE
Ho (2003) studied past tense marking in SE based on data from a corpus
of university students written assignments. In her study, she found that
past tense marking were systematic and not random. Her findings are also
consistent with past research by Ho & Platt (1993) on past tense marking in
SE based on a spoken corpus. Ho & Platt (1993) found that non-punctual
verbs receive a low degree of marking for past while punctual verbs receive
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a high degree of marking for past while analysing a spoken corpus. In Hos
(2003) study, she classified the verbs in the corpus according to three
semantic categories: punctual, non-punctual and stative. According to Ho
(2003), a verb is used punctually if it refers to a single completed event or
transaction while a verb is used non-punctually if it refers to an action that
takes place over a period of time or to a habitual activity. A verb is used
statively if it describes a state of affairs rather than an action (Ho, 2003).
The data from her study revealed that only 23% of verbs used non-
punctually were marked for past while 56% of verbs used punctually are
marked for past. The non-punctual category included stative verbs as well.
This is because stative verbs are durative and non-punctual. A verb is
durative if an action that takes place over a period of time. Her study
shows that punctual verbs are more likely to be marked for past tense.
Ho (2003) also found that when discussing habitual tasks, learners tended
switch from the past to present tense. Ho (2003) also pointed out that the
same pattern of not marking verbs for past habitual actions is seen in the
written English texts of Navajo speakers as seen in studies by Bartelt
(1983).
In another study, Saravanan (1989) investigated tense and aspect in
Singapore Tamil English (STE). Saravanan (1989) noted that speakers of
STE tended to use verbal morphology as well as time adverbials to indicate
completive, durative and habitual action. This pattern is similar to patterns
observed in SE by other researchers (Platt & Weber 1980, Alsagoff 1998,
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2001). Saravanan (1989) suggested that whether or not a speaker of STE
perceives a situation as punctual or non-punctual may affect the marking
and non-marking of past tense verbs. Saravanan (1989) also noted that
speakers of SE often do not mark stative verbs, which are also non-
punctual, for past tense. In her study, Saravanan (1989) reported that
speakers tend to mark punctual uses of verbs more than verbs that carry
non-punctual references. However, she also noted that the differences are
less significant with speakers at the upper level of educational
qualifications. Saravanan (1989) noted that speakers with higher levels of
educational qualifications tend to have acquired near native level of
proficiency.
Another interesting finding by Ho (2003), who studied past tense marking in
SE based on data from a corpus of students written assignment, is that
she found that the copula be is frequently marked for past. Saravanan
(1989) also found that among speakers of STE, more statives are marked
for past tense than non-punctual verbs. This is interesting because
according to the Aspect Hypothesis (Andersen and Shirai 1996), stative
verbs being an atelic verb should be less likely to be marked for verbal
morphology.
Saravanan (1989) studied the use of progressive aspect qualitatively
focussing on specific verbs such as remember, forget, feel, and understand
used by speakers of STE. Her study showed that the stative verbs
mentioned above were used in a deviant manner in relation to the ing
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construction. Saravanan (1989) also pointed out that a common feature in
STE was the deviant use of have + ing to refer to the stative sense of
health, possession, and existential location. She also found that speakers
with lower levels of education tended to commit more of such errors while
speakers with higher levels of education have acquired near native level of
proficiency. She attributed this to the interference of the base language
Tamil because more educated speakers did not seem to have this problem.
Saravanans (1989) study did not investigate patterns in the morphology of
the perfective aspect, which this study attempts to undertake.
2.2.3 Past tense marking errors in compositions of primary schools
students Yip (2004)
In a recent study concerning tense morphology in Singapore English, Yip
(2004) investigated past tense errors in the English compositions of
primary school children by looking at three areas:
1) Aspectual Classes of verbs
2) Grammatical features of clauses in which verbs appeared
3) Morpho-phonological features of verbs
In her quantitative study, Yip (2004) wanted to see if any of the three areas
could be used to explain past tense marking errors amongst primary five
pupils.
