Language

Language & Language Structure Language: our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning.

Language & Language Structure If you were to invent a spoken language, where would you start? How would you do it? Phonemes: the smallest distinctive sound units in a language. (Phones make sounds) bat = b, ă, tchat = ch, ă, t

if yuo can raed tihs, you hvae a sgtrane mnid, too. Can you raed tihs? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can. i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

Language & Language Structure Morphemes: the smallest units that carry meaning in a language. May be a word (I, dog) or something like a prefix or suffix (pre- in preview, -ed in adapted, or s as in cats)

Language & Language Structure Grammar: the system of rules that enables us to communicate with one another. These rules guide us in deriving meaning from sounds and ordering words into sentences.

Language Development Grammar: the system of rules that enables us to communicate with one another. These rules guide us in deriving meaning from sounds and ordering words into sentences. Channels of Communication What are the different ways to communicate?

Language Development Receptive Language: By 4 months babies can recognize differences in speech sounds. By 7 months can understand some words

Language Development Productive language: Starts to mature after receptive language. Begin to babble at about 4 months. Ah-goo By 10 months, babbling resembles household language. Da-da, ma-ma

Language Development

Acquiring Language Universal Grammar: as diverse as the world’s ±7000 languages are, Noam Chomsky’s research shows they all have nouns, verbs and adjectives as building blocks. He claims grammar acquisition is innate with nouns being the first building block.

Acquiring Language Childhood seems to be a sensitive period for learning language. The younger one learns a language, the more it sounds natural. Adults who learn a second language usually speak with an accent from their native language and have more difficulty with the grammar.

Acquiring Language Children will become linguistically stunted if isolated from language during these early critical periods.

The Brain & Language Aphasia: an impairment of language, usually caused by damage to Brocha’s area or Wernicke’s area of the brain. Some can speak, but not read Some can comprehend reading, but not speak Some can read & write, while others write but not read, read but not write, read numbers but not letters, sing but not speak.

The Brain & Language Broca’s area: controls language expression, in frontal lobe, usually in left hemisphere.

The Brain & Language Wernicke’s area: controls language reception & comprehension, usually in left temporal lobe. Damage in this area can also result in meaningless expression

Acquiring Language In processing language, as with other functions, the brain operates by dividing its mental functions – speaking, perceiving, thinking, remembering – into subfunctions.