The price of linguistic productivity : how children learn to break the rules of language / Charles Yang.

Author
Yang, Charles D. [Browse]
Format
Book
Language
English
Published/​Created
Cambridge, Massachusetts : The MIT Press, [2016]
Description
xii, 261 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Availability

Copies in the Library

Location Call Number Status Location Service Notes
Firestone Library - Stacks P118.65 .Y36 2016 Browse related items Request

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    Subject(s)
    Summary note
    Ll languages have exceptions alongside overarching rules and regularities. How does a young child tease them apart within just a few years of language acquisition? In this book, drawing an economic analogy, Charles Yang argues that just as the price of goods is determined by the balance between supply and demand, the price of linguistic productivity arises from the quantitative considerations of rules and exceptions. The learner postulates a productive rule only if it results in a more efficient organization of language, with the number of exceptions falling below a critical threshold. Supported by a wide range of cases with corpus evidence, Yang's Tolerance Principle gives a unified account of many long-standing puzzles in linguistics and psychology, including why children effortlessly acquire rules of language that perplex otherwise capable adults. His focus on computational efficiency provides novel insight on how language interacts with the other components of cognition and how the ability for language might have emerged during the course of human evolution--Publisher's website.
    Bibliographic references
    Includes bibliographical references (pages 229-255) and index.
    Other title(s)
    How children learn to break the rules of language
    ISBN
    • 9780262035323 (hardcover ; : alkaline paper)
    • 0262035324 (hardcover ; : alkaline paper)
    LCCN
    2016010715
    OCLC
    946160456
    Statement on language in description
    Princeton University Library aims to describe library materials in a manner that is respectful to the individuals and communities who create, use, and are represented in the collections we manage. Read more...
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