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In her study, Yip (2004) analysed, in detail, compositions of 20 primary five
pupils narrative or factual recount compositions. For her analysis, all verbs
for each of the 20 compositions were tagged. All main verbs were assigned
an aspectual class according to Vendlers four-way classification, which is
a means to distinguish verbs in relation to their lexical aspect. The
grammatical features of clauses in which the verbs appeared were also
analysed in terms of embedded and non-embedded clauses, and whether
direct speech or time adverbials were used in the text. Morpho-
phonological features of verbs as to whether a verb was regular or irregular
and the final syllable cluster of each verb were also analysed.
Yip (2004) found that errors in past tense marking were not predictable
from aspectual classes of the verbs in any statistically significant way.
Grammatical features were also not significant factors in contributing to
patterns of past tense errors. Only morpho-phonological factors yielded
statistically significant results, and could therefore be used to predict errors
in past tense marking. She found that primary five pupils tend to make
more past tense marking errors with verbs which have base forms ending
in consonant sounds.
Yip (2004), however, did not provide an explanation for this finding. The
perceptual salience hypothesis (PSH) might provide an explanation for this
observation. The perceptual salience hypothesis (PSH) (following works of
Shirai & Kurono, 1998 and Man, 1990) states that a second language
learner will perceive and produce a syllabic grammatical suffix more
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accurately than a non-syllabic grammatical suffix because a syllable is
more perceptually salient than a consonant (or cluster of consonants).
Klein et al (2004) found that L2 learners overall performance is much
better on verbs requiring the syllabic allomorph [Id] than on verbs requiring
the non-syllabic allomorph [d], supporting the perceptual salience
hypothesis.
However, Yip (2004) did not distinguish syllabic vs. non-syllabic syllables,
as such we cannot assess the validity of PSH although Yips (2004) study
seems to show that primary school students are more likely to be
influenced by phonology of verbs.
Yips (2004) finding that the analysis of the aspectual classes of verbs does
not help in predicting tense and aspect marking is contrary to research in
the area of Aspect Hypothesis as reported in Andersen and Shirai (1996).
According to the Aspect Hypothesis, it is expected that learners first
acquire tense and aspect morphology in telic verbs (i.e. accomplishment
and achievements), which means that there is a direct correlation between
past tense morphology and telicity.
Several reasons can explain Yips (2004) finding that the aspectual classes
of verbs do not help in predicting tense and aspect marking errors in her
subjects writings.
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One of the reasons could be the relative small sample size of the study. In
her study, only 20 samples of primary five pupils writings were analysed.
Furthermore, the length of each composition tends to be short, about 150
words long. Therefore, the sample size of 20 compositions, with a corpus
of about 3000 words, may also not be significant enough for the data to be
generalised. Therefore in this research study, compositions from secondary
three students will be collected. 50 samples of writings, with a significantly
larger corpus of over 22,000 words will be considered. It is hoped that this
larger corpus will yield more significant and revealing findings.
Another reason could be the relative young age of her subjects as studies
by Lenneberg (1967) proposed that there is a critical period for language
learning, he reasoned that lateralization for language takes place by
puberty and the brains left hemisphere is no longer able to acquire
language. Therefore, Yips (2004) subjects might be too young to fully
master verbal morphology.
2.3 The Aspect Hypothesis (AH)
The Aspect Hypothesis is based on the study of lexical aspect (Bardovi-
Harlig 2000). Lexical aspect is different from grammatical aspect.
Grammatical aspect is concerned with the internal temporal constituency
of one situation (Comrie 1976: 5) while lexical aspect is concerned with
the semantics of verbs and their arguments (Bardovi-Harlig, 2000).
Definitions of some key terms relating to lexical aspect will be briefly
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presented here because the review will include these terms. Fuller
explanations of these terms will be covered in Chapter Three.
Lexical aspect can be viewed in terms of Vendlers (1967) four-way
classification whose four aspectual classes can be defined and
differentiated using binary semantic categories such as +/- telicity, +/-
punctuality +/- stative and +/- agentive.
