The Acquisition of L2 Sociolinguistic Competence

Overview & Synopsis

This reprint brings together cutting-edge research on the acquisition of sociolinguistic competence by speakers of additional languages. Acquiring an additional language involves not only knowledge of structures and pronunciation but also knowledge of what is appropriate in different situations. This knowledge permits speakers to generate and manage social interactions and involves knowing intricate patterns which permit the more subtle aspects of human language interaction. The research situates itself squarely at the juncture of second language acquisition and variationist sociolinguistics. Variationist approaches focus on the factors, linguistic and social, which influence the production of variation patterns where alternative speech forms have the same referential meaning but carry different social weight. Knowledge of this is crucial in effective communicative competence. Chapters cover a wide range of language pairs including L2 Chinese, English, French, German, Korean and Spanish. They investigate previously underexplored aspects of L2 sociolinguistic competence such as learner attitudes and perception. They cover novel methodological and technical approaches such as social network analysis, L2 identity construction and usage-based linguistics. The volume represents an important evolution in our understanding of how, when and in what contexts L2 sociolinguistic competence develops and the linguistic and social factors which impact this development.