Chapter 6. Language acquisition across the lifespan and the emergence of new varieties

Abstract

This chapter examines the role of acquisitional processes in the emergence of new language varieties, exploring the question in two ways. We first consider how different age groups and generations contribute to the emergence of new multi-ethnolects in Europe and in comparable contemporary contact situations. Age of exposure and the social context of acquisition are both shown to alter the course of a given variety. We then look at cases of post-colonial dialect emergence, which we exemplify with cases stemming from British colonialism. These examples are used to show that theories of second language acquisition can account for the development of specific grammatical features over generations, and indeed that those theories can in turn be evaluated by such examples. Overall, these cases show that new varieties are key contexts to understand the role of language acquisition in historical sociolinguistics.