ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the important questions about idiom acquisition, including issues such as knowledge and skills needed for acquiring idioms, models of development of figurative competence for acquiring metaphorical idioms, and unique problems related to L2 idiom acquisition. Of course, the issue of idiom acquisition goes beyond how people process and understand idioms. Research on idiom acquisition has focused almost exclusively on children. As is the case with their ability to understand idioms, children's ability to produce idioms is also correlated with their development in cognitive and general linguistic skills. In Winner's analysis, children's understanding of metaphors falls into four categories: literal, metonymic, primitive metaphoric, and genuine metaphoric. Unlike pre-metaphorical understanding, genuine metaphorical comprehension accurately identifies the underlying topic–vehicle relationship of an idiom and offers a correct interpretation. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the importance of grasping idioms in language development.
