scholarly journals Misused Terms in Linguistics

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Evelina Leivada
Keyword(s):  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Narrow Sense ◽  
Language Faculty ◽  
Grammaticality Judgment ◽  
Language Universals

Many terms in linguistics, Evelina Leivada observes, are often used inconsistently, incorrectly, or incoherently: Universal Grammar, language universals, parameter, feature, linguistic genotype, language faculty in a narrow sense, hardwired, and grammaticality judgment. These are the very terms that linguists have learned to love, striking evidence that love is often blind.

scholarly journals On Attitudes toward Terminology

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fahad Rashed Al-Mutairi ◽  
Evelina Leivada
Keyword(s):  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Narrow Sense ◽  
Grammaticality Judgment

Out of the ten key notions that Evelina Leivada focuses on, her discussions of three seem highly problematic: Universal Grammar, faculty of language in the narrow sense, and grammaticality judgment.

Introduction

2016 ◽  
pp. xxii-34
Author(s):  
Ian Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Generative Grammar ◽  
Grammatical Knowledge ◽  
Language Faculty ◽  
Philosophical Background ◽  
Language Universals ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Genetically Determined ◽  
Animal Language

This introductory chapter tries to set the chapters to follow in a general background, and to link them together. The first part begins by clarifying what is meant by Universal Grammar (UG), first distinguishing grammar from logic and then UG from a group of related concepts (biolinguistics, the language faculty, competence, I-language, generative grammar, language universals, and metaphysical universals). This leads to a clearer definition of UG as the general theory of I-languages, taken to be constituted by a subset of the set of possible generative grammars, and as such characterizes the genetically determined aspect of the human capacity for grammatical knowledge. The remaining sections introduce each of the five parts of the volume: the philosophical background to UG, linguistic theory, language acquisition, comparative syntax, and a number of wider issues ranging from creoles to animal language.

L2 Grammar and L2 Processing in the Acquisition of Spanish Prepositional Relative Clauses

2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 577-596 ◽  
Author(s):  
SILVIA PERPIÑÁN
Keyword(s):  
Real Time ◽  
Relative Clauses ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Judgment Task ◽  
Linguistic Knowledge ◽  
Time Data ◽  
Arabic Speakers ◽  
Grammaticality Judgment ◽  
The One

This paper investigates the acquisition of prepositional relative clauses in L2 Spanish by English and Arabic speakers to understand the role of previous linguistic knowledge and Universal Grammar on the one hand, and the relationship between grammatical knowledge and its use in real-time, on the other. An oral production task and an on-line self-paced grammaticality judgment task were analyzed. Results indicated that the acquisition of oblique relative clauses is a problematic area for L2 learners. Divergent results compared to native speakers in production and grammatical intuitions were found; however, L2 reading time data showed the same real-time effects that native speakers had, suggesting that the problems with this construction are not necessarily linked to processing deficits. These results are interpreted as evidence for the ability to apply universal processing principles in a second language, and the relative independence of the processing domain and the production system.

FUNDAMENTAL AND GRADIENT DIFFERENCES IN LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT

2009 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 259-289 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Herschensohn
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
First Language ◽  
Cognitive Strategies ◽  
Foreign Language Learning ◽  
Language Faculty ◽  
Generative Theory ◽  
The Difference

This article reexamines Bley-Vroman’s original (1990) and evolved (this issue) fundamental difference hypothesis that argues that differences in path and endstate of first language acquisition and adult foreign language learning result from differences in the acquisition procedure (i.e., language faculty and cognitive strategies, respectively). The evolved assessment of the theoretical and empirical developments of the past 20 years is taken into account with respect to Universal Grammar and parameters in generative theory and with respect to cognition and acquisition in data processing. This article supports the spirit of Bley-Vroman’s proposals in light of the discussion of three topics: pathway of acquisition, endstate age of acquisition effects, and language processing by monolinguals and bilinguals. I argue that the difference between child and adult language acquisition is, above all, quantitative not qualitative, a gradient continuum rather than a precipitous break.

