Noam Chomsky is a well-known American linguist famous for his psychological research on language and one of the great thinkers of the modern age. Since the beginning of his career, Chomsky has turned out to be a quite controversial character due to his political inclinations and his career as a renowned activist in socialist campaigns.
Among many published articles and books, Chomsky is known in the world of psychology for his famous theory of language acquisition. In this linguistic theory, he states that we are born with a innate ability to speak and that our acquisition process is based on learning the structures of language and grammar. Do you want to know more about Noam Chomsky and the theory of language? Then we recommend that you continue reading this Psychology-Online article.
Who is Chomsky: biography and ideology
Avraham Noam Chomsky was born in 1928 in Philadelphia, United States. The son of Ukrainian immigrants, Noam decided to direct his life and career to the study of linguistics. He studied philosophy, linguistics and mathematics at the University of Pennsylvania and, years later, was named professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
In 1949, Noam married Carol Schatz, better known as Carol Chomsky, a well-known linguist who developed her language acquisition studies parallel to those of her husband. In 1957, Noam Chomsky published the first book that revolutionized the way the scientific community interpreted language: Syntactic Structures. From that moment on, he began publishing publications, studies and books related to that same topic.
On the other hand, Noam Chomsky also has a strong reputation as an activist and critic of the capitalist system, its ideology has often been criticized for being sympathetic to ideas of socialism. He took a stand against the Vietnam War and, since then, has continued to publish political works with harsh criticism of the current system.
Noam Chomsky’s theory of language development
Chomsky’s theory is also known as biolinguistics. In it, the existence of certain structures in our mind is affirmed that allow both the production of language and the fact of understanding a message regardless of the language.
How is language acquired according to Chomsky?
In his first publication: Syntactic Structures (1957), Noam Chomsky proposes a revolutionary theory. In it, the famous linguist affirms that there is an element called Language Acquisition Device or LAD (language acquisition device) in the human mind that innately facilitates the knowledge of basic structures of the native language.
In this way, the relative similarity in language learning between different cultures and the ease of learning the native language in childhood are due to the innate ability to understand common language structures such as SVO (Subject – Verb – Object).
Chomsky’s linguistic theory
Thus, Chomsky’s theory of language considers that a child does not learn language by exposure and imitation, but rather learns to relate his innate knowledge of the syntactic structures of language, with the limited set of words (also known as lexicon) that it contains. your native language. This theory, which marks the beginning of a new conception of linguistics, has been reviewed and modified by Chomsky himself until reaching the theory of Universal Grammar (UG).
The theory of universal grammar
According to linguist Noam Chomsky, there is a limited set of rules and common characteristics in the construction of all languages, known as Universal Grammar, innate to human beings. In this way, there is “certain mental structure formed by a system of rules and principles that generates and relates mental representations of various types”
Thus, the acquisition of the basic rules of language is unconscious, and Universal Grammar establishes the initial state of a child in his psychological learning process. When the child receives information about the words contained in the mother tongue, she builds a specific lexicon to which she applies the set of characteristics of Universal Grammar. Thus, from birth, Universal Grammar allows a child to unconsciously know that there are words that behave like verbs, others like nouns, and that there is a limited set of possibilities for ordering these categories to form a sentence.
Theory modifications: a more open approach
A few years later, Noam Chomsky stated that a naturalistic approach to his theory. Thanks to this approach, it is evident that the objective of nativist theory is not to reduce acquisition to a merely biological fact, but rather to unite the principles of cognitive thinking with anatomical and physiological study. Broadly speaking, the naturalistic approach aims to seek to what extent the essence of language and its acquisition depend on innate mental operations.
Chomsky’s linguistic theory: language and thought
In short, according to Chomsky’s innatist theory, language is a characteristic that all human beings have even before they are born. This theory is completely contrary to behaviorism since the behaviorist theory states that language is acquired through learning and repetition.
According to Chomsky’s linguistic theorylanguage acquisition is based on principles such as the following:
- Only the human species You can learn to communicate by learning language
- Imitating and repeating are not elements that interfere with language acquisition
- When a child begins to make sounds, he or she does not do so through repetition or learning, but rather through the activation of his or her acquisition device.
- He is a property that acts independently of intelligence
Criticisms of Chomsky’s theory: language and thought
- It does not explain how language is produced or perceived in a real, everyday environment. His studies focus on controlled scenarios and unreal.
- Many experts say it is a theory simple and reductionist and that does not take into account factors as important as learning and the social environment.
- The empirical evidence that supports this theory they are not enoughthe ideas of Noam Chomsky and his theory of language acquisition are rather abstract in tone and, although they attempt to explain processes as important as language acquisition, they need more studies to prove their validity.
Noam Chomsky: books
We can differentiate two clearly different editorial lines: his political essays and his studies on linguistics. Next, we will highlight his most emblematic worksclassified by theme and following a chronological order.
Books on Chomsky’s theory of language
- 1955: Logical Structure of Linguistic Theory (unpublished until 1975).
- 1957: Syntactic Structures (Syntactic structures).
- 1965: Aspects of the Theory of Syntax (Aspects of the theory of syntax).
- 1965: Cartesian Linguistics (Cartesian linguistics).
- 1968: Language and Mind (The language and the understanding).
- 1968: Sound Pattern of English (with Morris Halle).
- 1970: Current Issues in Linguistic Theory.
- 1972: Studies in Semantics in Generative Grammar.
- 1975: Reflections on Language (Reflections on language).
- 1977: Essays on Form and Interpretation (Essays on form and interpretation).
- 1980: Rules and Representations (Rules and representations).
- 1981: Lectures on Government and Binding: The Pisa Lectures.
- 1984: Modular Approaches to the Study of Mind.
- 1986: Barriers (Barriers).
- 1986: Knowledge of Language: Its Nature, Origin, and Use. (Knowledge of language, its nature, origin and use).
- nineteen ninety five: The Minimalist Program (The minimalist program).
Noam Chomsky: political books and essays
- 1996: Rollback (How the cake is distributed. US policies at the end of the millennium)
- 1997: The Global Village
- 1997: Class Warfare (Class struggle).
- 1997: World Orders, Old and New (The new world order and the old).
- 2002: Propaganda and the Public Mind (Propaganda and public opinion)
- 1983-1999: The Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel, and the Palestinians
- 2003: Class struggle
- 2006: Human nature: justice versus power, debate with Michel Foucault
- 2007: Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy. (Failed states. The abuse of power and the attack on democracy).
- 2008: Interventions (Interventions)
- 2013: On Anarchism (Reasons for anarchy)
- 2016: Who rules the worldd (Who rules the world?)
- 2017: Requiem for the American Dream (Requiem for the American Dream)
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References
- Chomsky, N. (1980). Rules and representations. Oxford: Blackwell.
- White, L., & White, L. (2003). Second language acquisition and universal grammar. Cambridge University Press.
Bibliography
- Chomsky, N. (1957). Syntactic Structures, ed. XXI century.
- Birchenall, L.B., & Müller, O. (2014). The linguistic theory of Noam Chomsky: from beginning to present. Language, 42(2), 417-442.
- Analysis of Chomsky’s theory by Vegas, M. (2018).