Language

and
Mind
AS.050.102
Fall 2024
Linguistics

• The study of human language

2
Cognitive Science
• The study of the human mind
• How does the human mind represent knowledge?
• How does the mind process information that it
receives from the world around it?
• How is the human mind similar to and different
from the minds of other species?

3
Why Language?
• Universality across humans
• Distinguishing feature between
humans and other species
• Highly fruitful research program (past
60 years): knowledge of language

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Linguistics as Cognitive Science

Questions:
1) What is it that we know when we know
a language?
2) How do children acquire that
knowledge?

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Cognitivist revolution (1950-60)

Noam Chomsky’s foundational works:

1957 – Syntactic Structures
1959 – Review of Verbal Behavior

6
 Overview of the course
Mental grammar & Innate knowledge
• components of mental grammar
• sound system
• words
• sentence structures and meaning
• how children learn language
• how adults deploy linguistic knowledge
• how language is implemented in the brain
7
Mental Grammar:
the system of rules and constraints
stored in the mind of a speaker that
generates the words and sentences
of that speaker’s language.

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What do you know
about your language?
sun
tree
goat
decision
honesty
kiitos

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What do you know
about your language?
flum
lfum
sproke
tlim
worpz
rpod

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What do you know
about your language?

cat cats [s]

dog dogs [z]
tick ticks [s]
pole poles [z]
car cars [z]
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What do you know
about your language?
happiness = happy + ness

X + -ness what other possibilities?

rough roughness
bright brightness
run *runness
friend *friendness
happily *happilyness 12
What do you know
about your language?

Make up a sentence that you think no one

has ever said before in the history of the
universe. Write it down.

* My childrens playing like blocks with

colored.

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What do you know
about your language?
My children are playing with a red little oval
lovely Italian wooden old jewelry box.

My children are playing with a lovely little old

oval red Italian wooden jewelry box.

opinion-size-age-shape-color-origin-material-
purpose Noun 14
What do you know
about your language?

Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.

Compare this to…

*Furiously sleep ideas green colorless.

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Linguistic Competence
1. Words (meaning and sound)
Lexicon
2. How to pronounce sounds in combination with
others
Phonology
3. How to build complex words out of parts
Morphology
4. How to combine words into sentences
Syntax
5. How to understand what sentences mean
Semantics 16
Mental Grammar = computing
device for language

the system of rules stored in the mind of a speaker

that generates the words and sentences of that
speaker’s language.

Computational theory of mind: domain-specific

computational devices (Chomsky, Fodor, et al.)

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Mental Grammar = computing
device for language

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The Argument for
Mental Grammar
• The creativity or expressivity of
language use implies that a language
user’s mind contains a set of
unconscious grammatical principles
or rules.
• Linguists construct a model of the
speaker’ knowledge of language.
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The Argument for
Mental Grammar

Mental grammar
vs.
memorizing or storing the list of
possible sentences

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The Argument for
Mental Grammar
A numeral is not a numbskull.
A numeral is not a nun.
…
A numbskull is not a numeral.
A numbskull is not a nun.
…
An X is not a Y.

10,000 nouns = 100,000,000 sentences

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The Argument for
Mental Grammar
Since a numeral is not a numbskull, a numbskull is
not a nun.
108 X 108 = 1016

Human brain contains ≈ 1010 neurons

1016 sentences

One million sentences per neuron

The number of sentences we are capable of using
is too large to store them all 22
Argument for
Mental Grammar
BUT, it’s not just that the possible number of
sentences is enormous

It’s infinite.

How do we know that speakers can produce and

understand an infinite number of sentences?

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Because we can do this:
This is the house [that Jack built].
This is the door [that leads to the house
[that Jack built]].
This is the mold [that grew on the cheese
[that fell out of the fridge [that stood in
the house [that Jack built]]]].

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Recursion
We can produce (and understand) potentially
infinitely long sentences.

Therefore, there are an infinite number of

sentences.

