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A Worldly Look at Language Acquisition Dan Isaac Slobin (Ed.) Reuiew by the Ctosslinguistic Study of Language Kenji Hakuta Acquisition, Vol

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A Worldly Look at Language Acquisition Dan Isaac Slobin (Ed.) Reuiew by the Ctosslinguistic Study of Language Kenji Hakuta Acquisition, Vol A Worldly Look at Language Acquisition Dan Isaac Slobin (Ed.) Reuiew by The Ctosslinguistic Study of Language Kenji Hakuta Acquisition, Vol. 1: The Data; Vol. 0: Theoretical Issues Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1985. 1,332 pp. ISBN 0-89859-367-0(set). $125.00 (VO~.1); $65.00 (VO~.2); ’ $160.00 (set) Dan Isaac Slobin, professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, is author of Psycholinguistics (2nd ed.). Slobin is recipient of the New York Acad- emy of Sciences Award in thBehavioral Sciences. Kettji Hakuta, professor of etlrrcotiori adpsycchology ut the University of CulijLmia, Suntn Cruz. is author of Mirror of Language: The Debate on Bilingualism. o appreciate the nature of this con- of child language research, into the heady T tribution by Dan Slobin, we need to days of the 1960s. These were the days step back at least 20 years into the historv when the empiricist account of language CONTEMPORARY PSYCHOLOGY, 1988, Vol. 33, No. 7 acquisition and behavior had been dealt sort of process mechanism-a set of proce- tremely informative and readable refer- ; a lcthal blow in the form or Cltonisky’s Jurc-s uttl iiifc:rc-iicc rii1c.s. if yoii will--llixt encc muiual. b (1959) classic review ofskinner’s (1957) he uses to process linguistic data. These The bulk of the two volumes are taken Verbal Behnuior: Most significantly for the mechanisms are such that, applying them to up by syntheses of the literature on the the input data. the cliiltl eiids up with somo- new generation of developmental psy- acquisition of different languages. Elevcii thing which is a member of the class of human cholinguists, a revolution-very much in languages. The linguistic universals. then, are different languages are reviewed: English the sense of Thomas Kuhn-had oc- the result of YI innate cognitive competence (by de Mlliers and de Villiers); German curred in the field of linguistics, resulting rather than the content of such a competence. (by Mills); Hebrew (by Berman); Hun- in a parallel new agenda for the study of (Smith & Miller, 1966. pp. 87-88) garian (by MacWhinney); Japanese (by child language. Clancy); Kaluli (by Schieffelin); Polish (by The aspect of the new linguistic agenda This interest in finding out the child’s set Smoczynska); Romance-with special that most tantalized the developmental of procedures and inference rules led to reference to French (by Clark); Samoan psycholinguist was the centrality of the his paper, “Cognitive Prerequisites for (by Ochs); Turkish (by Aksu-Koc and Slo- effort to account for the linguistic intu- the Development of Grammar,” in which bin); and American Sign Language (by itions of idealized speaker-hearers of the he argued that the appearance of a par- Newport and Meier). The individual con- language. Of particular relevance was the ticular linguistic form could be seen as a tributions are of extremely high quality demonstration that an analysis of surface function of (a) the cognitive complexity (those by Clancy and by Newport and properties of language could not lead to of the concept represented therein, and Meier, in my opinion, are exceptional), insights about the more abstract prop- (b) the formal linguistic complexity of the and each one merits a review in its own erties of grammar found in intuitions particular structure. The pacesetter for right. Indeed. the chapters are also pub- (e.g., the fact that ambiguous sentences language development. he claimed, would lished individually as monographs. Over such as The students are rtwolting are as- be cognitive development, and within the next several years, an additional two signable to two distinct structural assign- those boundaries, the grammatical means to three volumes are planned covering ments). If linguists could not derive such of expression would be important. In other languages. deep insights from the analysis of surface making this claim, Slobin took advantage Slobin indicates in his introduction that configurations, neither could children. of crosslinguistic information. By assum- each of the authors was asked to approach How, then, do children come to have such ing that children of different language his or her task with a common Framework. linguistic competence? The logical step backgrounds develop cognitively at a They were to describe the language and proposed by Chomsky. and followed by uniform rate, universals in the appearance the nature of the studies. This was to be many developmental psycholinguists, was of the linguistic expression of given con- followed by a description of the language that structural knowledge about language cepts across different languages could be acquisition data for the language with re- was innate. attributed to the primacy of cognitive spect to the typical errors reported, the Another important