Language Our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning

Language

Our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning

Fun Facts About Language• How many languages exist in the world today? • 6800• How many languages are spoken by more than 1

million people?• 250 (Chinese, Hindi, English, Spanish, Arabic)• How many languages will likely survive the century?• 600• What % of children throughout the world are raised

bilingual?• 66%• What % of U.S. children are raised bilingual?• 6.3%

Language can be…..

We need 3 building blocks for SPOKEN language:

Phonemes• The smallest units of sound

in language– Ex: Bat= b, a, & t (3)– Ex: Chat= ch, a, t (3)

• English has about 40 phonemes

• Sometimes difficult to learn new language

• Let’s Practice– Love– Pitch– Throat– Platypus

Morphemes• The smallest unit of

meaningful sound• Can be a word or part

of a word• Can also be parts of

words like prefixes or suffixes…”s” means plural

How many morphemes does cats have?

Grammar• Grammar: the rules

that enable us to communicate with & understand others

• Semantics: study of meaning-ex: ”ed” at the end of a word means past tense

• Syntax: the rules for combining words into sentences that make sense

Is this the White House or the House White?

Language DevelopmentStages that we learn language…1.Babbling Stage: 4 months,

baby starts making various sounds

2.Holophrastic Stage (one word stage): around 1 year old-begin to use sounds to communicate meaning -“ball” “dog”

3. Telegraphic Speech Stage (two word stage): around 2 yrs- “big doggy” “hit ball”

How do we learn language?

Operant Learning Theory• B.F.Skinner &

Behaviorism • Imitation &

Reinforcement• Kid may imitate a parent

• Ex: your mom says a curse word and your little sister does

• If they are reinforced they keep saying a word• Ex: your little sister says

curse word and your mom laughs

• If they are punished, they stop saying the word• Ex: your mom spanks

your little sister for says the curse word

Noam Chomsky’s Theory(nativist theory)

• We learn language too quickly for it to be only through reinforcement & punishment– Children acquire language more

quickly than other skills

• Language acquisition device– People have a natural

tendency to acquire language– Enables us to turn ideas into

sentences, etc…• Language is a brain function,

not a social phenomenon– Cognitive Psychology

Linguistic Determinism

• Linguistic Determinism: WHORF HYPOTHESIS that language determines how we think– Different languages create different

concepts of reality & worldviews– Ex: Hopi tribe have no past tense to they

cannot think about the past– Ex: Norwegians have many different

words for snow (meaningless to us in southern ca)

Critical Period

• Many researchers believe that childhood is the critical period for learning language

• After age 7, children gradually lose the ability to master any language– “Genie”