A., y Boulevard Las Palmas A., cédulas de personas jurídicas

Background information

The instrument employed to test the acquisition of passive constructions in the present study is a subsection of Southwood and Van Dulm’s (2012) language therapy instrument known as

Receptive and Expressive Activities for Language Therapy (REALt). This instrument was

designed to enhance the language intervention process in the case of L1 and L2 English- and Afrikaans-speaking children with SLI or a language delay/disorder stemming from some other condition (Southwood & Van Dulm, 2012:1). The instrument has since also been

169 translated into isiXhosa, but this version (Southwood & Potgieter, 2013) is as yet unpublished and available only from the authors. Included in the target population of this instrument are children from low SES communities whose general and classroom-relevant linguistic skills may be developed through the type of language stimulation that the use of this instrument can offer (Southwood & Van Dulm, 2012:1). As by far the majority of child language therapy material focuses on the development of vocabulary and basic sentence structure in very young children, the focus of this instrument is the remediation of later-developing language skills in children of early school-going age who struggle with syntax and pragmatics (Southwood & Van Dulm, 2012:1). The development of this instrument was further motivated by the lack of standardised language assessment instruments that are culturally and linguistically suited for use with South African children. As a result, the REALt instrument was designed to serve both language remediation and informal language assessment purposes in the South African context (Southwood & Van Dulm, 2012:1).

The REALt material consists of 361 colour picture-based items for use as therapy material and/or informal assessment material; 140 reproducible take-home colour-in story booklets; a CD with electronic copies of the aforementioned booklets for office photocopying and assessment/progress record forms; an A3 poster depicting the two families used as characters in the REALt; and lastly also a user manual. The picture items in the REALt all depict scenes from the lives of two neighbouring middle- to lower-middle-class South African families of different ethnic backgrounds, viz. the Zulus (a black family) and the Martins (whose skin tone suggests they are either white or of mixed race). The scenes and activities in the items are “simple enough for children from economically deprived backgrounds to identify with, yet interesting enough for economically privileged children to enjoy”, whilst culture-, race- and religion-specific activities and socio-cultural taboos were avoided wherever possible (Southwood & Van Dulm, 2012:2-3). The various sections of the REALt allow the remediation and/or assessment of aspects of articles, binding, conjunctions, ellipsis, narratives and role-taking, quantifiers, wh-questions and passive constructions, with each section including a number of subsections targeting subsets of these features, constructions and skills.

170

Comprehension subset

Because of the difficulties language-impaired children experience with passives, and also because these constructions are very common in the type of academic writing found in school text books, the creators of the REALt decided to include a section on passives in their instrument, focusing on both comprehension and production (Southwood & Van Dulm, 2012:49). The comprehension section constitutes a picture-selection task and includes 10 items targeting “agentive” or “long” passives (i.e. passives containing a by-phrase), 10 items targeting “agentless” or “short” passives (i.e. passives in which the AGENT is unspecified through the omission of the by-phrase) and 15 items targeting reversible long passives. All the sentences in the sections on long and short passives are actional passives (cf. the section below on verb types). As for the section on reversible passives, recall from Chapter 4, Section 4.4 that these are passives in which the expression denoting the animate AGENT argument and that denoting the animate THEME argument are interchangeable, even if such an alteration renders the interpretation somewhat improbable, e.g. The cat was chased by the dog versus The dog was chased by the cat (cf. (3c) and (4b) below for more examples of improbable scenarios).

