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WE 5: Unlearning distributions of weak elements: Evidence from German-Turkish learners of L3 French

Weak elements, such as the reduced syllable in the second position of the so-called canonical trochee and the intonation system of German based on it can lead to problems when learning a foreign language. This is particularly true for the target language French, whose intonation is not word-based, but phrase-based. Unlike in German, French F0 contours are not determined by the position of metrically strong syllables and the pitch accents realized on these, but by the boundaries of prosodic phrases (so-called accentual phrases (AP)), which are marked by an obligatory final and an optional initial prominence. German-speaking learners often transfer the word accent and especially the trochaic (strong-weak) pattern of their first language (L1) to French and thus tend to produce too many prosodic prominences in the target language. Turkish combines characteristics of both languages: In the unmarked case, prosodic words exhibit final prominences regardless of their length, which corresponds to the final stress of the French AP. However, Turkish also has a well-defined number of exceptions (e.g., loan words, toponyms) that have a word accent and thus correspond to the German system. The acquisition of French prosody should therefore be easier for Turkish learners than for German learners. It can also be assumed that bilingual German-Turkish learners benefit from the two prosodic strategies of their heritage language and have an advantage over monolingually raised German learners in the acquisition of French prosody. The project explores these considerations and investigates prosodic transfer in the learning of French as a foreign language. Based on German, it appears to be the case that successful prosody acquisition goes hand in hand with the “unlearning” of the distribution of weak elements determined by L1 lexical stress patterns. The project combines measurements of speech production and perception. Production data from learners are analyzed phonetically and phonologically and compared with French L1 data before prosodic deviations from the French target (i.e., a non-target-like, word-based realization of French prosody) are investigated in perception. To this end, brain activity is measured via the electroencephalogram; behavioral data is also collected. We expect that both the French L1 group and the three learner groups will show deviation effects. The strongest effects should occur in the L1 group and the weakest in the German learners. An intervention tailored to improve the learners’ prosodic awareness should moderate this effect and contribute to an improvement in both perceptual performance and production in the target language. The project thus places the research unit’s topics in an applied framework and investigates the extent to which prosodic patterns of the L1 must be “unlearned” in foreign-language learning to achieve target-like performance.