My position on innateness is that it is too early for anybody to make 
definitive claims. Brain research is beginning to show that language 
processing is scattered around the brain, and it may differ across 
genders/sexual orientations. It is way too early to determine whether 
specific brain parts are devoted to language (claims derived from brain 
injury are not as clearcut as they are presented in the literature, as 
I learned from a specialized neurolinguistics text). The brain is such 
a complex organ, it is likely that there is a mixture of innateness and 
modularity and general cognition. Modularity of other functions, such 
as vision, make it premature to rule out modularity completely. But 
Chomsky and his followers have ruled it in prematurely. I am not 
necessarily in agreement with poverty-of-stimulus arguments, but, since 
the question overall is far from settled (despite what people on both 
sides claim), I don't wish to debate these issues deeply. My interests 
lie elsewhere.

As to how much instruction is needed to achieve competence in language 
and thinking, we must be very careful what kind of assumptions we make. 
Societies that never developed literacy have nevertheless achieved high 
levels of logical thought. Even folk tales like the Ananzi stories and 
Br'er Rabbit stories show lots of sophisticated logic in what the 
tricksters pull off. Anglos (except in the South) have very little 
experience of or appreciation for oral cultures; oral performances 
typical of these cultures are not valued in our schools, unfortunately. 
The current generation is finally getting some exposure to this through 
rap and hip-hop, although it's unfortunate that so much of that is 
violent and misogynistic. Our cultural situation is very particular, 
with a mix of dialect variation, very uneven quality of schooling, lots 
of racism still around, and an anti-intellectual culture.

It doesn't make much sense to make claims in a public forum like this, 
then qualify them by admitting to bias and an insufficient knowledge 
base. There's plenty of research out there. Look for support before you 
make a claim.

I'm waiting for takers on my tag-question rules. Prove your unconscious 
knowledge to yourself. What rules apply to form the tags (e.g., "can't 
she?") on the  following:

1. Jane can play the piano, can't she?
2. Patients should trust their doctors, shouldn't they?
3. Susan wouldn't steal my book, would she?
4. Mikey fed the dog, didn't he?
5. Mr. Blake didn't kill his wife, did he?
6. Your train was late, wasn't it?
7. The students weren't in the auditorium, were they?

You'll find that you have to revise your rules a couple of times. There 
are seven rules. If I may be so bold, put your money where your mouth 
is, see if you "know" these rules consciously or have to figure them 
out, and tell me when you remember being taught these rules by anyone, 
or seeing them laid out in a grammar book for native speakers (I don't 
think they appear even in ESL books). I'd bet money that you can't just 
write down these rules without working them out. If we needed conscious 
training in grammar rules, you wouldn't be able to form these tags, 
because nobody teaches these rules to native speakers. But you forms 
tags like this in milliseconds in everyday speech.

People will certainly claim that those of us who advocate methods like 
contrastive analysis are biased. Certainly we have opinions. But they 
are _informed_, _expert_ opinions derived from many years of reading 
replicated research and practicing language study. In general, it is 
common nowadays to accuse academics of liberal bias. Well, maybe that 
bias comes from the decades of research findings that they have access 
to. I wouldn't dream of claiming that I know as much as or more than 
someone with a Ph.D. in physics. People are much readier to challenge 
experts in linguistics, because language is bound up with cultural 
identity (witness the current official-English movement, which is not 
at all informed by international findings on language policy) and 
political and economic control (e.g., will ballot pamphlets be 
published in Vietnamese? Is it fair to deny a native-English speaker a 
job because she doesn't speak Spanish? Should someone who uses double 
negatives be given a high school diploma?) Also, there is a competing 
tradition centered on literature and correctness that has held sway 
since the 1600's in Western Europe in general. There are two sets of 
"language experts" for people to consult, but most people don't know 
about the ones who have taken language study far beyond that competing 
tradition.



Dr. Johanna Rubba, Associate Professor, Linguistics
Linguistics Minor Advisor
English Department
California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
Tel.: 805.756.2184
Dept. Ofc. Tel.: 805.756.2596
Dept. Fax: 805.756.6374
URL: http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba

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