A First Language: The Early Stages

Contents......Page 14
An Unbuttoned Introduction......Page 24
Five Aspects of Sentence Construction......Page 29
Relations or Roles within the Simple Sentence......Page 30
Modulations of Meaning within the Simple Sentence......Page 34
Modalities of the Simple Sentence......Page 36
Embedding of One Sentence within Another......Page 43
Coordination of Simple Sentences and Propositional Relations......Page 49
Linguistic Apes......Page 55
Washoe’s Accomplishments......Page 62
Sarah’s Accomplishments......Page 66
The Study of Adam, Eve, and Sarah......Page 74
The Expository Plan of this Work......Page 81
Stage I. Semantic Roles and Grammatical Relations......Page 84
The Available Data......Page 88
Telegraphic Speech......Page 97
Pivot and Open Classes......Page 113
Concepts and Relations......Page 134
Grammatical Relations, Predication, and Topic-Comment......Page 143
Case Grammar......Page 155
Conclusions......Page 166
The Role of Word Order......Page 170
The Period of Single-Word Utterances......Page 174
Word Order in Spontaneous Speech......Page 179
Discriminating Response to Contrastive Word Orders......Page 181
Word Order Judgments and Corrections......Page 184
Word Sequencing in Aphasics......Page 187
Conclusions......Page 188
The Major Meanings at Stage I......Page 191
Causes of the “Pivot Look”......Page 192
Prevalent Relations and Development in Stage I......Page 195
Definitions and Fragmentary Data......Page 210
Sensorimotor Intelligence and the Meanings of Stage I......Page 221
A Grammar for Late Stage I English......Page 224
Facts to be Represented......Page 225
Examples of Detail that will not be Represented......Page 233
A Schlesinger-type Grammar......Page 235
A Case Grammar......Page 240
A Bloom-type Grammar......Page 249
Summary of Grammar Types......Page 265
In General Summary......Page 266
Stage II. Grammatical Morphemes and the Modulation of Meanings......Page 270
The Order of Acquisition......Page 277
The Morphemes Scored......Page 282
Grammatical Morphemes Not Scored......Page 292
The Order of Acquisition......Page 293
Acquisition Order in Other Studies of Spontaneous Speech......Page 296
Acquisition Order in Controlled Studies......Page 305
Acquisition Order for Grammatical Morphemes in Languages Other Than English......Page 316
The Grammar of the Fourteen Morphemes......Page 321
The Progressive......Page 325
The Prepositions in and on......Page 328
Plural and Singular Number......Page 330
Past Tense......Page 334
The Possessive......Page 335
The Copula......Page 336
Articles......Page 337
The Progressive......Page 338
The Prepositions in and on......Page 351
Plural and Singular Number......Page 353
Past Tense......Page 354
The Possessive......Page 358
The Copula......Page 360
The Third Person......Page 362
Articles......Page 363
The Frequency of the Fourteen Morphemes in Parental Speech......Page 379
Determinants of the Order of Acquisition......Page 384
Frequency......Page 385
Semantic Complexity......Page 391
Grammatical Complexity......Page 394
The Problem of Variability......Page 402
The Problem of Segmentation......Page 413
Summary......Page 421
Conclusions......Page 424
References......Page 438
Index......Page 446