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The Language Bioprogram Hypothesis and Singaporean English

School of Accountancy and Business Nanyang Technological University Singapore

In his rather controversial book "Roots of Language" 1981, Bickerton claims that 'many of the prerequisites for human language were laid down in the course of mammalian evolution, and that the most critical of those prerequisites... was the capacity to construct quite elaborate mental representations of the external world....' (Bickerton 1981:294-295). The Language Bioprogram Hypothesis (LBH) concerns 'a biological' or 'a species-specific program for language, genetically coded and expressed in ways still largely myste rious, in the structures and modes of operation of the human brain' (Bickerton 1984:173). Among the important distinctions of the LBH are those between state and process, punctual and non-punctual, specific and non-specific and causative and non-causative. Such dis tinctions are clearly evident when a pidgin becomes a creole. The in nate punctual/non-punctual distinction is manifested in Bickerton's investigation of past tense marking in 2 decreolizing situations- Guyana and Hawaii. Verbs which were used non-punctually received a lower marking for past tense than verbs that were used punctually.

What are the factors which influence variation in past tense marking of Chinese Singaporeans? The substratum language may have a strong influence since in Chinese there is no morphological change to the past form of the verb. Or it could be that the innate Language Bioprogram has an influence as well. Naturally, other fac tors such as teaching and general language learning strategies cannot be ignored.

This paper is based on an empirical investigation of recordings of spontaneous speech of a hundred ethnically Chinese Singaporeans who have had English-medium education and discusses variation in past tense marking in Singaporean English as well as pedagogical im plications of the LBH for second language acquisition.

RELC Journal, Vol. 23, No. 1, 1-14 (1992)
DOI: 10.1177/003368829202300101


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