Second Language Acquisition and the Subset Principle

In this paper, I examine the claim that the Subset Principle is not operative in (adult) second language acquisition. It has been suggested that the Subset Principle is available to first language learners, but not to second language learners, and that this difference is responsible, at least in part, for the fossilization that seems to be characteristic of second language acquisition. I intend to show that this hypothesis cannot be supported because of both logical and empirical problems. For other issues related to the Subset Principle, which I am not able to address in this space, see the references listed in (1).