Publications [#351831] of Michael Tomasello

Journal Articles

1. Brandt, S; Diessel, H; Tomasello, M, The acquisition of German relative clauses: a case study., Journal of child language, vol. 35 no. 2 (May, 2008), pp. 325-348 [doi]
   (last updated on 2025/06/15)

   Abstract:
   This paper investigates the development of relative clauses in the speech of one German-speaking child aged 2 ; 0 to 5 ; 0. The earliest relative clauses we found in the data occur in topicalization constructions that are only a little different from simple sentences: they contain a single proposition, express the actor prior to other participants, assert new information and often occur with main-clause word order. In the course of the development, more complex relative constructions emerge, in which the relative clause is embedded in a fully-fledged main clause. We argue that German relative clauses develop in an incremental fashion from simple non-embedded sentences that gradually evolve into complex sentence constructions.