Language in Our Brain: The Origins of a Uniquely Human Capacity
304
Language in Our Brain: The Origins of a Uniquely Human Capacity
304eBook
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Overview
Language makes us human. It is an intrinsic part of us, although we seldom think about it. Language is also an extremely complex entity with subcomponents responsible for its phonological, syntactic, and semantic aspects. In this landmark work, Angela Friederici offers a comprehensive account of these subcomponents and how they are integrated. Tracing the neurobiological basis of language across brain regions in humans and other primate species, she argues that species-specific brain differences may be at the root of the human capacity for language.
Friederici shows which brain regions support the different language processes and how these brain regions are connected structurally and functionally to make language processes that take place in milliseconds possible. She finds that one particular brain structure connecting syntax-relevant brain regions is present only in the mature human brain and only weakly present in other primate brains. Is this the “missing link” that explains humans’ capacity for language?
Friederici describes the basic language functions and their brain basis; the language networks connecting different language-related brain regions; the brain basis of language acquisition during early childhood and when learning a second language, proposing a neurocognitive model of the ontogeny of language; and the evolution of language and underlying neural constraints. She finds that it is the information exchange between the relevant brain regions, supported by the white matter tract, that is the crucial factor in both language development and evolution.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780262342971 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | MIT Press |
| Publication date: | 11/16/2017 |
| Series: | The MIT Press |
| Sold by: | Penguin Random House Publisher Services |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 304 |
| Sales rank: | 131,909 |
| File size: | 6 MB |
| Age Range: | 18 Years |
About the Author
Noam Chomsky is Institute Professor and Professor of Linguistics (Emeritus) at MIT and the author of many influential books on linguistics, including Aspects of the Theory of Syntax and The Minimalist Program, both published by the MIT Press.
Table of Contents
Foreword Noam Chomsky ix
Preface xi
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction 1
Language as a Uniquely Human Trait 1
Language as a Specific Cognitive System 3
Language as a Brain System 5
Part I 13
1 Language Functions in the Brain: From Auditory Input to Sentence Comprehension 15
1.1 A Cognitive Model of Auditory Language Comprehension 15
1.2 Acoustic-Phonological Processes 20
1.3 From Word Form to Syntactic and Lexical-Semantic Information 27
1.4 Initial Phrase Structure Building 32
1.5 Syntactic Relations during Sentence Processing 43
1.6 Processing Semantic Relations 56
1.7 Thematic Role Assignment: Semantic and Syntactic Features 62
1.8 Processing Prosodic Information 71
1.9 Functional Neuroanatomy of Language Comprehension 82
2 Excursions 85
2.1 Language Comprehension and Production: A Common Knowledge Base of Language 85
2.2 Language Comprehension and Communication: Beyond the Core Language System 95
Part II 101
3 The Structural Language Network 103
3.1 The Neuroanatomical Pathways of Language 103
3.2 Pathways in the Right Hemisphere and Cross-Hemispheric Pathways 112
3.3 The Neuroanatomical Pathway Model of Language: Syntactic and Semantic Networks 115
4 The Functional Language Network 121
4.1 The Neuroreceptorarchitectonic Basis of the Language Network 121
4.2 Functional Connectivity and Cortical Oscillations 125
4.3 The Neural Language Circuit 134
Part III 143
5 The Brain's Critical Period for Language Acquisition 145
5.1 Neurophysiology of Second Language Learning 146
5.2 Critical and Sensitive Periods of Learning: Facts and Speculations 155
5.3 Universality of the Neural Language Network 157
6 Ontogeny of the Neural Language Network 163
6.1 Language in the First Three Years of Life 165
6.2 Language beyond Age 3 183
6.3 Structural and Functional Connectivity during Development 191
6.4 The Ontogeny of the Language Network: A Model 196
Part IV 201
7 Evolution of Language 203
7.1 Theories of Language Evolution 203
7.2 Processing Structured Sequences in Songbirds 205
7.3 Comparing Monkeys and Humans 207
7.4 Paleoanthropological Considerations of Brain Development 219
8 The Neural Basis of Language 221
8.1 An Integrative View of the Language Network 223
8.2 Epilogue: Homo Loquens-More than Just Words 231
Glossary 233
Notes 241
References 245
Index 281
What People are Saying About This
In this masterful summary of decades of work on the neurobiological foundations of language, Friederici develops a comprehensive account of how this most complex of human computational functions is organized, providing a detailed and lucid perspective on the neuroscience of language. This is essential reading for anyone interested in a theoretically motivated and biologically sophisticated perspective on how language is represented and processed in the brain.
No stone has been left unturned in Angela Friederici's masterful all-encompassing scientific analysis of the brain systems that allow human beings to communicate with one another. It is a delightful and enriching read for linguists and neuroscientists alike.
No stone has been left unturned in Angela Friederici's masterful all-encompassing scientific analysis of the brain systems that allow human beings to communicate with one another. It is a delightful and enriching read for linguists and neuroscientists alike.
—Cathy J. Price, Professor in Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London
In this masterful summary of decades of work on the neurobiological foundations of language, Friederici develops a comprehensive account of how this most complex of human computational functions is organized, providing a detailed and lucid perspective on the neuroscience of language. This is essential reading for anyone interested in a theoretically motivated and biologically sophisticated perspective on how language is represented and processed in the brain.
—David Poeppel, Professor of Psychology and Neural Science, New York University; Scientific Member and Director, Neuroscience Department, Max Planck Institute of Empirical AestheticsNo stone has been left unturned in Angela Friederici's masterful all-encompassing scientific analysis of the brain systems that allow human beings to communicate with one another. It is a delightful and enriching read for linguists and neuroscientists alike.
—Cathy J. Price, Professor in Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London