For Wednesday 12/1, please read the following article, which can be downloaded from the Readings section of this website: Boroditsky, Lera. 2oo1. Does Language Shape Thought?: Mandarin and English Speakers’ Conceptions of Time. Cognitive Psychology 43: 1-22. Note: Â In pgs. 8-18 of the article, the author describes three different psychological experiments that she conducted with …
For Monday 11/29, please read pgs. 114-127 of the following book chapter, which can be downloaded from the Readings section of this website: Whitney, Paul. 1998. The Psychology of Language, Chapter 4 (‘Theories of the Language-Thought Relationship’). Also, please read the following (extremely short) article: Pullum, Geoffrey K. 1989 The great Eskimo vocabulary hoax. Natural Language …
Continue reading ‘Reading for M 11/29: Whitney (1998), Ch. 4 (pgs. 114-127) and Pullum (1989)’ »
(Note:  due to the cancellation of this Friday’s (11/19) class, the following reading is now assigned for Monday 11/22.) For Monday 11/22, please read pgs. 208-235 of the following book chapter, which can be downloaded from the Readings section of this website: Devlin, Keith. 1997. Goodbye Descartes: The End of Logic and the Search for a …
Continue reading ‘UPDATED: Reading for M 11/22: Devlin 1997, Ch. 9 (pgs. 208-235)’ »
For Wednesday 11/17, please read pgs. 143-149 and pgs. 160-172 of the following, which can be downloaded from the Readings section of this website: Devlin, Keith. 1997. Goodbye Descartes: The End of Logic and the Search for a New Cosmology of the Mind, Chapter 7 (‘Machines That Think’). (Note:  pgs. 154-160 are optional, though highly recommended. …
Continue reading ‘Reading for W 11/17: Devlin (1997), Ch. 7 (pgs. 143-149, 160-172)’ »
For Friday 11/12 and Monday 11/15, please read the following article, which can be downloaded from the Readings section of this website: Bickerton, Derek. 2007. Language Evolution: A Brief Guide for Linguists. Lingua 117: 510-526. UPDATE: Â You should skip sections 3.2 and 5 of the paper.
As I mentioned in yesterday’s class, your second midterm exam will be next Wednesday, November 10. The exam will cover material from our readings and lectures pertaining to the following topics: Â sentence comprehension, sentence production, language and the brain, as well as the critical period in language development, and pidgins/creole languages. Â The emphasis will be …
For Monday 11/8, please read the following, which can be downloaded from the Readings section of this website: Hauser, Marc D. 2000. Wild Minds: What Animals Really Think, Chapter 8 (‘Gossip on the Ark’).
Some of you asked me for the links to the aphasia clips we watched in Monday’s class. Â Here they are: Broca’s aphasia: Â http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2IiMEbMnPM Wernicke’s aphasia: Â http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-LD5jzXpLE Anomic aphasia: Â http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWAUmsgk8eg
For Wednesday 11/3, please read the following, both of which can be downloaded from the Readings section of this website: Anderson, Stephen R. 2004. Doctor Dolittle’s Delusion: Animals and the Uniqueness of Human Language, Chapter 2 (‘Language and Communication’). Excerpt from The Language Files (an introductory linguistics textbook) on animal systems of communication.