FACTORS AFFECTING THE L2 EFFECT ON THE L1
In the literature, most of the work on cross-linguistic influence has focused on the effects of the first language (hereafter the L1) on the second language (hereafter the L2), but there is so little research which specifically focuses on the effects of the L2 on the L1. In fact, the first book on this subject -Effects of the Second Language on the First- (edited by Cook, 2003) came out in 2003 which is so recent. This suggests that this area needs much more research and the discussion offered in this book will be a contribution to this literature by making this topic easily readable for not only academicians, but also for students ranging from undergrate degree to the PhD degree.
Accordingly, the aim of this book is to demonstrate the L2 effect on the L1 and the nature of this phenomenon. The goals is to specifically focus on the factors affecting this phenomenon and to discuss it in relation to the Multi-competence Theory, the models of the bilingual mind, the nature of the L2 users and the characteristics of L2 users. The author of this book tried to make a contribution to the relevant literature by making the mentioned topics easily readable for not only academicians, but also for students ranging from undergraduate degrees to the PhD degree. The overall contribution is to present the mentioned issues in a concise and systematic way which can be a short handbook for various type of readers, from academic or non-academic backgrounds.
This book is prepared based on the master’s thesis Atar (2012). Previously, three articles were published based on this thesis. The first one, Atar (2014), specifically utilized the data analysis of the thesis and presented it to the literature. Atar (2018) specifically focused on an intriguing finding of the thesis and it developed the analysis by re-analyzing the data of the thesis with specific regard to the issue of metalinguistic awareness. The article Atar (2017) took the study one step further and using a different methodology, Corpus Linguistics, it undertook a study to unearth the validity of prescriptive grammar conventions. A seen in these articles, one of them directly utilized the data of the Atar (2012) thesis and the others also focused on the analysis aspects. However, in this book the author aims to expand on the literature review of the thesis in order to provide academicians, students and practitioners with a book which presents the issues around the L2 effect on the L1 in a systematic way.
Asst. Prof. Dr. Cihat ATAR
Istanbul Medeniyet University, Faculty of Education
English Language Teaching Department
