What is Second Language

The goal of this research, a work in progress, is to address areas in second/foreign language acquisition prone to cross-linguistic influence, and to examine related cultural factors. More specifically, the authors aim to identify such areas, map available knowledge in this respect using ontological engineering methodology, and devise appropriate teaching strategies and learning scenarios to help overcome cross-linguistic influence with the help of computer-assisted language learning systems. The authors have been working mainly with Japanese-speaking students of English and first-year university English-speaking students of French. In this chapter, the authors describe culture in relation to foreign language learning, cross-linguistic influence, their cultural framework as well as ontological engineering methodology. They demonstrate their work with examples of the use of modals by Japanese students/speakers of English. They further provide an illustration of ontological modeling in addition to a basic simulation of how a CALL system based on an ontology could potentially work.