In the case of each individual comprehension item, the child is presented with a selection of three pictures. One picture denotes the target passive construction that the child is presented with orally, another picture depicts the opposing form, and the final picture serves as a distracter that is semantically less related to the target. In the case of items targeting the comprehension of agentive and agentless actional passives, the opposing picture depicts an active sentence in which the same argument featuring in sentence-initial position in the passive stimulus sentence occurs at the start of the sentence, this time in the role of AGENT rather than THEME. In such cases, differences between the target passive sentence presented to the child and the sentence associated with the opposing picture are limited to a few function words or bound morphemes (Southwood & Van Dulm, 2012:49). Below are examples of the options that a child is presented with visually in the case of the agentive subset (cf. (3a), which corresponds with item 1 in this subset), the agentless subset (cf. (3b),

171 which corresponds with item 5 in this subset), and the reversible subset (cf. (3c), which

corresponds with item 6 in this subset).76

(3) (a) Passive sentence stimulus: Bubbles is walked by Granny Gogo. Picture 1 [opposer]: Bubbles is walking by Granny Gogo. Picture 2 [target]: Bubbles is walked by Granny Gogo.

Picture 3 [distracter]: Granny Gogo is walking without Bubbles.

1. 2. 3.

© 2012 Stellenbosch University

(3) (b) Passive sentence stimulus: Thandi was caught.

Picture 1 [opposer]: Thandi is catching Stevie (depicting Thandi was catching). Picture 3 [distracter]: Thandi and Stevie are standing.

Picture 2 [target]: Stevie is catching Thandi (depicting Thandi was caught).

76 _{Due to space limitations, examples from only the English version of the REALt are provided in this chapter.} For a detailed description as well as examples of the relevant types of passive constructions in Afrikaans and isiXhosa, cf. Chapter 4.

172

1. 2. 3.

© 2012 Stellenbosch University

(3) (c) Passive sentence stimulus: Thandi is dressed by Bubbles.

Picture 1 [distracter]: Bubbles has clothes on and is sitting next to Thandi. Picture 2 [target]: Bubbles is putting a shirt on Thandi (depicting Thandi is

dressed by Bubbles)

Picture 3 [opposer]: Thandi is putting a shirt on Bubbles (depicting Bubbles is

dressed by Thandi)

1. 2. 3.

© 2012 Stellenbosch University

Production subset

The production section constitutes a sentence completion task and includes 10 items targeting actional passives (cf. the section below on verb types) and 15 items targeting reversible passives. The Afrikaans and isiXhosa versions also have an additional five items each targeting existential passives, i.e. five daar-passives in Afrikaans and five ku-passives in isiXhosa. In the case of each item, the child is presented with a single picture and a

173 descriptive active sentence detailing the action depicted in the picture. The child is then prompted to reformulate the sentence so that the semantic content stays the same, but the structure differs. The examples below illustrate how this is done in the case of (4a) item 2 on the action subset; (4b) item 3 in the reversible subset; and (4c) item 3 in the daar-passives subset in the Afrikaans and the ku-passives subset of the isiXhosa version of the instrument (Southwood & Van Dulm, 2012:50). In all cases, the child is free to produce either a long or a short passive, as there is no way to elicit the production of a long passive without excessive prompting, which would most likely result in an inaccurate reflection of the child’s true ability, and would make the data unrepresentative of what a child might produce spontaneously.

(4) (a) Stimulus: Look how funny this is. Bubbles is reading the newspaper! We can say

it another way. We can start with The newspaper. The newspaper...

Target: ...was/got read by Bubbles.

© 2012 Stellenbosch University

(b) Stimulus: In this picture, a great big fish has caught John. We can say that in

another way; we can put John first and say John...

174

© 2012 Stellenbosch University

(c) Stimulus: Hierdie hond blaf hard. Ons kan dit anders ook sê. Ons kan sê Daar word... [This dog is barking loudly. We can also say it another way. We can say There gets...]

Target: …geblaf […barked]

© 2012 Stellenbosch University

Types of verbs

Three different types of verbs were targeted in both the comprehension and production subsets of the passives section of the REALt: action verbs (denoting a physical action, e.g.

push, pinch, catch, teach, swallow); psychological verbs (denoting a psychological

175 sensory perception, e.g. see, feel, taste, smell, hear). This decision was guided by the fact that, according to research by Babyonyshev, Hart and Grigorenko (2005), language-impaired children fare best with actional passives, less well with psychological passives and worst with perceptual passives. As a result, the authors of the REALt decided to include in the reversible passives comprehension subset nine actional, three psychological and three perceptual passives (the agentive and agentless comprehension subsets contain only straightforward actional passives). In the case of the production section, the 15 items in the reversible passives subset are divided equally between items targeting actional, psychological and perceptual passives.

