WORKSHEET 2 (A): Lenneberg and Chomsky Flashcards
Explain the Biological Foundations of L (Lenneberg)
- Normal developmental pattern for L which is largely independent from the environment.
- Understanding comes before speaking (it is simpler and more basic).
- Influence of genetically determined processes.
- Built in biological schedules.
- Stage of resonance (critical period) when children become excited.
- The mechanics of speech production includes the coordinated activity of more
than 100 muscles as well as respiration and breathing adjustments. - The environment has an important but limited role.
- L is needed for survival.
Language as species-specific:
o species of animal has spontaneously come to use anything like human L.
Genetic endowment
children are biologically programmed and predispositioned for L and L develops in the same way as any other biological function.
What is: an autonomous or independent area of the mind devoted to L knowledge?
The language faculty
Explain the States of the language faculty
Children are born in the S0 which consists of the UG itself. As the children grow older, the LF evolves until it reaches the SS (full knowledge of the L including principles, parameters and lexicon)
What is: the information-processing system or hypothesis-forming system that children have to enable grammar learning.
The Language Acquisition Device
Universal Grammar
System of universal linguistic rules (which is unborn) and allows children to discover for themselves the way in which the L they are acquiring makes use of these rules.
Explain Plato’s problem
If sth comes out of the LAD that didn’t enter, where does it come from? Plato talked about memories from prior lives.
The poverty of stimulus argument
L is a very complex subject and we don’t have all the data available in the surrounding environment so much of our linguistic knowledge must come from the internal structure of the mind.
The role of the environment in Nativist approach
It makes a basic contribution (the availability of people who speak to the child) which will trigger the internally determined processes of FLA.
Schedule for language development
FLA is a process that unfolds slowly until the child reaches 18 months, and then begins to go at an incredible rate until the child reaches 5 years of age (they can make use of complex L)
Built-in biological schedule or biologically programmed development
This reflects a gradual acquisition of linguistics elements for expressing ideas that have been present in children’s cognitive understanding for a long time.
Natural order of acquisition
if the child has mastered the grammatical morphemes at the end of the list, they have acquired those at the top. But the opposite isn’t true.
Explain the critical period
It extends from birth to age 12 (for Lenneberg it’s from age 2 to age 12). This is the period in which children have more facility with L and the LF is active.
Explain Plasticity of the brain
the capacity for change and growth that the brain has long after birth.
