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Exceptional Cases

Exceptional Cases. One way to look at the issue of what is special (if anything) about language acquisition is to look at unusual cases to see how language acquisition proceeds creolization deaf children feral children Non-children (Primates) Electronic children (computers). Creolization.

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Exceptional Cases

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  1. Exceptional Cases • One way to look at the issue of what is special (if anything) about language acquisition is to look at unusual cases to see how language acquisition proceeds • creolization • deaf children • feral children • Non-children (Primates) • Electronic children (computers)

  2. Creolization • Bickerton (1981, 1990): The Language Bioprogram Hypothesis • Studying the process of creolization, or the process of when two or more languages merge to form a new, indigenous language • When does this happen? When people who do not share a common language are forced or compelled to communicate with each other • Masters and slaves • Exploration • Deaf children who do not know sign

  3. Creolization • So what happens when people are put into situations like this? • They attempt to communicate using important vocabulary items and gestures • This communication system is called a pidgin. It is not a language because it has little syntactic structure. Sounds a lot like baby talk. • They also do what comes naturally and have children

  4. What happens next? • The children, exposed only to the pidgin language, begin to speak a more fully grammatical language called a creole. • Combines vocabulary from the pidgin (so words from both of the parent languages) with systematic syntactic rules, especially word order. • Great consistency between creoles in terms of their syntactic structure, regardless of the root language • Conclusion: The processing of the pidgin through the children’s brain produces a language.

  5. Language in Deaf Children • Children who are deaf from birth and have never been exposed to spoken language • For many years were taught lip reading and hand-spelling (still used) • Now most are exposed to and taught American Sign Language (not a universal sign language) • ASL is a complex visual-spatial system of communication that meets all the requirements to be called a language. • Topic-comment structure • 4th most commonly used language in the U.S. ?

  6. Learning ASL by Deaf Children • Deaf children who are exposed to ASL as their first language show nearly exactly the same pattern of development as hearing children learning spoken language • In fact, some advantages for ASL learners, because the gestures are easier to control than the articulatory system • If not exposed to ASL early (usually with hearing parents), children will show deficits in ASL Syntax • Conclusion: Language acquisition can occur in multiple modalities

  7. Feral Children • Children raised in the wild or with reduced exposure to human language • What is the effect of this lack of exposure on language acquisition? • Two classic cases • Victor, the Wild Boy of Aveyron • Genie

  8. Victor, The Wild Boy of Aveyron • Found in 1800 near the outskirts of Aveyron, France • Estimated to be about 7-years-old • Neither spoke or responded to speech • Taken to and studied by Dr. Jean-Marc-Gaspard Itard, and educator of deaf-mute and retarded children • Never learned to speak and his receptive language ability was limited to a few simple commands. • Described by Itard as “an almost normal boy who could not speak

  9. Genie • Found in Arcadia, California in 1970 around the age of 13 • Raised in isolation (in a closet), Genie could barely walk and could not talk when found • Studied by Dr. Susan Curtiss (and many others who fought over her) • Made great efforts to teach her language, and she did learn how to talk, but her grammar never fully developed. • Used few closed-class morphemes and function words • Speech sounded like that of a 2-year-old

  10. What Do These Cases Tell Us? • Suggestive of the position that there is a critical period (Lorenz) for first language learning • If child is not exposed to language during early childhood (prior to the age of 6 or 7), then the ability to learn syntax will be impaired while other abilities are less strongly affected • Not uncontroversial: Victor and Genie and children like them were deprived in many ways other than not being exposed to language • Genie stopped talking after age 30 and was institutionalized shortly afterward (Rymer, 1993)

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