Viewing profile — jugbandjames

I'd say his research methods are wrong. Limiting your research to so-called competent speakers is cherry picking data, in my view.

My training is in language variation, and I specialized in sociophonetics, so I'm not an expert on syntax, but my understanding is that whenever chomsky's theories are empirically …

> I wonder if there's much history of groups starting out with common languages, then groups separating and the languages evolving separately, either intentionally to demonstrate g…

>Language doesn't dictate patterns of thought, but it certainly shapes them. What you're talking about is the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, and it is not certain at all. It's highly cont…

It's not always that "natural" of a selection. Many native Americans were basically kidnapped and forced to learn English. Governments in the past have intentionally tried to eradi…

Babies are born with the ability to distinguish between any two frequencies that are important for a phonetic distinction. Within the first year, they begin to lose that ability an…

It isn't necessary to have only one language for people to communicate. Humans are perfectly capable of learning multiple languages, and and it may even be good for a child's cogni…

Actually, the impact that standardized language education has had on dialect variation isn't quite clear. It appears to have had some impact, but not as much as laypeople usually t…