HPS111 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Language Acquisition Device, Frontal Lobe, 18 Months
WEEK 10- Language
Intro
- Ours is so much more complex
- Its what we stand out compared to animals
- Central to social and intellectual life
- And thought
Non-human language
- Honey bee, communicate through a dance
Language in primates
- Learnt sign language
- No better than a 2-3 year old child, took so long
- Type of language they use is very different
- Mainly for food
- The best they can do is put 3 or 4 words together
Human language
- Infinitely long sentence
- Understand thing we have never heard before
- Thoughts and feelings
Linguistics
Phonology
- The study of the sound of a language
- Concerned with phonemes, units of sound
- Contrast the sounds: Arabic, English, Chinese, polish
Morphology
- The study of words and meaningful word parts
- Concerned with morphemes, smallest units of meaning
- Suffixes and prefixes
- “dog”, “cat”, “ing”, “s”
Syntax
- The rule of sentences and phrases in a given language
find more resources at oneclass.com
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- Governs use and ordering of words and punctuation to combine morphemes into meaningful
structures
- Eg: noun, verb, noun
Semantics
- The meaning of sentences and the relationship between signifies (words) and the things they
stand for
Pragmatics
- The study of how context and other information changes the meaning from the literal content
- “can you pass the salt?” – non literal use
Development of language
- Only have many different theories
- Chomskys theory
oPosits language capacity is innate, this is known as ‘nativism’
oLanguage is too complex, examples are hard to learn from
oTherefore, must be supplemented by inherent knowledge from the language acquisition
device
oInherit genetically the knowledge of language
- Interactionist theories
oSit between contrasting poles:
oNativism- only from inherited genetics
oEmpiricism- language comes only from the environment
oLanguages is product of both natural ability and the environment
oBorn with the capacity however the specific bits are developed from environment
Pre-linguistics
- Generally birth to 12 months
- In this stage: make appropriate eye-contact, take turns in babbling, acquire phonemes of their
first language
Holophrastic stage
- Also termed one-word-sentence phase
- Occurs between 10-13 months
- In this stage: produce first words, use single words to convey complex ideas, begins of syntax
Two-word phase
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Its what we stand out compared to animals. No better than a 2-3 year old child, took so long. Type of language they use is very different. The best they can do is put 3 or 4 words together. The study of the sound of a language. The study of words and meaningful word parts. The rule of sentences and phrases in a given language. Governs use and ordering of words and punctuation to combine morphemes into meaningful structures. The meaning of sentences and the relationship between signifies (words) and the things they stand for. The study of how context and other information changes the meaning from the literal content. Can you pass the salt? non literal use. In this stage: make appropriate eye-contact, take turns in babbling, acquire phonemes of their first language. In this stage: produce first words, use single words to convey complex ideas, begins of syntax.
