L1 attrition in a wider perspective
In proposing a formal model for grammatical attrition, Hick and Hicks and Domínguez (2020, henceforth H&D) present some valid arguments but also expose some limitations of their approach. First, they state that ‘the possibility of grammatical attrition is crucial to our understanding of bilingual acquisition (p. 144).’ I am in complete agreement with this view. For a long time, research on first language (L1) attrition was not systematically connected to research on second language (L2) acquisition. The emergent view now is rather to look at L1 attrition and L2 acquisition as two inseparable sides of bilingualism, both in the same individual speaker and in bilingual communities. Second, the new picture requires considering L1 attrition not only in terms of loss or erosion but, more generally, as change (although not necessarily grammatical change): this is a view that has been gaining strength in recent years, and is also explicitly recognized by H&D. Third, H&D acknowledge that incorporating L1 attrition in a generative model requires ‘a model of the language faculty that retains a role for input in maintaining an L1 grammar beyond the primary years of language acquisition’ (p. 145): they are absolutely right, although they ignore the equally strong need to understand how language interacts with general cognition and how these interactions modulate both L1 attrition and L2 acquisition. Ultimately, H&D’s main concern seems to be to provide a formal generative account of L1 attrition, to the exclusion of additional (not necessarily alternative) explanations. I will briefly expand on each of these points. I would start by distinguishing between L1 attrition in first-generation L1 speakers who learn another language as adults and generational attrition in heritage speakers who learn their minority language as children in a bilingual context. H&D are only concerned with individual attrition, not with generational attrition, but the distinction is important because the effects on language in first vs. second generation attrition are different, both in terms of scope and in terms of stability. As H&D recognize, individual attrition involves no ‘erosion’ or ‘permanent loss’ but rather fluctuations and increasing