Biolinguistic Investigations on the Language Faculty

Biolinguistic Investigations on the Language Faculty
Author: Anna Maria Di Sciullo
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2016-11-24
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027266301

The papers assembled in this volume aim to contribute to our understanding of the human capacity for language: the generative procedure that relates sounds and meanings via syntax. Different hypotheses about the properties of this generative procedure are under discussion, and their connection with biology is open to important cross-disciplinary work. Advances have been made in human-animal studies to differentiate human language from animal communication. Contributions from neurosciences point to the exclusive properties of the human brain for language. Studies in genetically based language impairments also contribute to the understanding of the properties of the language organ. This volume brings together contributions on theoretical and experimental investigations on the Language Faculty. It will be of interest to scholars and students investigating the properties of the biological basis of language, in terms the modeling of the language faculty, as well as the properties of language variation, language acquisition and language impairments.

Biolinguistic Investigations and the Formal Language Hierarchy

Biolinguistic Investigations and the Formal Language Hierarchy
Author: Juan Uriagereka
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 327
Release: 2018-06-14
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1351622250

This volume collects some of Juan Uriagereka’s previously published pieces and presentations on biolinguistics in recent years in one comprehensive volume. The book’s introduction lays the foundation for the field of biolinguistics, which looks to integrate concepts from the natural sciences in the analysis of natural language, situating the discussion within the minimalist framework. The volume then highlights eight of the author’s key papers from the literature, some co-authored, representative of both the architectural and evolutionary considerations to be taken into account within biolinguistic research. The book culminates in a final chapter showcasing the body of work being done on biolinguistics within the research program at the University of Maryland and their implications for interdisciplinary research and future directions for the field. This volume is essential reading for students and scholars interested in the interface between language and the natural sciences, including linguistics, syntax, biology, archaeology, and anthropology.

Advances in Biolinguistics

Advances in Biolinguistics
Author: Koji Fujita
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 323
Release: 2016-02-12
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1317486196

Biolinguistics is a highly interdisciplinary field that seeks the rapprochement between linguistics and biology. Linking theoretical linguistics, theoretical biology, genetics, neuroscience and cognitive psychology, this book offers a collection of chapters situating the enterprise conceptually, highlighting both the promises and challenges of the field, and chapters focusing on the challenges and prospects of taking interdisciplinarity seriously. It provides concrete illustrations of some of the cutting-edge research in biolinguistics and piques the interest of undergraduate students looking for a field to major in and inspires graduate students on possible research directions. It is also meant to show to specialists in adjacent fields how a particular strand of theoretical linguistics relates to their concerns, and in so doing, the book intends to foster collaboration across disciplines. Chapter 1 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Biolinguistics

Biolinguistics
Author: Lyle Jenkins
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 284
Release: 2000
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9780521003919

Argues that biology plays a more central role in language acquisition than teaching or learning.

Language, from a Biological Point of View

Language, from a Biological Point of View
Author: Cedric Boeckx
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 400
Release: 2012-03-15
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 144383842X

The present volume offers a collection of essays covering a broad range of areas where currently a rapprochement between linguistics and biology is actively being sought. Following a certain tradition, we call this attempt at a synthesis “biolinguistics.” The nine chapters (grouped into three parts: Language and Cognition, Language and the Brain, and Language and the Species) offer a comprehensive overview of issues at the forefront of biolinguistic research, such as language structure; language development; linguistic change and variation; language disorders and language processing; the cognitive, neural and genetic basis of linguistic knowledge; or the evolution of the Faculty of Language. Each contribution highlights exciting prospects for the field, but they also point to significant obstacles along the way. The main conclusion is that the age of theoretical exclusivity in Linguistics, much like the age of theoretical specificity, will have to end if interdisciplinarity is to reign and if biolinguistics is to flourish.