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The Argument for
Mental Grammar
Given that our brains are finite, there is no way
we can store all of the possible sentences of our
language

“Language makes infinite use of finite means”

Chomsky 1965, Aspects of the Theory of Syntax

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Lexicon

Lexicon = internal dictionary

Words
Pronunciation
Meaning

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Mental Grammar

LEXICON RULES

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Questions

What is the nature of that knowledge?

• Generated by rules?
• Or memorized example by example?

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Pronunciation of the plural
[s] [z]
cats dogs
ticks poles
trips cars
paths toes
doves
plays
If it’s a rule, what is it?
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Pronunciation of the plural
[……….. X]N

If X is voiceless, then plural => [s]

If X is voiced, then plural => [z]

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Hypothesis A: Complex forms
stored in memory

Lexicon
Cat [kæt]
Cats [kæts]
Dog [dɔg]
Dogs [dɔgz]

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Hypothesis B: complex forms
derived by rule

Lexicon Rules
Cat [kæt] N + PL = Npl
Dog [dɔg]
PL → [s] if […-voiced]N
→ [z] if […+voiced]N

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 Evidence for Rules
• Novel forms

Singular: smick
Plural: smicks [s]

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Evidence for rules
child
childish
childishness

elf
elvish
elvishness

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Evidence for rules

Novel forms

smick N
smickish Adj
smickishness N

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 Pronunciation of the plural
• Could the plural –s pronunciation "rule” be just
a consequence of the physical properties of
human vocal tract?

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Mental rule
or physical necessity?
Doors [z] tens [z]
Horse [s] tense [s]

Rule only applies to the plural “s”

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Also, evidence from
other languages
English: rows [roz]

Spanish: libros [libros]

Conclusion: mental rule

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 Conclusion
Pronunciation of plural as [s] or [z] is not a
necessary consequence of vocal tract

Rather: pronunciation of plural is a mental rule

extracted from patterns in the input language

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 Rules
Mental (not physical); Not conscious

Extracted from the patterns that exist in the

input

Some rules might be innate

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 The linguist’s goal

• Build a model of the speaker’s knowledge of

language
• Discover what the rules and representations
are
• Linguists reverse engineer the linguistic
computational device in our brain

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Methodology:
Scientific Method
• Examine data
• Make generalizations (describe observable
patterns)
• Make hypotheses to explain observed
generalizations
• Test predictions of hypotheses against more
data

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Data

Data = speakers’ judgments about grammatical

and ungrammatical forms (words, sentences,
etc.)

But what counts as

“grammatical”?
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Grammatical = meaningful?

A sentence is grammatical if it makes sense. If

we can understand the meaning, then the
sentence is grammatical.

My toothbrush is pregnant.
versus:
*My toothbrush are pregnant.
*Toothbrush my pregnant is.
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Grammatical = meaningful?

Me Tarzan. You Jane.

Grammaticality  meaningfulness

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 Grammatical?

a) John is taller than me.

b) John is taller than I.

c)*John is taller than my.

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Rule: When comparing subjects, after “than”
and “as” the nominative form of the pronoun
should be used (“I” rather than “me”)

Rule of mental grammar?

Example of a prescriptive rule

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• Remember:

The job of the linguist is to determine what the

rules are that allow people to speak and
understand novel sentences in their native
language

• Linguists study how people really speak

(describe patterns that exist in the data)
• They do not tell people how to speak

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Grammaticality
From this point on,
grammatical = native speaker could / would
say (normally)

A grammatical linguistic form sounds

acceptable or natural to a native speaker

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How to be a descriptivist
(and not a prescriptivist)

Step 1: Observe pattern (gather data)

1) I went 4) * Me went
2) We went 5) * Us went
3) She went 6) * Her went

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 Pronouns
Nominative Accusative
sg pl sg pl
1 I we me us
2 you you you you
3 he, she they him, her them
it it

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How to be a descriptivist
Step 2: Make a generalization
(posit a rule)

Nominative pron <=> subject position

Accusative pron <=> object position

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How to be a descriptivist

Step 3: Test the generalization (rule)

1) Sammy and me went.

