Minding the Absent: Arguments for the Full Competence Hypothesis

Children, it is well known, go through a developmental stage in which they omit functional material, a fact which is often attributed to a missing of deficient functional structure in the early grammar. We argue that the systematic omission of functional material, on the contrary, argues for the presence of functional structure, as in the absence of such structure, what is expected is not a systematic omission of functional material, but rather, its random (over)use. Random use of functional material is attested in agrammatic speech, where, we suggest, it may indeed stem from absent or deficient functional structure. On the other hand, the early grammar is characterized by a full, albeit phonologically unrealized, functional structures. Such phonologically unrealized functional structures, we suggest, are interpreted in the early grammar through D(iscourse)-linking, using UG-available principles that are otherwise attested in natural language. 1 The authors would like to thank audiences at the 21st Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development and at Northwestern University as well as Kirrie Ballard and Cynthia Thompson for helpful comments. Special thanks to Collin Phillips for comments on an earlier draft of this paper, and to four anonymous reviewers of Language Acquisition for many illuminating comments.