Regan (1995) finds that in relation to the deletion of “ne” in French
L2, the learners who have been living in France and have had contact with
young native speakers tend to overgeneralise the use of non-prestige
forms. Given contact with the native speech community they apply the
native speaker behaviour which uses the prestige form in monitored more
than casual style. But they also, after the stay in France, delete more “ne”
in monitored style. This seems to be a case of “covert” prestige described
by Trudgill (1974) for native speech. Adamson and Regan (1991) reported
a case of second language learners using high rates of non-prestige
forms in monitored style in order to accommodate to a covertly prestigious
native-speaker form. A possible explanation may be due to input.
These young speakers, whose general behaviour values non-traditional
mores, develop a resistance to the prestige norm during contact with
native French speakers of their own age and values, precisely those speakers
who have the highest deletion rates in the native community.
Therefore the non-natives do not use the prestige variant. They adopt the
non-prestige form and reject the prestige one. A likely possibility
(although difficult to quantify due to lack of precise data on this issue) is
the issue of contact with native speakers. The students may not have come into contact with as many speakers of the prestige norm. They would have
had minimal contact with university lecturers but much more with
French students of their own age. A second point to be made about these
learners is that several of them actively sought contact with native speakers.
Gardner (1979), in explaining accommodation for integrative purposes
by minority groups to majority languages, says that these speakers
will actively seek out contact with natives. These speakers wish for further
integration into the French-speaking community. Many professed a strong
desire to live and work in France ultimately, at least for an extended period
of several years.