5.4.4.2 Administering of test and coding of test data

As mentioned above, the two halves of the passive test were alternated with the two halves of the vocabulary test in each play session. All child responses were written down and later verified with the audio recording of the interaction. Administering the comprehension items, where the child simply had to select the target picture from a selection of three pictures, typically took far less time than administering the production items. Problems with testing production included the following: (i) in order to keep testing time to a minimum to prevent participant fatigue, the administrator often had to curb the enthusiasm of children who would provide lengthy, creative descriptions of the action depicted in the picture (mostly using only active constructions); (ii) the administrator regularly had to make up answers to the numerous questions about the depicted scenario that some children would ask, and then try to revert their attention back to the stimulus; (iii) trying to focus the child’s attention on the target action rather than on some other visual detail in the picture that peaked her interest; (iv) trying to discourage the rote repetition of the stimulus (complete with an accurate mimicking of the administrator’s intonation pattern) which would mostly be unaccompanied by the completion of the target sentence; (v) preventing code-switching in the case of trilinguals; and (vi) trying to coax a verbal response from children who were hesitant to produce anything, for whatever reason.

The latter type of null response to production items was predominant among the trilingual participants and may thus be a result of low proficiency levels in the language of testing.

176 However, this type of response was also found, albeit to a lesser extent, among monolinguals, and therefore may also be a result of personality factors such as shyness and/or fatigue. In the case of shy children, this trait may have been exacerbated by the fact that the administrator was an outsider to the community and sometimes of a different race. Additionally, the possibility of erring (which may be humiliating or discouraging) is decidedly greater when having to formulate one’s own sentence, than when having to choose a target picture from only three given options during the comprehension task. Silence, in this case, may thus have been an avoidance strategy.

Trouble with eliciting production data from young children is not in any way unique to the present study. According to Paradis (2010:661,674-675), there is common agreement in the literature that production tasks are more “demanding” than comprehension tasks and in the case of bilinguals, the competition between a speaker’s two languages may be more severe during production than during other linguistic tasks, especially in the non-dominant language. Significantly reduced exposure may furthermore increase the challenge that production poses to multilinguals, as suggested by Pearson et al. (1997) upon observing that those children in her study who received less than 20% exposure to a given language produced the least spontaneous speech in that medium (cf. Section 5.2.1.3 above). Recall, however, my earlier argument for including participants with as little as 10% exposure to one or more of their languages as a way of capturing the full range of variability in the trilingual experience. Low production rates among such participants, albeit frustrating in the testing scenario, may thus constitute an important phenomenon to note in researching the relationship between input and proficiency.

With regard to scoring participants’ responses to the passive section of the REALt, no existing score sheet was available as the instrument was not designed to serve as a formal test instrument. The researcher thus developed her own scoring system. As such, a mark of one was awarded for every answer in the comprehension section that corresponded with the number of the target item (the latter being a number between one and three, representing one of the three pictures that the child is presented with). In the case of incorrect answers, a mark of zero was awarded. As for the production items, the child’s verbatim response was entered into a spreadsheet, and a score of 0, 1 or 2 awarded, depending on the extent to which it

177 approached or deviated from the target answer. All responses to production items were additionally classified as being of a certain nature, this nature determining the score. The categories of response types were based on the predominant response patterns, i.e. these categories were not conceived prior to the analysis of the data, but represent the most common response types found during the analysis of the data. Only once these categories had been defined was each of the responses labelled as being of a specific type. The system of categorisation is detailed below, the numeral indicating the score awarded and the letter in brackets detailing the response type.

