A Basic Course in Anthropological Linguistics (Studies in Linguistic ...

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LINGUISTIC METHOD 21 who had suffered language impairments, called aphasias, caused by damage to specific language areas in their brains. From his review, Lenneberg noted a pattern. It was statistically more likely for those who incurred aphasias during childhood to develop language abilities nonetheless, despite their impairments. However, aphasias incurred after puberty tended to cause permanent impairments. Lenneberg’s hypothesis appeared to receive support in the early 1970s from a widely reported case of a child, named Genie, whose abusive father had isolated and physically restrained her day and night in a small bedroom with little light and virtually no stimulation from the age of 20 months (Curtiss 1977). When found at almost the age of 14, and thus after the critical period, Genie could not speak, nor was she ever able (as far as I know) to learn how to speak hke someone who had had the benefit of a normal upbringing. However, many doubts have been cast on the case. First, Genie was not an ideal subject for testing Lenneberg’s hypothesis, because there was some question as to whether she was mentally retarded from birth. Her father, it is thus claimed, locked her up in cruel response to her abnormality. The extreme deprivation that Genie suffered also may have had biological mfluences on her brain, making it difficult for her to acquire language after she was found. Critical period theory suggests that human biology puts limits on our ability to learn a language. But this is not necessarily the case. There are many examples of people learning a new language fluently after puberty. There are simply too many factors involved in human development and learning that defy facile theories such as UG theory, LAD theory, or a critical period theory. There is some element of truth in all such theories, of course, for learning is subject to some biological constraints. But the unique power of the human mind is that it can transcend these constraints on willpower alone. CONCLUDING REMARKS In this opening chapter we looked at a few general aspects of language and of linguistic method. The approach defined as AL-which is now considered a branch of general linguistics-inheres in seeing the various subsystems of language not as autonomous phenomena, to be studied only as physical objects in and of themselves, but in relation to cognition, culture, and the social systems that they undergird. Boas and his student Sapir are the founders of AL. Sapir’s own brilliant student, Benjamin Lee Whorf, expanded the purview of AL by elaborating substantively upon his mentor’s views and giving them a more
22 A BASIC COURSE IN ANTHROPOLOGICAL LINGUISTICS empirical foundation. Through his in-depth study of the Hopi language of the southwestern US, Whorf posited, in essence, that the categories of one’s particular language are much more than simple mediators of thought. He saw them as being the “shapers” of the very thought patterns they embodied: “The world is presented in a kaleidoscopic flux of impressions which has to be organized by our minds-and this means largely by the linguistic systems in our minds” (Whorf 1956: 153). The main objective ofaremains, to this day, to study the “linguistic systems in our mind,” as Whorf so eloquently put it.
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Page 6 and 7: Table of Contents Preface .........
Page 8 and 9: Metaphor ..........................
