Foundations of Language: Brain, Meaning, Grammar, Evolution

0199264376......Page 1
Contents......Page 6
Preface......Page 12
Acknowledgments......Page 18
PART I: PSYCHOLOGICAL AND BIOLOGICAL FOUNDATIONS......Page 22
1.1 A sociological problem......Page 24
1.2 The structure of a simple sentence......Page 26
1.3 Phonological structure......Page 28
1.4 Syntactic structure......Page 30
1.5 Semantic/conceptual and spatial structure......Page 32
1.6 Connecting the levels......Page 34
1.7 Anaphora and unbounded dependencies......Page 36
2.1 What do we mean by “mental”?......Page 40
2.2 How to interpret linguistic notation mentally......Page 44
2.3 Knowledge of language......Page 48
2.4 Competence versus performance......Page 50
2.5 Language in a social context (all too briefly)......Page 55
3.1 The need for an f-mental grammar......Page 59
3.2 Some types of rule......Page 61
3.3 Lexical rules......Page 72
3.4 What are rules of grammar?......Page 76
3.5 Four challenges for cognitive neuroscience......Page 79
4.1 The logic of the argument......Page 89
4.2 Getting the hypothesis right......Page 92
4.3 Linguistic universals......Page 95
4.4 Substantive universals, repertoire of rule types, and architectural universals......Page 98
4.5 The balance of linguistic and more general capacities......Page 99
4.6 The poverty of the stimulus; the Paradox of Language Acquisition......Page 103
4.7 Poverty of the stimulus in word learning......Page 108
4.8 How Universal Grammar can be related to genetics......Page 111
4.9 Evidence outside linguistic structure for Universal Grammar/Language Acquisition Device......Page 115
4.10 Summary of factors involved in the theory of Universal Grammar......Page 122
PART II: ARCHITECTURAL FOUNDATIONS......Page 126
5.2 A short history of syntactocentrism......Page 128
5.3 Tiers and interfaces in phonology......Page 132
5.4 Syntax and phonology......Page 139
5.5 Semantics as a generative system......Page 144
5.6 The tripartite theory and some variants......Page 146
5.7 The lexicon and lexical licensing......Page 151
5.8 Introduction to argument structure......Page 153
5.9 How much of syntactic argument structure can be predicted from semantics?......Page 159
5.10 A tier for grammatical functions?......Page 170
6.1 Lexical items versus words......Page 173
6.2 Lexical items smaller than words......Page 175
6.3 Psycholinguistic considerations......Page 184
6.4 The status of lexical redundancy rules......Page 186
6.5 Idioms......Page 188
6.6 A class of constructional idioms......Page 193
6.7 Generalizing the notion of construction......Page 199
6.8 The status of inheritance hierarchies......Page 204
6.9 Issues of acquisition......Page 208
6.10 Universal Grammar as a set of attractors......Page 211
6.11 Appendix: Remarks on HPSG and Construction Grammar......Page 215
7.1 The parallel competence architecture forms a basis for a processing architecture......Page 217
7.2 How the competence model can constrain theories of processing......Page 221
7.3 Remarks on working memory......Page 226
7.4 More about lexical access......Page 228
7.5 Structure-constrained modularity......Page 239
8.1 The dialectic......Page 252
8.2 Bickerton\'s proposal and auxiliary assumptions......Page 256
8.3 The use of symbols......Page 259
8.4 Open class of symbols......Page 262
8.5 A generative system for single symbols: protophonology......Page 263
8.6 Concatenation of symbols to build larger utterances......Page 266
8.7 Using linear position to signal semantic relations......Page 267
8.8 Phrase structure......Page 273
8.9 Vocabulary for relational concepts......Page 274
8.10 Grammatical categories and the “basic body plan” of syntax......Page 278
8.11 Morphology and grammatical functions......Page 280
8.12 Universal Grammar as a toolkit again......Page 282
PART III: SEMANTIC AND CONCEPTUAL FOUNDATIONS......Page 286
9.1 Introduction to part III......Page 288
9.2 Semantics vis-à-vis mainstream generative grammar......Page 289
9.3 Meaning and its interfaces......Page 292
9.4 Chomsky and Fodor on semantics......Page 296
9.5 Some “contextualist” approaches to meaning......Page 301
9.6 Is there a specifically linguistic semantics?......Page 302
9.7 Four non-ways to separate linguistic semantics from conceptualization......Page 306
10.1 Introduction......Page 315
10.2 Problems with the common-sense view: “language”......Page 316
10.3 Problems with the common-sense view: “objects”......Page 321
10.4 Pushing “the world” into the mind......Page 324
10.5 A simple act of deictic reference......Page 327
10.6 The functional correlates of consciousness......Page 331
10.7 Application to theory of reference......Page 335
10.8 Entities other than objects......Page 336
10.9 Proper names, kinds, and abstract objects......Page 339
10.10 Satisfaction and truth......Page 345
10.11 Objectivity, error, and the role of the community......Page 350
11.1 Boundary conditions on theories of lexical meaning......Page 354
11.2 The prospects for decomposition into primitives......Page 355
11.3 Polysemy......Page 360
11.4 Taxonomic structure......Page 364
11.5 Contributions from perceptual modalities......Page 366
11.6 Other than necessary and sufficient conditions......Page 371
11.7 The same abstract organization in many semantic fields......Page 377
11.8 Function–argument structure across semantic fields......Page 381
11.9 Qualia structure: characteristic activities and purposes......Page 390
11.10 Dot objects......Page 394
11.11 Beyond......Page 396
12.1 Simple composition......Page 399
12.2 Enriched composition......Page 408
12.3 The referential tier......Page 415
12.4 Referential dependence and referential frames......Page 419
12.5 The information structure (topic/focus) tier......Page 429
12.6 Phrasal semantics and Universal Grammar......Page 438
12.7 Beyond: discourse, conversation, narrative......Page 439
13 Concluding Remarks......Page 443
References......Page 452
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