Yesterday word stress acquisition

1
LOT Course Tuesday
Yesterday (word stress acquisition)
The child turns input into intake by truncations
2
LOT Course Tuesday
Overview today (category acquisition)
The hierarchy of acquisition steps should follow
from a hierarchy of acquisition frames
3
LOT Course Tuesday
Intermediate Grammars
The linear order of the grammars Gi may be total,
partial or non-existent due to the amount of
simultaneous steps
The order in the series should be predictable
given a grammar
4
LOT Course Tuesday
Intermediate Grammars
Gi-1 ltFi?gt ? Gi-1 ltFigt ? Gi
5
LOT Course Tuesday
Example 1 characterizing word ? predicate
characterization ? predicate
6
LOT Course Tuesday
Example 2 goal ? argument phrase
goal ? prepositional object
7
LOT Course Tuesday
Example 3 name ? objectreference
theme ? referential object
8
LOT Course Tuesday
Example 4 name ? subjectreference
topic name ? referential subject
9
LOT Course Tuesday
Discovery procedure
No addition of F without old binarity, new
hierarchy
10
LOT Course Tuesday
Human/Animal?
Grammar, like music and number, a human invention
11
LOT Course Tuesday
The distinction N/V
Are universal N/V acquired first? What is the cue
to see the category correspondence?
12
LOT Course Tuesday
A priori knowledge of N/V?
Postulating a priori knowledge offers no escape
from the acquisition problem
13
LOT Course Tuesday
A priori knowledge (somewhat more abstract)
Innate grammar does not help without an
internalized lexicon
14
LOT Course Tuesday
The distinction N/V chicken and egg problem
BUT, the child does not have a grammar yet to
make such a start no category, no phrases, no
relations
15
LOT Course Tuesday
Pinker Semantic bootstrapping of N/V
Xthing ? N (cognitive structure in space
there) Xevent ? V (cognitive structure in time
now)
16
LOT Course Tuesday
Difficulties with Pinkers scenario
Stretching the semantic distinction of things and
events is necessary, but disqualifies them as a
syntactic cue
17
LOT Course Tuesday
Pinkers scenario the switch to syntax
Do not end up with syntax, but start with syntax
18
LOT Course Tuesday
Category-neutrality (Van Kampen 1997)
No syntax no categories
19
LOT Course Tuesday
No form - no grammar
Add licensing conditions (order, flexion) and
you get grammar
20
LOT Course Tuesday
Lyons proto-grammar reinterpreted
Using proto-grammar is within the reach of
animals Spotting proto-grammar is beyond the
reach of animals
21
LOT Course Tuesday
Examples of proto-grammar
Proto-grammar has no licensing conditions, nor
systematic use of categories/order/flexion

22
LOT Course Tuesday
Binary syntax in proto-grammar
The topic-comment utterance will eventually take
over
23
LOT Course Tuesday
From proto-grammar to real grammar
Adding I-marking and D-marking deletes proto
24
LOT Course Tuesday
Intermediate Grammars
a category feature F a phrasal structure FP two
phrasal relations a graph with order/speed
Gi-1 ltFi?gt ? Gi-1 ltFigt ? Gi
25
LOT Course Tuesday
The rise of I-marking
I-marked comment Predicate
26
LOT Course Tuesday
The rise of D-marking
D-marked name Reference
27
LOT Course Tuesday
Grammatical marking
Obligatory realization of the subject/topic is
an acquisition step on its own
28
LOT Course Tuesday
Grammatical marking
No grammar - no formal reference, - no formal
predication Hence - no formal discourse
29
LOT Course Tuesday
The crucial steps predication and reference
pragmatic
syntactic
The systematic marking of pragmatic
proto-distinctions is the human touch in
communication
30
LOT Course Tuesday
The grammatical bootstraps for N/V
The most outspoken UG categories (N/V) are
discovered due to language specific (D/I)
31
LOT Course Tuesday
Bootstraps towards Vo
Each ltDgt yields a ltNgt but not every ltIgt
yields a ltVgt
32
LOT Course Tuesday
Bootstraps towards No
Obligatory determiner systems rely on more phrase
structure. Case systems do not
33
LOT Course Tuesday
The grammatical way for N/V
the this that his any
to ing s may
The Io/Do diversity harbors many further
problems
34
LOT Course Tuesday
The distinction content/functional
Situational non-saliency and high frequency make
the functional categories to natures own
bootstraps
35
LOT Course Tuesday
Further problems

Begin to see the problems from this point of
view
36
LOT Course Tuesday
Differences with Pinker
The distributional approach is closer to
distinctions in child language
37
LOT Course Tuesday
Discovered
Learnability suggests a more fruitful research
than stipulation about neurology
38
LOT Course Tuesday
Recapitulation
Natural language is based on evidence frame for
each category Fi
39
LOT Course Tuesday
Further questions
The answers my friends are blowing in the wind
40
LOT Course Tuesday
References