Page 10 and 11: Preface Language is a truly fascina
Page 12 and 13: Without words to objectify and cate
Page 14 and 15: LINGUISTIC METHOD 3 languages the s
Page 16 and 17: LINGUISTIC METHOD 5 Saussure’s ap
Page 18 and 19: LINGUISTIC METHOD 7 as computationa
Page 20 and 21: LINGUISTIC METHOD 9 language utiliz
Page 22 and 23: LINGUISTIC METHOD 11 making the wor
Page 24 and 25: LINGUISTIC METHOD 13 Although there
Page 26 and 27: LINGUISTIC METHOD 15 chairrnan, spo
Page 28 and 29: LINGUISTIC METHOD 17 for example, s
Page 30 and 31: LINGUISTIC METHOD 19 they are unabl
Page 34 and 35: Language is a part of our organism
Page 36 and 37: THE OFUGIN AND EVOLUTION OF LANGUAG
Page 38 and 39: THE ORIGIN AND EVOLUTION OF LANGUAG
Page 48 and 49: THE ORTGIN AND EVOLUTION OF LANGUAG
Page 58 and 59: A linguistic system is a series of
Page 60 and 61: SOUNDS 49 Sounds made by touching t
Page 62 and 63: Main Points of Articulation: SOUNDS
Page 64 and 65: SOUNDS 53 English living in Alabama
Page 66 and 67: SOUNDS 55 If a phoneme has variants
Page 68 and 69: SOUNDS 57 other by means of a compl
Page 70 and 71: SOUNDS 59 Distinctive features also
Page 72 and 73: ~ ~ SOUNDS 61 Syllables with Primar
Page 74 and 75: SOUNDS 63 In some languages, such a
Page 76 and 77: SOUNDS 65 that we hardly ever notic
Page 78 and 79: flee float fly SOUNDS 67 On the oth
Page 80 and 81: Give the people a new word and they
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WORDS 71 inflected classes (such as
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THE MORPHEME WORDS 73 The bits and
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WORDS 75 There are two other types
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WORDS 77 This suggests, of course,
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ZIPF’S LAW AGAIN WORDS 79 Recall
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WORDS 81 Abbreviations save effort.
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WORDS 83 The American linguist Jose
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The words of the world want to make
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SENTENCES 87 The hierarchical struc
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SENTENCES 89 complement (or object)
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SENTENCES 91 For example, uttering
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SENTENCES 93 As a follow-up study,
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SENTENCES 95 The . . ./-ingl . . ./
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SENTENCES 97 timeline on which spec
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For a large class of cases-though n
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MEANINGS 101 The three referents to
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MEANINGS 103 a legislative assembly
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or [-canine] - [+canine] dog (male)
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MEANINGS 107 connotations, namely t
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MEANINGS 109 We do not detect the p
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MEANINGS 111 thnlung] was rendered
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(3) We don’t hire crew cuts. MEAN
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MEANINGS 115 ~~ Evil Good Appropria
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MEANINGS 117 he called gesticulants
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MEANINGS 119 given names come from
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You can stroke people with words. E
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DISCOURSE AND VARIATION 123 other k
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explicating family relations explic
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DISCOURSE AND VARIATION 127 (4) a c
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DISCOURSE AND VARIATION 129 or she
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DISCOURSE AND VA€”TION 131 Gend
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DISCOURSE AND VARLATION 133 Today,
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DISCOURSE AND VAFUATION 135 English
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All objects, all phases of culture
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LANGUAGE AND REALITY 139 0-0 1. 2 .
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LANGUAGE AND REALlTY 141 relations
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c English Salisb Sahaptit Chinook S
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LANGUAGE AND REALITY 145 brown, pur
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METAPHOR LANGUAGE AND REALITY 147 T
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LANGUAGE AND REALITY 149 In Modern
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LANGUAGE AND REALITY 151 Arizona. A
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LANGUAGE AND REALITY 153 it enters
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9 8 LANGUAGE AND REALITY Side Grow
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LANGUAGE AND REALITY 157 The Greeks
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CONCLUDING REMARKS LANGUAGE AND REA
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CHAPTER 1 Activities and Topics for
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CHAPTER 2 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. ACTI
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ACTIVITIES AND TOPICS FOR DISCUSSIO
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A addressee addresser affii allopho
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cohesive gesture communicative comp
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G gambit generative grammar GLOSSAR
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locutionary act logograph M manner
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eferential function register repair
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vocalization voicing vowel GLOSSARY
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Cited Works and General Bibliograph
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CITED WORKS AND GENERAL, BIBLIOGRAP
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CITEiD WORKS AND GENERAL BIBLIOGRAP
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CITED WORKS AND GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPH
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A abbreviations, 79-8 1 acronyms, 7
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metaphor, role of, 147-153 proverbi
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illocutionary act, 184 image schema
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emotional meaning, 1 18 figurative,
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eality, and language color terminol
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gesture theory, 26-28 La-La theory,
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