How do babies learn to speak? Why are there so many languages? Do we think in our mother tongue? Who decides what's correct English? How did language evolve? In this landmark book, Pinker explains the mysteries of language within a coherent theory: that language is an adaptation for communication.
In this exhilarating book, Steven Pinker asserts that language should not be seen as a cultural artefact that we learn in the way we learn to tell the time, but as a distinct part of the biological make-up of our brains.
With a new chapter entitled 'How People Really Speak' which uses corpus data to analyse how language is used in spontaneous English conversation, responses to critics, extensive revisions throughout, and a new preface by Paul Postal of New ...
"Everyone has questions about language. Some are from everyday experience: Why do immigrants struggle with a new language, only to have their fluent children ridicule their grammatical errors? Why can't...
Klaw, S. 1993. Without sin: The life and death of the Oneida community. New York: Pen— guin. Klein, R. G. 1989. The human career: Human biological and ... Kosslyn, S. M., Pinker, S., Smith, G. E., Schwartz, S. P., 81 commentators. 1979.
With a new chapter entitled 'How People Really Speak' which uses corpus data to analyse how language is used in spontaneous English conversation, responses to critics, extensive revisions throughout, and a new preface by Paul Postal of New ...
Some scientists have argued that language is innate, a type of unique human 'instinct' pre-programmed in us from birth. In this book, Vyvyan Evans argues that this received wisdom is, in fact, a myth.
This important debate which concerns linguistics until today will be the topic of the following work.
27 Kasher, 1977; Sampson, 1982. 28 Schelling, 1960, pp. 139—142. 29 Dawkins & Krebs, 1978. 30 Alan Dershowitz, presentation at a seminar On Indirect Speech at the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics, Harvard University, May 16, 2006; ...
"If you are not already a Steven Pinker addict, this book will make you one.
Are we creatures who learn new things? Or does human mental development consist of awakening instinctive structures of thought? A view has gained ground that language in much of its...