On Sun, 3 Sep 2006, Robert Yates wrote...
>I will let Johanna explain what perspective she speaks from.
>
>However, many of the claims in the following are just plain wrong.
>
>>>> [log in to unmask] 09/03/06 7:37 AM >>>
>
>Johanna speaks from the transformational/generative perspective
which
>*assumes* that *native* speakers of a language know the *grammar* of
>that language. Unfortunately, this theory has never been supported
with
>evidence. There is evidence, though, that children never exposed to
>language will never speak a human language. Language, as cognitive
>linguistics affirms is learned, and not innate.
>
>***
>For the teaching of grammar to native speakers, this debate has
>important consequences. If Eduard is right, then a lot of grammar
>categories have to be explicitly taught because students don't know
>them. If language is innate, then a lot of grammar instruction can
be
>dispensed with (does any native speaker get taught how the article
>system in English works?), and for those categories that are
important
>for students to know explicitly, we can define those categories in
such
>a way as to show students how their innate knowledge can identify
them.
>
>Much of Eduard's claims that language cannot be innate go to the
poverty
>of the stimulous argument that is made by innatists. Essentially,
all
>native speakers know things about their language that cannot
possibly be
>in the input. There is evidence for the poverty of the stimulous
>argument.
>
>I) We all know that children produce utterances that they have never
>heard. If language is not innate and the language we use crucially
>depends on the input, we left trying to explain how that is
possible.
>
>Moreover, even those of us who have full native-speaker competence
can
>make judgements about possible sentences that we have never been
exposed
>to. An example I like to use is relativizing the genetive of the
object
>of a comparative.
>
>1) There is the woman whose daughter my daugher is prettier than.
>
>That is a perfect good sentence in English; it is not possible in
most
>languages of the world; and I am confident most of us have never
heard
>or read it. Eduard's claim is that linguistic categories are not
>"innate." It will be interesting to read an explanation about how we
>"learned" that (1) is possible without any reference to abstract
>linguistic categories.
>
>II) It should be observed that dogs are talked to all the time and
>never learn the language that is address to them. Obviously,
children
>need some kind of input, but the serious issue is what does the
nature
>of that input have to be. Contrary to what Eduard claims, there is
>evidence that that input can be very, very minimal.
>
>First, there is the work on home sign by Susan Goldin-Meadow and
>colleagues. Home sign is the gestural system of deaf children born
in
>hearing households in which no one has learned or will learn America
>Sign Language. I recommend the following article by Goldin-Meadow
and
>Mylander in Language.
>
>Goldin-Meadow, S and Mylander. (1990). Beyond the input given: The
>child's role in the acquisition of language. Language, 66, 323-
355.
>
>Goldin-Meadow and Mylander discuss one child who developed agreement
>morphology (hand shape was different depending on the object being
>manipulated) that the child regularly used. NO ONE in his family
>regularly used hand shape in this way. In other words, this child
>created a morphological system without any input. This is predicted
by
>the innatist claim. I have no idea the story that someone who
believes
>language is not innate would tell.
>
>Second, there is the work of Jenny Singleton with Simon. You can
find
>this research cited in Chapter Two of Pinker's The Language Instinct.
>(An aside: Sampson makes no mention of this work in his book refuting
>Pinker.)
>
>Simon was born deaf to deaf parents. Simon's only ASL (American sign
>language) was from his parents who had learned ASL late and were not
>native-like in their signing. Singleton found that Simon's ASL did
not
>look like his parents' ASL but like kids born to native ASL
signers. In
>other words, Simon went beyond the language he had been exposed to
and
>regularized it. These results are predicted by the innatist
hypothesis
>and not by a claim that language must be "learned."
>
>III) I found nothing particular insightful in Sampson's book refuting
>the innatist hypothesis. I will consider an example that Sampon
spends
>a lot of spacing on: yes - no questions in which there is a tensed
>clause in the subject.
>
>Sampson is correct to observe Chomsky has cited such sentences, and
>beginning linguistics texts, use such sentences as evidence that we
have
>knowledge about language that is not in the input. Here is the
example
>used by Sampson. Notice that in the following sentence only "will"
can
>be moved to make a good yes-no question and "are" can't.
>
>2) Will those who are coming raise their hands?
>3) *Are those who coming will raise their hands?
>
>For innatists, the kind of knowledge we have to know (2) is possible
and
>(3) is not cannot come from the input. Try to explain why (2) is
>possible and not (3) without any grammatical categories. Remember if
>language is not innate, then children don't have those categories.
Note
>that (4) is possible.
>
>(4) Are those [children] coming?
>
>It is instructive to observe how Sampson refutes the poverty of the
>stimulous claim about such yes-now questions. On page 82, he
provides a
>number of examples from a written corpus of 90 million words. He
says
>he found many examples, but doesn't tell us how many. Children are
not
>really exposed to those written sources, so this really is not any
>refutation.
>
>Sampson reports he could not find any examples of such questions in a
>spontenous speech corpus. It is very revealing to read his
speculation
>on why he was unsuccessful:
>
>Certainly the possibility exists, as always, that my failure to find
the
>[relevant examples in the spoken language corpus] was because of some
>shortcoming in the search patterns I used used and there really are
>examples which my automatic search missed. (Sampon (2005), The
>'language instinct' debate, p. 82)
>
>For those of us how are native speakers, we don't have any
shortcomings
>in our search patterns for such sentences, and more importantly, we
>don't even know what we are searching for to determine whether the
>search was successful or not. Of course, this is not problematic if
>language is innate, but Sampon's own speculation here shows how
>difficult it is to connect just input to what we know is possible in
a
>language.
>
>Much of grammar is innate. We can use this fact to help us teach
>grammar to native speakers. This is not a new observation. Both
>DeBeaugrande and Noguchi have made this proposal and shown how
native
>speaker intuitions can help students understand grammar.
>
>Bob Yates, Central Missouri State University
>
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