Predicates that are telic have a natural end while atelic predicates do not
(Bardovi-Harlig 2000). Punctual Verbs such as dieoccur instantaneously
while non-punctual verbs like run and construct require duration in time
(Bardovi-Harlig, 2000). With a state, unless something happens to change
that state, then the state will continue. In a dynamic situation, the situation
will only continue if it is continually subject to a new input of energy (Comrie
1976). A verb that requires a causer for the event to occur is said to be
agentive (Kearns, 2000).
Vendler (1967) classified verbal predicates into four aspectual classes:
states, activities, accomplishments and achievements. According to
Vendler (1967), states denote situations where no change occurs (know,
love). In terms of binary semantic categories, state verbs are telic, -
punctual + stative and -agentive. Activities denote situations where a
change occurs but without manifesting any inherent ending for this change,
that is to say, atelic situations (run, walk). It is not that activities lack an
ending point, but rather that this ending point is only dependent on the
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causers will. When the causer decides to cease the action, the event
stops. In terms of binary semantic categories, activity verbs are telic, -
punctual - stative and +agentive. Accomplishments, on the other hand,
represent changing situations with in intrinsic natural culmination (build,
destroy). In terms of binary semantic categories, state verbs are + telic, -
punctual - stative and + agentive. Finally, achievements denote situations
where the inherent end is instantaneously achieved (explode, kill). In
terms of binary semantic categories, state verbs are + telic, + punctual -
stative and - agentive.
Having defined some key terms concerning lexical aspect, we can go on to
discuss the AH. The Aspect Hypothesis (Andersen & Shirai, 1996) states,
1. Learners first use past marking or perfective marking on
achievement and accomplishment verbs, eventually
extending its use to activity and then to stative verbs.
2. In languages that encode the perfective-imperfective
distinction, a morphologically encoded imperfective past, as
in the Romance languages, appears later than perfective
past, and imperfective past marking begins with stative and
activity verbs, then extends to accomplishment or
achievement verbs.
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3. In languages that have progressive aspect, progressive
marking begins with activity verbs, then extends to
accomplishment or achievement verbs.
Andersen & Shirai, 1996:533
The Aspect Hypothesis attempts to account for the observation that past
tense verbal morphology does not appear with all types of verbal
predicates at the same time and the emergence of past-tense verbal
morphology is guided by the lexical aspect of verb predicates (Bardovi-
Harlig, 2002).
The Aspect Hypothesis stated above, consisting three parts, need not be
seen as a single hypothesis. According to Bardov-Harlig (2002), the Aspect
Hypothesis can be broken down into four separate hypotheses.
1. Learners first use (perfective) past marking on achievements
and accomplishments, eventually extending use to activities
and statives.
2. In languages that encode the perfective/imperfective
distinction, imperfective past appears later than perfective
past, and imperfective past marking begins with statives,
extending next to activities, then to accomplishments, and
finally to achievements.
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3. In languages that have progressive aspect, progressive
marking begins with activities, then extends to
accomplishments and achievements.
4. Progressive markings are not incorrectly overextended to
statives.
Bardovi-Harlig 2002:130
The Aspect Hypothesis can be summarised by saying that the selection
and use of perfective and/or past marking are initially restricted to the
marking of telic predicates, that is, achievements and accomplishments.
The imperfective marking is initially restricted to marking atelic predicates
(states and activities), whereas progressive marking is restricted to marking
dynamic and atelic predicates (activities) (Salaberry and Shirai, 2002).
The first claim of the aspect hypothesis that achievement and
accomplishment verbs tend to be marked first for past and/or perfective
tense is central to this research. From this claim, we can extrapolate that
because learners tend to first acquire past tense and perfective marking for
telic verbs (achievements and accomplishments), learners should make
more errors in the marking of atelic verbs (activities and states) in terms of
past tense and perfective marking. By studying errors in tense and aspect
marking in terms of aspectual classes of verbs, an explanation as to why
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more errors are associated with certain lexical classes of verbs can be
obtained.
The next claim of the aspect hypothesis that imperfective marking is initially
restricted to atelic predicates (activities and states) will not be included in
this study. This is because the English language does not encode the
perfective/imperfective distinction like other European languages such as
French and Italian.