2) Sammy and her went.
3) Sammy and us went.
Are these grammatical?
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Prescriptivist’s Perspective

“These people are using an ungrammatical

construction”

Maintain rule: nominative <=> subject

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 Descriptivist’s perspective

Revise the original generalization (rule):

Pronouns in non-conjoined subject position are

nominative.
Pronouns in conjoined positions can be
accusative.

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Innateness
 Mental grammar
• How did it get there?

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How do children learn
language?
• Parents teach them?
• Imitation? (i.e., copy & memorize, repeat
verbatim)

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How do children learn
language?
Child: Nobody don’t like me.
Mother: No, say “nobody likes me.”
Child: Nobody don’t like me.
x8
Mother: Now listen carefully; say,
“nobody likes me.”
Child: Oh! Nobody don’t likes me.
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How do children learn
language?
a) Joan appeared to Mary to like herself
b) Joan appeared to Mary to like her
c) Joan appealed to Mary to like herself
d) Joan appealed to Mary to like her

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How do children learn
language?
a) manu-freaking-facturer (manufacturer)
b) Cali-freaking-fornia (California)
c) * Chom-freaking-sky (Chomsky)
d) * ele-freaking-phant (elephant)

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How do children learn
language?

• Figure out patterns

• Construct own mental grammar

→ Similar to what linguists do (though

children do this unconsciously)

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How do children learn
language?
Compare learning language to other things
that we learn….
• times tables
• long division
• playing a musical instrument
• walking
• Not taught
• Not conscious
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A Paradox
Language is extremely hard to figure out

• Linguists studying grammatical principles

underlying language are far from finding the
right rules and constraints for even one
language
• Engineers and computer scientists trying to
solve problems of machine translation and AI
for 60+ years

• Yet children become fluent speakers by age 5

(or younger) without explicit training
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Innateness Hypothesis

The human brain contains a genetically

determined specialization for language.

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Language learning –
natural ability
Part of human biology

• Just like the ability to walk

• Just like echolocation is part of bat biology

• This is separate from learning other skills

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Questions

• If language is innate, why aren’t children born

speaking their language?

• How could it be that language is innate to the

human species? Humans speak all different
languages

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Innateness Hypothesis

Mental Grammar

Innate part Learned part

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The Argument for Innate
Knowledge

The way that children learn language implies

that the human mind/brain contains a
genetically determined specialization for
language.

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Arguments for innateness

• Uniformity throughout the species

• Species-specificity

• Poverty of the stimulus: children create

grammar beyond what they have evidence
for

• Critical period

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Arguments for innateness
What could babies possibly have in their brains
that could help them acquire any language that
they might end up being exposed to?

=> Universal Grammar (UG)

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Language Universals

What kind of commonalities do languages have?

What is the range of possible differences?

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Language Universals
Example
• Negation in English
Affirmative: Mary has eaten the cookies.
Negative: Mary hasn’t eaten the cookies.
Mary has not eaten the cookies.
Affirmative: My brother has a big house.
Negative: My brother doesn’t have a big house.
My brother does not have a big house.
My brother has not a big house.
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Language Universals
Example
• Negation in Quechua
nuka wawki mana [jatun wasi-ta chari-n-chu]
my brother not big house have-3-NEG
My brother doesn’t have a big house
• Negation in French
Mon frère ne veut pas d'une grande maison
my brother not want NEG a big house
My brother doesn’t want a big house
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 Language Universals

• No language forms negation by reversing the

order of the words:
Pos: Mary has eaten the cookies.
Neg: Cookies the eaten has Mary.

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 Summary
• Humans are born with genetically specified
component for learning language

• Universal Grammar: restricts range of options

• All languages share common features – due to

brain structure

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