The Biolinguistic Enterprise

The Biolinguistic Enterprise
Author: Anna Maria Di Sciullo
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 576
Release: 2011-03-17
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0199553270

This book, by leading scholars, represents some of the main work in progress in biolinguistics. It offers fresh perspectives on language evolution and variation, new developments in theoretical linguistics, and insights on the relations between variation in language and variation in biology. The authors address the Darwinian questions on the origin and evolution of language from a minimalist perspective, and provide elegant solutions to the evolutionary gap between human language and communication in all other organisms. They consider language variation in the context of current biological approaches to species diversity - the 'evo-devo revolution' - which bring to light deep homologies between organisms. In dispensing with the classical notion of syntactic parameters, the authors argue that language variation, like biodiversity, is the result of experience and thus not a part of the language faculty in the narrow sense. They also examine the nature of this core language faculty, the primary categories with which it is concerned, the operations it performs, the syntactic constraints it poses on semantic interpretation and the role of phases in bridging the gap between brain and syntax. Written in language accessible to a wide audience, The Biolinguistic Enterprise will appeal to scholars and students of linguistics, cognitive science, biology, and natural language processing.

The Cambridge Handbook of Biolinguistics

The Cambridge Handbook of Biolinguistics
Author: Cedric Boeckx
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 788
Release: 2013-02-14
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1107354536

Biolinguistics involves the study of language from a broad perspective that embraces natural sciences, helping us better to understand the fundamentals of the faculty of language. This Handbook offers the most comprehensive state-of-the-field survey of the subject available. A team of prominent scholars working in a variety of disciplines is brought together to examine language development, language evolution and neuroscience, as well as providing overviews of the conceptual landscape of the field. The Handbook includes work at the forefront of contemporary research devoted to the evidence for a language instinct, the critical period hypothesis, grammatical maturation, bilingualism, the relation between mind and brain, and the role of natural selection in language evolution. It will be welcomed by graduate students and researchers in a wide range of disciplines, including linguistics, evolutionary biology and cognitive science.

International Journal of Language Studies (IJLS) – volume 11(2)

International Journal of Language Studies (IJLS) – volume 11(2)
Author: Mohammad Ali Salmani Nodoushan
Publisher: Lulu.com
Total Pages: 197
Release: 2017-04-06
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1365876349

PAPERS IN THIS ISSUE: A rhetoric-thematic analysis of surah "Waqi'a" (1-16); Studying Chinese as a foreign language: Learner attitudes and language learning (17-40); Iconicity in the syntactic structure of Mandarin Chinese (41-66); The impact of English versus Persian songs on Iranian EFL learners' mastery of English letters (67-88); The role of culture in cooperative learning (89-120); The interface between ESP, genre analysis, and rhetorical structure analysis (121-160); Four key focus on form options (161-171); Book Review (172-185)

I-Language

I-Language
Author: Daniela Isac
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 334
Release: 2008-04-24
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0191538612

I-Language introduces the uninitiated to linguistics as cognitive science. In an engaging, down-to-earth style Daniela Isac and Charles Reiss give a crystal-clear demonstration of the application of the scientific method in linguistic theory. Their presentation of the research programme inspired and led by Noam Chomsky shows how the focus of theory and research in linguistics shifted from treating language as a disembodied, human-external entity to cognitive biolinguistics - the study of language as a human cognitive system embedded within the mind/brain of each individual. The recurring theme of equivalence classes in linguistic computation ties together the presentation of material from phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics. The same theme is used to help students understand the place of linguistics in the broader context of the cognitive sciences, by drawing on examples from vision, audition, and even animal cognition. This textbook is unique in its integration of empirical issues of linguistic analysis, engagement with philosophical questions that arise in the study of language, and treatment of the history of the field. Topics ranging from allophony to reduplication, ergativity, and negative polarity are invoked to show the implications of findings in cognitive biolinguistics for philosophical issues like reference, the mind-body problem, and nature-nurture debates. This textbook contains numerous exercises and guides for further reading as well as ideas for student projects. A companion website with guidance for instructors and answers to the exercises features a series of pdf slide presentations to accompany the teaching of each topic.

The Evolution of Human Language

The Evolution of Human Language
Author: Richard K. Larson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 280
Release: 2010-01-07
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9780521516457

The way language as a human faculty has evolved is a question that preoccupies researchers from a wide spread of disciplines. In this book, a team of writers has been brought together to examine the evolution of language from a variety of such standpoints, including language's genetic basis, the anthropological context of its appearance, its formal structure, its relation to systems of cognition and thought, as well as its possible evolutionary antecedents. The book includes Hauser, Chomsky, and Fitch's seminal and provocative essay on the subject, 'The Faculty of Language,' and charts the progress of research in this active and highly controversial field since its publication in 2002. This timely volume will be welcomed by researchers and students in a number of disciplines, including linguistics, evolutionary biology, psychology, and cognitive science.