Errors in progressive marking are also not included in this study. This is
because from the review of literature, errors in the marking of progressive
aspect do not seem to be a common problem in Singapore English
(Alsagoff, 2001). In fact, it is noted that the progressive form is commonly
marked in SE, although the progressive auxiliary be might be left out
(Alsagoff, 2001). According to Saravanan (1989) who studied speakers of
SE, whose base language is Tamil, found that the incorrect use of
progressive marking is mainly confined to speakers of lower education
level. This is further supported by the corpus used in this study, which
reveals that such errors only make up about 0.3% of all errors in the
corpus.
Therefore, the most salient part of the aspect hypothesis to this study is the
first part of the aspect hypothesis, i.e., the selection and use of perfective
and/or past marking is initially restricted to the marking of telic predicates;
that is achievements and accomplishments (Andersen and Shirai, 1996,
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Salaberry and Shirai, 2002). In other words, in the process of acquiring
verbal morphology, a learner marks verbs for tense and perfective aspect
first among telic verbs (such as achievements and accomplishments)
before atelic verbs (such as states and activities). If the aspect hypothesis
is true, one can expect that tense and perfective aspect marking errors
occurring more frequently in verbs whose lexical aspects are atelic, i.e.
states and activities, and less frequently in verbs whose lexical aspects are
telic, i.e. achievements and accomplishments. This might be so especially
in texts that require the verbs to be written in the past tense such as
Narratives and Recounts.
The current Aspect Hypothesis, according the Bardovi-Harlig (2000) has its
genesis in the defective tense hypothesis following Weist et al (1984). The
defective tense hypothesis states that in the beginning stages of language
acquisition only inherent aspectual distinctions and not tense or
grammatical aspect are encoded by verbal morphology. The defective
tense hypothesis consists of three parts. Firstly only telic verbs receive past
tense inflections, secondly, tense distinctions are redundant and only
accompany aspectual distinctions and lastly, only references to immediate
past situation are made. However, it must be noted that Bloom et al (1980)
pointed out, earlier, that children do not necessarily only learn tense after
they have learnt aspect. Therefore, researchers such as Andersen (1989),
Shirai and Andersen (1995) and Andersen and Shirai (1996) put forward
that a relative interpretation of the defective tense hypothesis is more likely
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and can be better defended, thus giving rise to the Aspect Hypothesis
(Andersen & Shirai 1996).
Bardovi-Harlig (2000) notes that early work in support of the Aspect
Hypothesis, for example Kumpf (1984), Flashner (1989), Robison (1990)
and others were based on few individual learners. However, researchers
such as Meisel (1987) pointed out that studies based on few learners may
not accurately reflect the true patterns of acquisition of tense and aspect
morphology as the results may be skewed towards certain unique
characteristics of individual learners. Following this criticism, studies of
tense and aspect acquisition began working with larger sample sizes
(Bardovi-Harlig, 2000). Not only did the sample size of studies become
larger, researchers began to study learners from different levels of
proficiency. There was also a shift towards the quantification of the analysis
of results in order to test the hypothesis. There was also an expansion
concerning the type of data collected as well as techniques of linguistic
analyses. Tests for the determination of aspectual classes were also better
implemented to ensure better comparability between studies (Bardovi-
Harlig, 2000).
According to Bardovi-Harlig (2000) there are many methods used in the
study of tense and aspect morphology. Some researchers such as Van
Patten (1990), Robison (1993), Bardovi-Harlig & Bergstrom (1996) and
many others studied tutored versus untutored learners, while others
employed either cross-sectional or longitudinal design as well as a single
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level of proficiency in order to describe the relation between lexical aspect
and verbal morphology at a single point. Furthermore, as a result of the
expansion of sample sizes of studies, the elicitation procedures also
developed further. These tasks include oral and written personal and
impersonal narratives, written cloze passages, judgement tasks, telling and
retelling silent films, performing stories and use of picture stories.
