Chomsky's Universal Grammar

Chomsky's Universal Grammar
Author: Vivian Cook
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 338
Release: 2014-03
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9788126517473

This new edition introduces the reader to Noam Chomsky's theory of language by setting the specifics of syntactic analysis in the framework of his general ideas. It explains its fundamental concepts and provides an overview and history of the theory.

Meaning and Universal Grammar

Meaning and Universal Grammar
Author: Cliff Goddard
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 355
Release: 2002-01-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027230633

Volume one of a set of studies that is founded on the idea that universal grammar is based on - indeed, inseparable from - meaning. The theoretical framework is the natural semantic metalanguage (NSM) approach originated by Anna Wierzbicka and developed in collaboration with Cliff Goddard.

Investigations in Universal Grammar

Investigations in Universal Grammar
Author: Stephen Crain
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 362
Release: 2000
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9780262531801

This introductory guide to language acquisition research is presented within the framework of Universal Grammar, a theory of the human faculty for language. The authors focus on two experimental techniques for assessing children's linguistic competence: the Elicited Production task, a production task, and the Truth Value Judgment task, a comprehension task. Their methodologies are designed to overcome the numerous obstacles to empirical investigation of children's language competence. They produce research results that are more reproducible and less likely to be dismissed as an artifact of improper experimental procedure. In the first section of the book, the authors examine the fundamental assumptions that guide research in this area; they present both a theory of linguistic competence and a model of language processing. In the following two sections, they discuss in detail their two experimental techniques.

Universal Grammar in Child Second Language Acquisition

Universal Grammar in Child Second Language Acquisition
Author: Usha Lakshmanan
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 175
Release: 1994-01-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027224757

This book examines child second language acquisition within the Principles and Parameters theory of Universal Grammar (UG). Specifically, the book focuses on null-subjects in the developing grammars of children acquiring English as a second language. The book provides evidence from the longitudinal speech data of four child second language (L2) learners in order to test the predictions of a recent theory of null-subjects, namely, the Morphological Uniformity Principle (MUP). Lakshmanan argues that the child L2 acquisition data offer little or no evidence in support of the MUP s predictions regarding a developmental relation between verb inflections and null-subjects. The evidence from these child L2 data indicates that regardless of the status of null subjects in their first language, child L2 learners of English hypothesize correctly from the very beginning that English requires subjects of tensed clauses to be obligatorily overt. The failure on the part of these learners to obey this knowledge in certain structural contexts is the result of perceptual factors that are unrelated to parameter setting. The book demonstrates the value of child second language acquisition data in evaluating specific proposals within linguistic theory for a Universal principle.

A Theory of Syntax

A Theory of Syntax
Author: Norbert Hornstein
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 205
Release: 2009
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0521449707

Discusses a topical set of issues in syntactic theory, including a number of original proposals at the cutting edge of research in this area. The book provides a theory of the basic grammatical operations and suggests that there is only one that is distinctive to language.

Universal Grammar in the Reconstruction of Ancient Languages

Universal Grammar in the Reconstruction of Ancient Languages
Author: Katalin É Kiss
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
Total Pages: 538
Release: 2005
Genre: Foreign Language Study
ISBN: 9783110185508

The architecture of the human language faculty has been one of the main foci of the linguistic research of the last half century. This branch of linguistics, broadly known as Generative Grammar, is concerned with the formulation of explanatory formal accounts of linguistic phenomena with the ulterior goal of gaining insight into the properties of the 'language organ'. The series comprises high quality monographs and collected volumes that address such issues. The topics in this series range from phonology to semantics, from syntax to information structure, from mathematical linguistics to studies of the lexicon.

Universal Grammar and the Second Language Classroom

Universal Grammar and the Second Language Classroom
Author: Melinda Whong
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2013-06-26
Genre: Education
ISBN: 940076362X

This book proposes that research into generative second language acquisition (GenSLA) can be applied to the language classroom. Assuming that Universal Grammar plays a role in second language development, it explores generalisations from GenSLA research. The book aims to build bridges between the fields of generative second language acquisition, applied linguistics, and language teaching; and it shows how GenSLA is poised to engage with researchers of second language learning outside the generative paradigm. Each chapter of Universal Grammar and the Second Language Classroom showcases ways in which GenSLA research can inform language pedagogy. Some chapters include classroom research that tests the effectiveness of teaching particular linguistic phenomena. Others review existing research findings, discussing how these findings are useful for language pedagogy. All chapters show how generative linguistics can enhance teachers’ expertise in language and second language development. “This groundbreaking volume ably takes on the gap that currently exists between generative linguistic theory in second language acquisition (GenSLA) and second language pedagogy, by gathering chapters from GenSLA researchers who are interested in the relevance and potential application of their research to second/foreign language teaching. It offers a welcome and thought-provoking contribution to any discussion of the relation between linguistic theory and practice. I recommend it not only for language teachers interested in deepening their understanding of the formal properties of the languages they teach, but also for linguists interested in following up on more practical consequences of the fruits of their theoretical and empirical research.” Donna Lardiere, Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA

The Philosophy of Universal Grammar

The Philosophy of Universal Grammar
Author: Wolfram Hinzen
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2013-11-15
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0191626422

What is grammar? Why does it exist? What difference, if any, does it make to the organization of meaning? This book seeks to give principled answers to these questions. Its topic is 'universal' grammar, in the sense that grammar is universal to human populations. But while modern generative grammar stands in the tradition of 'Cartesian linguistics' as emerging in the 17th century, this book re-addresses the question of the grammatical in a broader historical frame, taking inspiration from Modistic and Ancient Indian philosopher-linguists to formulate a different and 'Un-Cartesian' programme in linguistic theory. Its core claim is that the organization of the grammar is not distinct from the organization of human thought. This sapiens-specific mode of thought is uniquely propositional: grammar, therefore, organizes propositional forms of reference and makes knowledge possible. Such a claim has explanatory power as well: the grammaticalization of the hominin brain is critical to the emergence of our mind and our speciation. A thoroughly interdisciplinary endeavour, the book seeks to systematically integrate the philosophy of language and linguistic theory. It casts a fresh look at core issues that any philosophy of (universal) grammar will need to address, such as the distinction between lexical and grammatical meaning, the significance of part of speech distinctions, the grammar of reference and deixis, the relation between language and reality, and the dimensions of cross-linguistic and bio-linguistic variation.

Switch Reference and Universal Grammar

Switch Reference and Universal Grammar
Author: John Haiman
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 358
Release: 1983-01-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027280266

Canonical switch-reference is an inflectional category of the verb, which indicates whether or not its subject is identical with the subject of some other verb. Switch-reference may be analyzed from a structural or a functional point of view. Functionally, switch-reference is a device for referential tracking. Formally, switch-reference is almost always a verbal category, similar to the familiar category of verbal concord. In most languages switch-reference marking is indicated by a verbal affix, however in some languages it may be marked by an independent morpheme. The contributions to this volume are concerned with questions of form, function, and genesis of canonical switch-reference systems.