Acquiring Phonology

Erscheinungsjahr 2009
ISBN: 978-0-521-51587-0
Verlag: Cambridge University Press

Buch, Englisch, Band 124, 284 Seiten, HC gerader Rücken kaschiert, Format (B × H): 157 mm x 235 mm, Gewicht: 568 g

Reihe: Cambridge Studies in Linguistics

Children often mispronounce words when learning their first language. Is it because they cannot perceive the differences that adults make or is it because they can't produce the sounds involved? Neither hypothesis is sufficient on its own to explain the facts. On the basis of detailed analyses of his son's and grandson's development, Neil Smith explains the everyday miracle of one aspect of first-language acquisition. Mispronunciations are now attributed to performance rather than to competence, and he argues at length that children's productions are not mentally represented. The study also highlights the constructs of current linguistic theory, arguing for distinctive features and the notion 'onset' and against some of the claims of Optimality Theory and Usage-based accounts. Smith provides an important and engaging update to his previous work, The Acquisition of Phonology, building on ideas previously developed and drawing new conclusions with the aid of fresh data.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Smith, Neil

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Sprachwissenschaft Spracherwerb, Sprachentwicklung
• Geisteswissenschaften Sprachwissenschaft Phonetik, Phonologie, Prosodie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Preface; Acknowledgements; 1. Preliminaries; 2. The main claims of Smith (1973) and the evidence for them; 3. Competing theories; 4. Z and his development; 5. The nature of the acquisition of phonology; 6. Diachronic lexicon of Z data; 7. Appendices; 8. References; 9. Index.

Über Autor(innen)

Smith, Neil
Neil Smith is Professor Emeritus of Linguistics at University College London. His previous publications include The Acquisition of Phonology (Cambridge University Press, 1973), Modern Linguistics (1979, with Deirdre Wilson), The Twitter Machine (1989), The Mind of a Savant (1995, with Ianthi Tsimpli), Chomsky: Ideas and Ideals (Cambridge University Press, 1999, 2nd edition, 2004), Language, Bananas and Bonobos (2002) and Language, Frogs and Savants (2005).