The Aspect Hypothesis has also been tested against many languages with
positive results. Bardovi-Harlig (2000) noted the following examples of
target languages studied: Catalan (Comajoan, 1998), Dutch (Housen,
1993, 1994), English (Kumpf 1984, Flashner 1989, Robison 1990, 1995,
Bayley 1991, 1994, Bardovi-Harlig 1992, Bardovi-Harlig and Reynolds
1995, Rohde 1996, Collins 1997 and many others), French (Kaplan 1987,
Bergstrom 1995, 1997, Salaberry 1998 and others), Italian (Giacalone
Ramat & Banfi, 1990, Giacalone Ramat, 1995c, 1997), Japanese (Shirai
1995, Shirai & Kurono, 1998), Portuguese (Leira 1994, Leira & Mendes
1995), Russian (Leary 1999) and Spanish (Andersen 1986, 1991, Ramsay
1990, Salaberry, 1997, 1999 and many others).
Weist (2002) suggests the reasons why it is important to investigate the
acquisition of tense and aspect. Firstly, it shows the early phrase of
temporal reference. Secondly, it is relevant to the question of how
morphological information is processed. Thirdly, it reveals elements of the
verb argument structure. Fourthly, it provides insights into the childs tacit
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knowledge of syntactic structure. Finally, it has comparative value for
research on L2 acquisition and non-typical L1 acquisition.
Although the view put forward above is from the language acquisition
perspective and many linguists would consider basing a study on Aspect
Hypothesis is within the purview of language acquisition and not the
analysis and explanation of patterns of tense and aspect marking errors,
the Aspect Hypothesis relevant to this study. This is because studies on
language acquisition of verbal morphology can provide explanations as to
why certain morphological errors occur among learners at a particular
stage in their language acquisition process.
In order to further illustrate AH, one of the experiments done in relation to
AH will be described. The description is based on a study by Bardovi-Harlig
(1998). This study addresses three claims of the aspect hypothesis that
pertains to English. That is the use of the perfective past, the distribution of
the progressive, and the (non) use of the progressive with states.
Data for this experiment was made up of a cross-sectional sample of oral
and written narratives from learners (university students) of English as a
second language, which was elicited by means of a film, retell task. In this
task, an 8-minute excerpt from the silent film Modern Timeswas used as it
contained a series of discrete, easily identifiable action sequences as well
as simultaneous actions and changes of scene.
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Learners watched the film excerpt in their Speaking-Listening classes. The
learners watched the film twice and were given opportunities to clarify
anything that they might not understand. These learners then met the
interviewer individually to record the retell of the story orally. Learners also
produced written narratives during their composition classes.
The participants in this particular study were all enrolled in at the Centre for
English Language Training at a university in the United States of America.
Learners of various proficiency levels were also selected and grouped
according to the prevalence of tense marking in their samples. A total of 74
oral and narrative samples from 37 participants were chosen. The learners
were drawn from five L1 backgrounds. There were 14 Arabic students, 10
Koreans, 6 Japanese, 6 Spanish and 1 Mandarin. Each verb in the
narrative was coded for use of a past tense form in past time contexts,
which include simple past, past progressive and past perfect. The non-use
of the past form in past time contexts was also coded. It was noted that the
occurrence of past perfect among the narratives was rare.
Each verb was also assigned to one of four aspectual classes according to
the tests established for aspectual categories by Vendler (1967). The tests
by Dowty (1979) were used to categorise these verbs. These tests will also
be elaborated on and discussed in chapter three of the current study.
In this study, it was found that in written narratives, achievement and
accomplishments show the highest rate of past-tense inflection. Activities
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also show greater occurrence of the progressive than any other aspectual
class. This finding is consistent throughout among learners of different
proficiency levels. The oral narratives also exhibit the same patterns as
written narratives.
Bardovi-Harligs (1998) study provides support for all claims of the aspect
hypothesis that applies to English. She found that achievement and
accomplishment verbs are more likely to be marked for the perfective past
and progressive marking occur more frequently in activity verbs than any
other aspectual classes and state verbs are not incorrectly marked for
progressive. The findings of her study are consistent with AH for both
written and oral narrative texts.
