First language attrition in second language acquisition: From cognitive disconnection to the translanguaging paradigm

Abstract

This article undertakes a radical critique of the contemporary foreign language educational paradigm, a framework that enshrines the "monolingual bias" and advocates for the severance of the mother tongue (L1) in pursuit of the illusory goal of "direct thinking" in the target language (L2). The primary aim is to anatomize the cognitive consequences of this coerced L1 suppression. Methodologically, eschewing large-scale quantitative surveys that obscure lived microexperiences, this study adopts a hermeneutic phenomenological approach through a critical case study of an adult learner. The analytical findings reveal a profound reality: the root cause of the acquisitional impasse lies not in a deficit of L2 vocabulary or grammar but fundamentally stems from first language attrition (mất gốc tiếng mẹ đẻ) and the repudiation of one's own ontological roots. Voluntarily severing this singular logical anchor does not foster unmediated fluency; instead, it plunges learners into a state of cognitive disconnection and the monolingual illusion of being culturally and cognitively uprooted (lạc cội lạc nguồn). This epistemic rupture precipitates an illusion of competence and generates fragmented layers of interlanguage fossilization. This state of ontological uprooting is currently exacerbated by the trend of "cognitive offloading" onto generative artificial intelligence, a peril that risks reducing learners to a state of profound epistemic dependency. Grounded in Vygotsky's sociocultural theory, Herbart's concept of the "apperceptive mass", and Cummins's common underlying proficiency model, this research posits that the L1 serves as the indispensable cognitive "scaffolding". Ultimately, the paper advocates for a pedagogical shift toward translanguaging. Imbued with Paul Ricoeur's ethos of "linguistic hospitality", this vision empowers learners to preserve their L1 as "the house of Being" while achieving a state of holistic linguistic apperception, resisting the epistemic misconception of rootless monolingualism.