facet of the new development. But within the broad con- acquisition of structures that are appar- linguistic agenda was its promise to lead straints set by cognitive development, ently acquired without error, and the in- to the discovery of language universals. variations in the relative ease or difficulty formation on the timing of acquisition. One important set of universals, called in the acquisition of forms expressing a The contributors were then asked to de- “formal universals” by Chomsky, referred given concept could be attributed to the scribe the setting of language acquisition: to properties of grammatical rules and means of formal expression. Slobin hy- the evidence on the issue of the cognitive constraints that could be found across all pothesized that any given structure would pacesetting of language development, the human languages. If one were to propose be influenced by the extent to which the linguistic pacesetting of cognitive devel- a candidate as to what might constitute form itself was consistent with the per- opment, the influence of the nature of innate structural knowledge about lan- ceptual and information-processingbiases adult-child interaction on linguistic de- guages, the set of language universals of children. He induced a set of “oper- velopment, and the individual differences. would constitute a prime candidate. ating principles” (OPs) that the language Finally, contributors were asked to ad- In those heady days, child language learning child appeared to have at his or dress various issues of theoretical signif- data were being combed for evidence for her disposal, such as: PAY AlTENTION icance and to make suggestions for further the innateness of language. Errors ob- TO THE ENDS OF WORDS and PAY AT- study. This schema for an organizational served in children’s language for which TENTION TO THE ORDER OF WORDS framework seems to have worked for most no adult model existed were noted and AND MORPHEMES. These OPs, in turn, of the chapters. It would have been ideal hailed as evidence for systematic rule are the inductive mechanisms used by the if all of the chapters had conformed formation, and abstract knowledge was child in constructing grammar. strictly to the standard format, but anyone imputed t9 children as part of their uni- Ever since the appearance of this sem- who has edited a volume with indepen- versal linguistic (and biologically based) inal article in which the strategic advan- dent-minded academics will appreciate endowmen t. tages of crosslinguistic comparison was the difficulty of such an accomplishment. During at least one celebration of the demonstrated, Slobin’s name has beeti The second part of the work consists linguistic capacity of children in this era, practically synonymous with the cross- of theoretical issues in language acquisi- Slobin indicated a direction for theoret- linguistic perspective on language acqui- tion. The centerpiece of this section is ical development that he has pursued ever sition. Now, he has really cornered the Slobin’s own contribution, in which he since. In commenting about McNeill’s market, for these volumes will be a stan- attempts to elaborate on the operating bold assertions about the structural con- dard reference for years to come. The principles of his earlier work, incorpo- tents of the child’s innate language ell- handbook elevates Slobill’s method of rating the data from the new studies. Most dowment, Slobin wrote: crosslinguistic correlation to a new di- readers familiar with the previous work It seems to me that the child is born not with mension, by systematizing the points of will find no surprises, other thm a far a set of linguistic categories but with some comparison and constructing an ex- greater specificity of the operating prin- CONTEMPORARY PSYCHOLOGY,1988. Vol. 33, No. 7 577 ciples (41 in all) and a larger data base in me while reading the volumes are in order References support of his approach. As in his’pre- in concluding this review: (a) DM Slobin Chomsky. N. (1959). [Review of Verbal vious work, Slobin is rigorously inductive has a great lave for human language in all behaoiorj. Language, 35.26-58. Creenberg, J. H. (Ed.). (1978). Lmioersal its incarnations, not just for linguistic and eschews theorizing in proposing his of ofhuman langiurgc. Vol. 4: Syntax. “Language-Making Capacity” (LMC): theories; (b) the volume is meticulously Stanford. a:Stanford University Press. cvlilcd-:i r:iiidoiii clicd on tlic. ;irciir:icy Hilwkiils. J. A. (1983). Word orhr natllcr tliaii “prc-tuiic“ LMC lo :I particiilar of refcrciict-5 sliowc.tl iio (*rrors,;uid typos raiiuersul. New York: Acatleiiiic I’rcss. Kuiio. The Japaiicrc laiiguape. 111 current theory of abstract syii~u,I prefer to are few in number; (c) it is a gold mine S. (l98G). H. Stevenson, H. Azuma. & K. Hakuta work backward from acquisition data to pro- of information, and even skimming pose systems of knowledge information (Eds.). Child deuebprnmt and education and through the pages is the cause of many inJapan (pp. 93-119). San Rancisco: processing that seem to be prerequisite for worthwhile linguistic daydreams; (d) Freeman.
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