In the literature, it is noted that learners go through several stages before
employing verbal morphology. However, when learners are ready to
acquire verbal morphology, in particular tense-aspect morphology, the AH
can be applied to predict there patterns of acquisition.
Studies pertaining to language acquisition among L2 learners and learners
of foreign languages have shown that even before learners acquire verbal
morphology to express tense and aspect, learners have many other
linguistic devices at their disposal. Linguistic devices used by learners to
express temporality include pragmatic and lexical devices other than
morphological devices (Bardovi-Harlig, 2000).
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Housen (2002) investigated the development of tense aspect in English
as a second language and the variable influence of the lexical aspect.
Housen (2002) notes that the acquisition of tense and aspect among
second language learners occurs in stages. During the first stage, the
learner learns formulaic expressions such as I dont know. Here, the
learner learns formulaic clusters of words that typically hang together in
order to communicate something. During the second stage, the learner
uses verbs in the morphologically invariant form or unmarked stem form
(e.g. I eat breakfast this morning). This means that the learner is starting to
coin different lexical words together to form an utterance and is more
concerned with the lexical meaning of the utterance than the correct use of
tense and aspect marking, especially if the utterance is said in a past time
context. The learner will start to have some form of formal diversification
such as V + ing at the third stage. At this stage, the learner will be more
aware of the proper use of verbal morphology such as the use of tense to
point to events in relation to time. It is during this stage that the Aspect
Hypothesis seems to be able to predict the patterns of emergence of tense
and aspect marking.
Different learners go through different stages in the acquisition of verbal
morphology. In the context of Singapore, it seems that there is an
assumption that the stage of language acquisition among students at a
specific academic level or year is uniform. Therefore, so long as a student
is in a specific academic level, such as in secondary three, the syllabus
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requires students to employ specific grammatical devices such as the use
of verbal morphology to reflect tense and aspect in their writings in order
for them to be assessed favourably. The presence of tense and aspect
errors in students writings suggests that students are lagging behind in the
stages of acquisition of verbal morphology despite being in a specific
academic level or year.
Students in Singapore are also in a unique position when it comes to the
acquisition of Standard English. This is because in school, these students
are expected to acquire the standard (or internationally intelligible) variety
of the English Language (MOE EL Syllabus, 2001). However, studies in SE
have revealed that speakers of SE have devised creative ways to mean
what they say by employing linguistic strategies such as reduplication (Lim,
1996), Be-omission, redundancy (Low & Brown, 2003), the use of time
adverbial to signal tense and aspect (Alsagoff 1998, Platt & Weber 1980,
Saravanan 1989, Bao 1995 and many others) etc.
This situation is also made more complex by the fact that many mother
tongue languages that students are familiar with such as Malay and
Chinese languages do not posses a tense marking system and verbal
morphology. Consider the following examples.
Saya sudamakan. (Malay)
Wo chi le.(Mandarin)
I eat already. (SCE)
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learners of a language have other linguistic devises at their disposal to
signal tense and aspect whereas L1 learners do not. Therefore, these L2
learners may not initially use verbal morphology to signal tense and aspect.
However, as learners (L1 and L2) progress, they will eventually acquire
and use verbal morphology of the target language to signal tense and
aspect. Research in tense and aspect acquisition reveal that although L2
and L1 learners go through different experiences in acquiring a language,
they seem to exhibit the same patterns in terms of the acquisition of verbal
morphology to signal tense and aspect (Collins 2002, Housen 2002).
These patterns can be explained using the Aspect Hypothesis (Andersen &
Shirai 1996).
The Aspect Hypothesis is a form-centred theoretical approach to the study
of tense and aspect morphology. According to researchers other factors
might also need to be considered. Salaberry and Shirai (2002) note that the
form-meaning correlation is only part of a larger picture. Other factors also
need to be considered such as L1 transfer, input data, formation of
prototypes, discourse functions, instructional varieties, cognitive as well as
universal constraints. Giacalone-Ramat (2002) also suggests that
prototypical semantic notions may be correlated with the frequency with
which some forms may be reflected in language (c.f. the Distributional Bias
Hypothesis, Andersen 1993; Andersen and Shirai 1994).
