The Second Language Acquisition Research Of The Mandarin Numeral Phrases Of English-speaking Learners Under The Perspective Of Universal Grammar

Generally, we divide numeral nominal expressions in Mandarin into Massifiers phrases and Classifiers phrases, considering whether the head nouns are mass nouns or count nouns. Both these two numeral phrases in Mandarin share the same sequence of’Numeral+Classifier+Noun’, however, under the perspective of Universal Grammar, their deep structures are distinguished. Firstly, about the adjective modification, a Massifier differs from a Classifier in its availability to be modified by an adjective, and the head noun of a Classifier can be modified with an adjective while that of a Massifier cannot. Secondly, speaking of the-de suffixation, a Massifier can be suffixed with a-de, which is a modification maker, while a Classifier cannot be followed by a modification maker-de.Based on these linguistic backgrounds studies, I will try to conduct an empirical study on investigating the L2acquisition of numeral expressions. To fill the gap of current second language studies on certain topicUnder the perspective of universal grammar (Chomsky,1981,1986), I will follow the DP Hypothesis (Abney,1987) analyzing the deep structures of these phrases, giving interpretations using syntactic and semantic rules. Following various popular theories of SLA, I will do a second language research among English-speaking learners of L2Mandarin from early proficiency level to the final states of learning, answering if certain types of phrases are acquirable in their steady states and how they will behave acquiring certain categories under both the influences of UG and their first language at their initial states and final states as well.This article will proceed as follows:There are four chapters in this thesis. In Chapter1following, as the introduction, I will brief the current research achievements in Mainland China, as well as overseas. In Chapter2, I will make detailed analyses of the underlying structures CIPs under the perspective of DP Hypothesis, which is supposed to be used universally or cross-linguistically. Chapter3provides the main empirical study, including second language acquisition backgrounds of current theories of SLA and the previous study of L2grammars of numeral expressions in Mandarin Chinese, the process of the empirical study, the result of the study and a detailed discussion. Based on the results and discussion, a conclusion is presented at last in Chapter4, as well as providing practical advises for futher teaching activities.