Chomsky has for many years promoted the belief that there are such innate preconditions. The maybe most famous answer to this question is Noam Chomsky’s. 2.2 The Innateness Hypothesisĭoes a human being have any innate preconditions for acquiring language? This is a topic well discussed among linguists for many years.
#Language acquisition theory chomsky how to#
The most obvious proof that the brain is indeed organized into different modules appears to be that people suffering brain damage in certain parts of their brain might, for example, forget how to speak even while their general cognitive functions and intelligence stay intact and they are still able to do things like playing chess or anything like that. However, Chomsky has dissociated himself from Fodor’s view of things, mainly because Fodor claims the central system of the brain is inscrutable, while Chomsky himself holds certain ideas about how the central system could be modularized (Smith 1999, p. The basis of Fodor’s modularity hypothesis is Noam Chomsky’s theory of the innate language module in people’s minds. The claim of modularity is also taken up by Jerry Fodor, who, in his essay “Modularity of Mind: An Essay on Faculty Psychology” published in 1983, argues that the mind is made up of an array of input systems and “that the input systems constitute a family of modules: domain-specific computational systems characterized by informational encapsulation, high-speed, restricted access, neural specificity, and the rest.” (Fodor 1983, p. The idea that a human brain is organized into different modules, each one with a different function, is the very basis of Noam Chomsky’s theory that there is an innate language module.
Chomsky’s Innateness 2.1 Modularity of Mind Sciarini, Michael Tomasello and also Hilary Putnam, who, with his essay “The Innateness Hypothesis and Explanatory Models in Linguistics”, gives a fairly interesting and also enlightening discussion of Chomsky’s Innateness Hypothesis.Īfter presenting arguments both for and against the Innateness Hypothesis, I will in the next chapter briefly present other models which might account for language acquisition, namely behaviorist and cognitivist models as well as the social interactionist theory.įinally, I will finish this term paper with a summary and ensuing conclusion, including an attempt to answer the main question if language acquisition is based on an innate language module in people’s heads or not. To do so, I will refer to Steven Pinker, Danny D. The main part of this paper will offer a discussion of Chomsky’s theories with regard to opinions of other linguists. After that, I will summarize Chomsky’s theory of innateness, in connection with his belief that there exists a “Universal Grammar”, which is responsible for people’s ability to acquire language.
To discuss and maybe answer this question, I will first give a short summary of the Modularity Hypothesis as found in works of Chomsky and also of Jerry Fodor.
This term paper deals with Noam Chomsky’s Modularity or rather Innateness Hypothesis, particularly with the question if there might be an innate language module in people’s minds.
#Language acquisition theory chomsky pro#
Arguments Pro and Contra the Innateness Hypothesisģ.2.2 Danny Steinberg and Natalia Sciarini
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