According to Weist (2002:69), the acquisition of tense-aspect morphology
evolves in a conversational context that requires the child to resolve deictic
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relations. But, more specifically, tense-aspect distinctions are made within
the domain of the verb morphology within the structure of a clause.
Therefore, it is also important to understand the acquisition of the clause
structures.
Shirai (2002) put forward a model of tense aspect acquisition. Shirai
(2002) notes that tense aspect acquisition can be associated with the
following mechanisms.
- form form association: whereby learners associate a certain
inflection with certain verbs. That is, the learner recognises
that certain verbs can only be inflected in a certain way.
- form meaning association: whereby learners associate a
certain inflection to a certain tense and aspect and will use
these inflections to convey the necessary tense and aspect
relation.
- L1 transfer: whereby the learner uses knowledge of the
grammar of the first language to guess and anticipate the
grammar of the target language.
- Universal prototype: learners taking into account of notions
that are universally grammaticizable (Shirai, 2002:472)
However, work by Collins (2002) reveals that the L1 influence in the
acquisition of tense and aspect morphology among Francophone L2
learners of English is very limited. It is only limited to a grammatical form
that is very similar between French and English and learners sometimes
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use these forms interchangeably. She found that, generally, adult
Francophone ESL learners use of tense/aspect markers in past contexts
supported the predictions of the Aspect Hypothesis. She found that these
learners were significantly more successful in using simple past with telics
and struggled most with statives.
Housen (2002) also notes of the effects of the first language or the base
language on the second language acquisition. Housen (2002) speculated
that L2 learners approach the acquisition of the tense and aspect system
of their target language taking into account of their tense and aspect
distinctions in their L1. If there are any similarities found, it will be used as a
basis for reconstructing the target language system. However, if no
similarities are found, learners might resort to universal semantic
prototypes to help them process these unfamiliar tense and aspect
systems. In the case of SCE, Malay and Chinese, these languages do not
employ verbal morphology to signal tense and aspect (Platt and Weber
1980, Poedjosoedarmo 2000, Deterding 2000 and many others).
Therefore, there is a likelihood that learners of English in Singapore resort
to universal semantic prototypes to help them process these unfamiliar
tense and aspect systems which Housen (2002) spoke about.
The researcher recognises that there are many other factors, as listed
above, to be considered in the study of tense and aspect morphology. As
this research study is primarily concerned with the structural problem of
errors in the production of verbal morphology concerning tense and
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perfective aspect that students make while writing compositions, there is an
overt concentration on studying structural patterns in the errors in order to
device ways to help the students overcome their propensity for errors in
tense and aspect marking.
From the literature review, both Ho (2003) and Saravanans (1989) findings
are consistent, to a certain degree, with the Aspect Hypothesis (Andersen
& Shirai 1996) in that punctual verbs, which are also telic, are more likely to
be marked for tense. However, due to the way Ho (2003) and Saravanan
(1989) categorised the verbs according to three semantic categories of
punctual, non-punctual and stative verbs, we cannot be sure that this
finding is entirely consistent with the Aspect Hypothesis. This is because
Ho (2003) defines verbs that are used punctually as events that are
completed or fully transacted while, in terms of lexical aspect, telic verbs
are verbs with natural end points (Bardovi-Harlig, 2000). The lexical aspect
of verbs, such as telicity, typically remains constant regardless whether an
event is completed or not, therefore the semantic categories used in Ho
(2003) and Saravanans (1989) studies are not directly comparable to the
aspectual classes used in studies addressing AH.
As the Aspect Hypothesis provides a clearer framework for the analysis of
tense and aspect morphology, this study will also adopt a similar
framework by categorising verbs according to Vendlers (1957/67) four-way
classification. This will also ensure that the findings of the current study can
be compared with other studies related to the Aspect Hypothesis.
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Despite the differences in semantic categories used in the different
analyses, it is important to note that studies addressing Aspect Hypothesis
(Andersen & Shirai 1996) as well as studies undertaken by Saravanan