2(a): A passive sentence that is exactly on-target (disregarding any possible concord or tense errors on the passive auxiliary in the case of English and Afrikaans); OR

An accurate passive sentence using a verb other than the one provided in the stimulus, but that is still suited to the depicted scenario (disregarding any possible concord or tense errors on the passive auxiliary in the case of English and Afrikaans), e.g. The

apple is chewed by Mr Zulu instead of The apple is eaten by Mr Zulu.

2(b): A passive sentence that is on-target, except for a change of verb class in the sense that a target psychological or perceptual passive verb was substituted by an actional passive verb, e.g. The elephant was cut by Stevie instead of The elephant was bothered by

Stevie (thus, the targeted psychological verb bothered is substituted by the actional verb cut).

1(a): A passive sentence that is on-target, except for a morphological error on the passive verb (such as the incorrect form of the passive affix, or an omitted passive affix), e.g.

Boxer was seed through the window instead of Boxer was seen through the window;

OR

A long passive sentence that is on-target, except for an error of some sort in the agentive phrase (such as an omission of the preposition by/deur in the case of English and Afrikaans respectively or the omission of the ku- morpheme in the case of isiXhosa); e.g. Pam is being smelled Boxer instead of Pam is being smelled by Boxer. 1(b): A passive sentence using a verb other than the one provided in the stimulus, with a

morphological error on the passive verb (e.g. The couch was bite by the dogs instead of

178

eating by a fish instead of John was caught by the fish; the child’s response here

involving both a morphological error on the passive verb and an omission of the passive auxiliary).

0(a): Incorrect: an active sentence using the verb provided in the stimulus/a very similar, context-appropriate verb, with the original AGENT argument retained at the start of the

sentence, e.g. The fish did bite John77 instead of John was caught by the fish (the latter

being an example of a reversible passive). This type of response is typically an exact repetition or close approximation of the stimulus sentence (here, A great big fish has

caught John).

0(b): Incorrect: an active sentence using the verb provided in the stimulus/a very similar, context-appropriate verb, with the original THEME argument serving as the AGENT argument, e.g. Pam is pushing Debbie instead of Pam is being pushed by Debbie or

Boxer is eating instead of Boxer is swallowed (by the bone). This type of response is

typically an exact repetition or close approximation of the stimulus sentence, with a simple role reversal between AGENT and THEME.

0(c): Incorrect: a non-passive sentence78 using a verb other than the one provided in the

stimulus, with the original THEME argument serving as the AGENT argument, e.g.

John did fall instead of John was knocked over by the car; The tea is getting cold

instead of The tea is being poured; or Pam is sad instead of Pam is upset (by Thandi). This type of response typically involves an explanation of the state that the original THEME argument is in, or a description of how that argument came to be in the situation depicted in the picture.

77

Note that the auxiliary verb did is not used for emphasis here, but is simply used to mark the past tense. This is a feature of Cape Flats English, which (as mentioned in Chapter 5, Section 5.4.3.2) is strongly influenced by Afrikaans. Compare, for example, the Cape Flats English sentence The fish did bite John with its translation equivalent in Standard South African English, The fish bit John, and in Afrikaans, Die vis het John gebyt. Directly translated, the Afrikaans equivalent would be “The fish has John bitten” as past tense can only be expressed with the aid of an auxiliary verb in Afrikaans. Alternative accounts in explanation of the non- emphatic use of did in Cape Flats English also exist, such as that put forward by Mesthrie (1999), according to which this phenomenon is a remnant of missionary English.

78 _{“Non-passive” is here used to refer to active constructions such as Pam is crying, but also to other types of} constructions that are not passive in nature, for example stative constructions such as Pam is sad or Pam was

having a sore; declarative constructions such as The lion, he must wake up; and interrogatives such as Boxer, why is you laying so?

179 0(d): Incorrect: a partial utterance (e.g. a single word) / no utterance at all / an utterance in a language other than the language of testing / an utterance consisting of one or more active sentences that do not fit any of the other response options above.

Recall from Chapter 4 that, in English and Afrikaans, there is sometimes ambiguity in the