Language Acquisition A Linguistic Introduction

by Goodluck, Helen

• ISBN13: 9780631173861
• ISBN10: 0631173862
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1991-08-26
• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell

Summary

This text is an up-to-date introduction to language acquisition, designed to meet the needs of advanced undergraduates and beginning graduate students in linguistics and cognitive science. It is the first language acquisition text to be written from the perspective of recent theoretical linguistics, and uses Chomskyan generative grammar as a framework for description. Taking models and analyses from generative phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics, Professor Goodluck describes children's language acquisition using examples from a variety of languages. Further chapters take up central questions concerning cognitive mechanisms by which children process language and form rules, the nature of the input to the language learner, and the relation between language development and other aspects of cognitive development.The book is extensively illustrated with models and figures, and each chapter is followed by questions for discussion and suggestions for further reading. It also includes a full bibliography.

Author Biography

Helen Goodluck is Associate Professor of Linguistics at the University of Ottawa.

Table of Contents

Preface

Acknowledgements

Introduction: Linguistics and Language Acquisition

Knowledge of Language: Competence and Performance

Types of Linguistic Knowledge

The Projection Problem

Universal Grammar

Outline

Notes

Further Reading

Phonological Acquisition

Speech Sounds

How Sounds are Made

Features

Phonetics, Phonology and Language Variation

Categorical Perception in Adults and Infants

Early Speech Sounds

Feature Acquisition

Child Phonologies

Segmental Rules

Suprasegmentals

Problems and Ideas

Summary

Conclusions

Notes

Further Reading

Questions

Exercises

Morphological Development and Innovation

Types of Morphological Rules

A Morphological Model

Children's Knowledge of Level Ordering

Rule Use and Innovation

Problems and Unknowns

A Cross-Linguistic Perspective

Summary

Conclusions

Questions

Exercises

The Acquisition of Syntax

Syntactic Structures and Universal Grammar

Basic Syntax

Levels of Representation

Universal Grammar: Principles and Parameters

Modules of Government Binding Theory

Government Binding Theory and the Acquisition of Syntax

The Outer Course of Development

Early Syntax

Early Phrase Structure

Subjectless Sentences

Syntax in Pre-School Years

Children's Knowledge Of the Binding Theory

Bounding Theory and the Development of Movement

Children's Grammar of Control

Summary

Syntactic Development after Age Six

Syntactic Development: Some Popular Ideas Reconsidered

'Semantics First'

'Syntax is Late'

Summary

Conclusions

Notes

Further Reading

Questions

Exercises

Further Aspects of Syntactic and Semantic Development

The Auxiliary System of English

Auxiliary Verbs and Morphological Endings

Negation and "Do" Support'

A Syntactic Analysis

The Acquisition of Auxiliary Systems: Syntax

The Acquisition of Negation

An Aside on Developmental Orders and Individual Development

The Acquisition of Modality, Tense and Aspect

Modality

Tense and Aspect

The Development of Word Meanings

Word Meanings

The Semantic Feature Hypothesis

Challenges to the Semantic Feature Hypothesis

Quantification and Logical Form

Summary

Conclusions

Note

Further Reading

Questions

Exercises

Cognition, Environment and Language Learning

Innateness

Input and Errors

The Role of Universal Grammar in Language Development

Learnability and Acquisition Principles

Subjacency and Degree-n Learnability

The Subset Principle

Summary: Components of a Learning Model

Some Questions and Problems in Acquisition Theory

Markedness and Orders of Acquisition

Continuity or Maturation?

Parameter Setting vs. Hypothesis Testing

The Limits of the Linguistic Model: Lexical Learning

Motherese

Language Development and Cognitive Development

Specificity and the Logic of Learning

Constructivism and Developmental Orders

Summary

Conclusions

Notes

Further Reading

Questions

Exercises

Performance Development

Estimating Competence

Adult Processing Mechanisms

A Model

Grammar vs. General Knowledge and Strategies

Words-to-Message Processing

Children's Sentence Processing

On-line Computation of Syntactic Structure

Strategies and Children's Comprehension

Resolution Strategies

Discourse Integration

Summary

Conclusions

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