V61.0001 Language
Instructors: Vincent Chanethom and Cara Shousterman
Summer 2008
MTWR, 4:00PM - 5:35PM, 5/19 - 6/27
Course Description:
Nature or nurture? Linguistics is a science that systematically addresses this puzzle, and it offers a uniquely interesting support for the answer both. Language is a social phenomenon, but human languages share elaborate and specific structural properties. The conventions of speech communities exist, exhibit variation, and change within the strict confines of universal grammar, part of our biological endowment. Universal grammar is discovered through the careful study of the structures of individual languages, by cross-linguistic comparisons, and the investigation of the brain. This course introduces some fundamental properties of the sound system and of the structure and interpretation of words and sentences, set into this context.
This course satisfies the introductory course requirement for the linguistics major and is also a MAP exemptor.
Required Textbook: Fromkin, Rodman, and Hyams, An Introduction to Language, 8th edition.
The syllabus for Summer 2008 will be posted soon. To view previous syllabi for this course, please visit the Language webpage.
Last Modified: April 17, 2008