Language acquisition is language change

1. Language acquisition is language change Brenda M. Martinez Professor: Evelyn Lugo ENGG 604

2. Objectives At the end of the presentation the participants will be able to: • Understand the concept of language acquisition and the implications extended to the rest of human cognition. • Appreciate the importance and influence of the theory of universal grammar. • Recognize the elements of the UG base approach. • Be familiar with language change and the reasons .

3. Introduction This presentation means to inform about the language acquisition. The theory of universal grammar, the UG base approach. Also will describe language change and the reasons that promote that state of change. Is been stated that humans are equipped with the necessary being that control gradually the way language is acquire, depending of the behavioral inventory and is a form of though translated is verbal communication. Chomsky disagree with this theory, according to Noa the child could learn a language with out externals influence. He believes that the human have with in the mechanism to acquire the language on it own. Another theory is stated by Hence that believed that the capacity of language learning depends on an innate quality that we all posses a module are an element that is distinctive from general intelligence. Chomsky’s theory also suggests that some rules of grammar are hard-wired into the brain, and manifest without being taught.

4. Language acquisition • The scientific study of language acquisition began around the same time as the birth of cognitive science, in the late 1950's. We can see now why that is not a coincidence. The historical catalyst was Noam Chomsky's review of Skinner's Verbal Behavior (Chomsky, 1959). • The mind consisted of sensor motor abilities plus a few simple laws of learning governing gradual changes in an organism's behavioral repertoire.

5. Language acquisition cont. • Therefore language must be learned, it cannot be a module, and thinking must be a form of verbal behavior, since verbal behavior is the prime manifestation of "thought" that can be observed externally. • Chomsky argued that language acquisition falsified these beliefs in a single stroke: children learn languages that are governed by highly subtle and abstract principles, and they do so without explicit instruction or any other environmental clues to the nature of such principles. • Hence language acquisition depends on an innate, species-specific module that is distinct from general intelligence. Much of the debate in language acquisition has attempted to test this once-revolutionary, and still controversial, collection of ideas. The implications extended to the rest of human cognition.

6. UG base approach • Universal grammar is a theory in linguistic that suggests that there are properties that all possible natural human languages have. Usually credited to Noam Chomsky, the theory suggests that some rules of grammar are hard-wired into the brain, and manifest without being taught.

7. Language change • Change as an inherent feature of living language. • A brief overview of the historical development of English to identify different ways in which language changes over time and continues to change in contemporary experience. • The ways in which style has changed in spoken and written English. • The socio-cultural causes and consequences of language change in English over time. • The relationship between dialectical variation and temporal change.

8. Reasons for language change • Interaction of the class structure - fewer extremes. • Proliferation of TV and film. • Education • New technology. • Rise of youth culture. • Media & public broadcasting • Impact of foreign invasion

9. Reasons for language change • Printing press - introduced by William Caxton in 1476 - used East Midlands dialect - dialect of education (Oxbridge) etc, became Standard Eng. Printing press worked by ordering letter blocks, so the actual font needed to be standardized. As well as that, spelling and language was standardized to a certain extent as well. Perhaps most importantly is that it was the portal into the world of written texts, which allowed them to be passed around and transported all across the country, which may have contributed to standardizing language.

10. The American linguist Noam Chomsky • During the first half of the 20th century, linguists who theorized about the human ability to speak did so from the behaviorist perspective that prevailed at that time. They therefore held that language learning, like any other kind of learning, could be explained by a succession of trials, errors, and rewards for success. In other words, children learned their mother tongue by simple imitation, listening to and repeating what adults said. • This view became radically questioned, however, by the American linguist Noam Chomsky. For Chomsky, acquiring language cannot be reduced to simply developing an inventory of responses to stimuli, because every sentence that anyone produces can be a totally new combination of words. When we speak, we combine a finite number of elements—the words of our language—to create an infinite number of larger structures—sentences. • Moreover, language is governed by a large number of rules and principles, particularly those of syntax, which determine the order of words in sentences.

11. Noam Chomsky cont. • The term “generative grammar” refers to the set of rules that enables us to understand sentences but of which we are usually totally unaware. It is because of generative grammar that everyone says “that’s how you say it” rather than “how that’s you it say”, or that the words “Bob” and “him” cannot mean the same person in the sentence “Bob loves him.” but can do so in “Bob knows that his father loves him.” (Note in passing that generative grammar has nothing to do with grammar textbooks, whose purpose is simply to explain what is grammatically correct and incorrect in a given language.) • Even before the age of 5, children can, without having had any formal instruction, consistently produce and interpret sentences that they have never encountered before. It is this extraordinary ability to use language despite having had only very partial exposure to the allowable syntactic variants that led Chomsky to formulate his “poverty of the stimulus” argument, which was the foundation for the new approach that he proposed in the early 1960s.

12. Conclusion • The topic of language acquisition involve the most profound questions about our understanding of the human mind, and the speech of children. But the effort to understand it systematically is certain to produce a certain degree of frustration. Languages are complicated combinations of sounds, interpretation, grammar, etc. Children are in a stage were their cognitive, social, perceptual, and motor skills are all developing at the same time as their linguistic systems are maturing and their knowledge of a particular language is increasing. • With that in mind, we are lucky to have been able to learn about language acquisition. If you think about it language acquisition, then, is one of the best examples of the multidisciplinary approach called cognitive science.