Three Factors in Language Design

2005 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noam Chomsky
Keyword(s):  
Computational Efficiency ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
The Body ◽  
Language Design ◽  
Cognitive Systems ◽  
Independent Research ◽  
Language Faculty ◽  
The Third ◽  
Genetic Endowment ◽  
Principled Explanation

The biolinguistic perspective regards the language faculty as an “organ of the body,” along with other cognitive systems. Adopting it, we expect to find three factors that interact to determine (I-) languages attained: genetic endowment (the topic of Universal Grammar), experience, and principles that are language- or even organism-independent. Research has naturally focused on I-languages and UG, the problems of descriptive and explanatory adequacy. The Principles-and-Parameters approach opened the possibility for serious investigation of the third factor, and the attempt to account for properties of language in terms of general considerations of computational efficiency, eliminating some of the technology postulated as specific to language and providing more principled explanation of linguistic phenomena

The L2 Basic Variety as an I-language

1997 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 374-385 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jürgen M. Meisel
Keyword(s):  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Inflectional Morphology ◽  
Functional Categories ◽  
L2 Acquisition ◽  
Language Faculty ◽  
Essential Properties ◽  
Language Capacity

The Basic Variety, as defined by Klein and Perdue (this volume), is understood as an instantiation of the essential properties of the human language capacity, and although, as the ‘initial fossilization point’ of adult second language acquisition, it lacks crucial features of fully fledged languages, the claim is that the BV is a natural language in the sense that it is constrained by principles of Universal Grammar (UG). In this discussion I raise a few points which may cast some doubt on the claim that the BV is an I-language. At the core of this debate, as far as (morpho)syntactic issues are concerned, one finds the problem of determining the role of functional categories in BV grammar. Crucially, in L2 acquisition in general and in the BV in particular, one does not find the same kind of developmental relation between the acquisition of overt inflectional morphology and word order patterns as is evidenced in L1 development. I conclude that neither UG nor the universal component of the language faculty, as envisaged by Klein and Perdue, can account adequately for the essential properties of L2 interlanguages, including the BV. One important reason is that, rather than relying on structure-dependent operations, as in L1 development, L2 learners resort to strategies referring to sequential ordering of surface strings. If this is correct, L2 varieties are a mix of both UG-constrained and non-grammatical cognitive processes.

scholarly journals Chomsky's Contribution to Linguistics: A Review

2018 ◽  
Vol I (I) ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Sonia Touqir ◽  
Amna Mushtaq ◽  
Touqir Nasir
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Phrase Structure ◽  
Generative Grammar ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Language Faculty ◽  
Acquisition Process ◽  
Principles And Parameters

This review seeks to highlight Chomsky's major contributions to the field of linguistics. He changed linguists' conception about the nature of language from an externalized to internalized approach. This shift also resulted in the language being thought of as a cognitive phenomenon rather than as a set of structures to be analyzed for their correctness or incorrectness to prove his stance introduced the concept of language faculty, its workings, Universal Grammar, Principles and Parameters, and Transformational and Generative Grammar. The TGG also significantly overhauled the existent phrase structure rules. These rules were brought to follow binarity principles that dictated that a node cannot have less than or more than two branches. Besides the concept of Universal Grammar, along with its principles and parameters, Chomsky simplified how the language acquisition process can be understood: instead of learning hundreds of rules, the human mind has to install a handful of principles and parameters.

Derivational Economy in Syntax and Semantics

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Željko Bošković ◽  
Troy Messick
Keyword(s):  
Syntactic Structure ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Minimalist Program ◽  
Efficient Design ◽  
Computationally Efficient ◽  
Computational System ◽  
Language Faculty ◽  
Generative Theory ◽  
Guiding Principles ◽  
Syntactic Dependencies

