To the root of (some) interface properties in near-natives’ grammars

In this work I outline a novel proposal aimed at explaining residual optionality in the use of anaphoric devices in near-native speakers of Italian with L1 English. While the current literature has assumed either a representational or a processing difference between natives and near-natives, my proposal reconciles the basic insight of the representational account with the findings concerning processing differences, in the spirit of a more general perspective aimed at integrating representations and processing (Fodor,1974; Sharwood-Smith, 2019). Key points of my proposal are: a) to the root of processing differences there is a different representation; b) this representation is not caused by the other language: rather, resort to the other language is a consequence of an underspecified representation, in turn a general feature of language acquisition.