Changing Minds Changing Tools: From Learning Theory to Language Acquisition to Language Change

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Vsevolod Kapatsinski (Associate Professor, University of Oregon)

Changing Minds Changing Tools

From Learning Theory to Language Acquisition to Language Change

Vsevolod Kapatsinski (Associate Professor, University of Oregon)

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English

MIT Press
24 July 2018

Lexicography; Cognition & cognitive psychology

Series: Changing Minds Changing Tools

A book that uses domain-general learning theory to explain recurrent trajectories of language change.

In this book, Vsevolod Kapatsinski argues that language acquisition-often approached as an isolated domain, subject to its own laws and mechanisms-is simply learning, subject to the same laws as learning in other domains and well described by associative models. Synthesizing research in domain-general learning theory as it relates to language acquisition, Kapatsinski argues that the way minds change as a result of experience can help explain how languages change over time and can predict the likely directions of language change-which in turn predicts what kinds of structures we find in the languages of the world. What we know about how we learn (the core question of learning theory) can help us understand why languages are the way they are (the core question of theoretical linguistics).

Taking a dynamic, usage-based perspective, Kapatsinski focuses on diachronic universals, recurrent pathways of language change, rather than synchronic universals, properties that all languages share. Topics include associative approaches to learning and the neural implementation of the proposed mechanisms; selective attention; units of language; a comparison of associative and Bayesian approaches to learning; representation in the mind of visual and auditory experience; the production of new words and new forms of words; and automatization of repeated action sequences. This approach brings us closer to understanding why languages are the way they are, Kapatsinski contends, than approaches premised on innate knowledge of language universals and the language acquisition device.

By: Vsevolod Kapatsinski (Associate Professor University of Oregon)
Imprint: MIT Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 24mm
ISBN: 9780262037860
ISBN 10: 0262037866
Series: Changing Minds Changing Tools
Pages: 392
Publication Date: 24 July 2018
Recommended Age: From 18 years
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Inactive

Vsevolod Kapatsinski is Associate Professor in the Department of Linguistics at the University of Oregon.