Economy considerations have always played an important role in the generative theory of grammar. They are particularly prominent in the most recent instantiation of this approach, the Minimalist Program, which explores the possibility that Universal Grammar is an optimal way of satisfying requirements that are imposed on the language faculty by the external systems that interface with the language faculty which is also characterized by optimal, computationally efficient design. In this respect, the operations of the computational system that produce linguistic expressions must be optimal in that they must satisfy general considerations of simplicity and efficient design. Simply put, the guiding principles here are (a) do something only if you need to and (b) if you do need to, do it in the most economical/efficient way. These considerations ban superfluous steps in derivations and superfluous symbols in representations. Under economy guidelines, movement takes place only when there is a need for it (with both syntactic and semantic considerations playing a role here), and when it does take place, it takes place in the most economical way: it is as short as possible and carries as little material as possible. Furthermore, economy is evaluated locally, on the basis of immediately available structure. The locality of syntactic dependencies is also enforced by minimal search and by limiting the number of syntactic objects and the amount of structure accessible in the derivation. This is achieved by transferring parts of syntactic structure to the interfaces during the derivation, the transferred parts not being accessible for further syntactic operations.

The empirical base of linguistics: Grammaticality judgments and linguistic methodology. Carson T. Schütze. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996. Pp. 212.

2000 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 149-152
Author(s):  
Pilar Durán
Keyword(s):  
Native Speakers ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Reliable Data ◽  
Linguistic Methodology ◽  
Empirical Base ◽  
Grammaticality Judgment ◽  
Grammaticality Judgments ◽  
Reliable Source ◽  
University Of Chicago Press

This book by Carson Schütze poses an important question. Are grammaticality judgments a reliable source of data for linguistic theories? Grammaticality judgments, reliable or not, have been the main, and most often the only, source of data in linguistic theory for many years. “‘Because many of the relevant structures are fairly complex and simply might not arise in the normal course of conversation, or during observation by an experimenter' (White, 1989, p. 58), UG [Universal Grammar] researchers have generally relied on some form of grammaticality judgment (GJ) task” (Katrien & Lantolf, 1992, p. 32). Katrien and Lantolf (1992) pointed out that with this task linguists try to draw on speakers' intuitions about their competence. Grammaticality judgments consist of questions about whether a sentence is grammatical according to native speakers. Most often, the native speaker is the linguist her- or himself as the only subject. Not only can bias exist when linguists are the source of data for her or his own theories, but also relying on the intuitions of only one speaker limits the credibility of the theory. When more than one speaker is queried, it has been shown that consistency is not always guaranteed: variation among and within speakers is a common feature in judgments (Mohan, 1977; Snow & Meijer, 1977). Idiosyncrasies of the subjects, presentation of the material, and experimenter's procedure are among the factors that contribute to this variation in judgments. An underlying problem in linguistic theorizing comes from the fact that linguists are normally not “trained in methods for getting reliable data” (p. 4). All this results in theories that are not adequately supported. Nonetheless, they are used as a springboard for new theories. Schütze provides linguists with answers to the following questions. What information about language can grammaticality judgments offer? What factors affect the form of these judgments? What can be done to make the best use of these judgments?

Universal Grammar Theory and Language Acquisition: Evidence from the Null Subject Parameter

2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 48
Author(s):  
Naif Alsaedi
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Developmental Stages ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Minimalist Program ◽  
Subject Position ◽  
Language Faculty ◽  
Null Subject ◽  
Generative Linguistics ◽  
Empty Categories ◽  
Null Subject Parameter

This article introduces the Universal-Grammar-based (UG) theory of language acquisition. It focuses on parameters, both as a theoretical construct and in relation to first-language acquisition (L1A). The null subject parameter is used to illustrate how languages vary and explain how a child’s grammar develops into adult grammar over time. The article is structured as follows: the first section outlines crucial ideas that are relevant to language acquisition in generative linguistics, such as the notions of competence, performance, critical period, and language faculty. Section two introduces and discusses the content of language faculty from the perspectives of the Principles and Parameters Theory and the Minimalist Program for Linguistic Theory. This section also briefly describes the contrast among languages in regard to whether or not they allow empty categories in subject position in finite clauses. The third section first discusses how children are hypothesised to acquire their native language (L1). Then, in light of findings from the early null subject phenomenon, this section empirically examines the content of grammars that are developed by children at various developmental stages until they acquire the appropriate value for the null subject parameter. The final section highlights the important role of UG theory to L1A.

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