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Which it is it? The acquisition of referential and expletive it

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2007

SUSANNAH KIRBY  and
MISHA BECKER
SUSANNAH KIRBY*
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
MISHA BECKER
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
*
Address for correspondence: Susannah Kirby, Department of Linguistics, 318 Dey Hall, CB #3155, UNC-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3155, United States.
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Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the natural order of acquisition of the proform it, comparing deictic pronoun it, anaphoric pronoun it and expletive it. Files from four children (Adam, Eve, Nina and Peter) aged 1 ; 6–3 ; 0 in the CHILDES database were coded for occurrences of NP it (here it is) and expletive it (it's raining). Occurrences of NP it were coded for whether they followed an overt discourse anaphor (anaphoric it) or not (deictic it). All children examined produce deictic and anaphoric pronoun it from the very first files, but do not produce expletive it until 2–7 months later. Following Inoue's (1991) lexical-semantic reanalysis account of the acquisition of expletive there after locative there, we propose that children acquire expletive it by reanalyzing referential pronoun it to include an expletive subtype. This reanalysis takes place when children realize that expletive it never co-occurs with any deictic/anaphoric referent.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 34 , Issue 3 , August 2007 , pp. 571 - 599
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2007

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