First Verbs is a detailed diary study of one child's earliest language development during her second year of life. Using a Cognitive Linguistics framework, the author focuses on how his daughter acquired her first verbs, and the role verbs played in her early grammatical development. The author argues that many of a child's first grammatical structures are tied to individual verbs, and that earliest language is based on general cognitive and social-cognitive processes, especially event structures and cultural learning.

First Verbs is a detailed diary study of one child's earliest language development during her second year of life. Using a Cognitive Linguistics framework, the author focuses on how his daughter acquired her first verbs, and the role verbs played in her early grammatical development. The author argues that many of a child's first grammatical structures are tied to individual verbs, and that earliest language is based on general cognitive and social-cognitive processes, especially event structures and cultural learning.

This volume focuses on how children acquire their early verbs. Verbs are an especially important part of the early lexicon because of the role they play in children's emerging grammatical competence. The contributors to this book investigate: children's earliest words for actions and events and the cognitive structures that might underlie them; and the possibility that the basic principles of word learning which apply in the case of nouns might also apply in the case of verbs, and the role of linguistic context, especially argument structure, in the acquisition of verbs.

This book, which gathers in one place the theories of 10 leading cognitive and functional linguists, represents a new approach that may define the next era in the history of psychology: It promises to give psychologists a new appreciation of what this variety of linguistics can offer their study of language and communication. In addition, it provides cognitive-functional linguists new models for presenting their work to audiences outside the boundaries of traditional linguistics. Thus, it serves as an excellent text for courses in psycholinguistics, and appeal to students and researchers in...

From the point of view of psychology and cognitive science, much of modern linguistics is too formal and mathematical to be of much use. The newly emerging approaches to language termed Functional and Cognitive Linguistics, however, are much less formally oriented. Instead, functional and cognitive approaches to language structure are typically couched in terms already familiar to cognitive scientists: perception, attention, conceptualization, meaning, symbols, categories, schemas, perspectives, discourse context, social interaction, and communicative goals. The account of human linguistic...

From the point of view of psychology and cognitive science, much of modern linguistics is too formal and mathematical to be of much use. The newly emerging approaches to language termed, "Functional and Cognitive Linguistics," however, are much less formally oriented. Instead, functional and cognitive approaches to language structure are typically couched in terms already familiar to cognitive scientists: perception, attention, conceptualization, meaning, symbols, categories, schemas, perspectives, discourse context, social interaction, and communicative goals. The account of human linguistic...

Beyond Nature-Nurture: Essays in Honor of Elizabeth Bates is a very special tribute to the University of California at San Diego psycholinguist, developmental psychologist, and cognitive scientist Elizabeth Ann Bates, who died on December 14, 2003 from pancreatic cancer. Liz was a force of nature; she was also a nurturing force, as is evidenced by this collaborative collection of chapters written by many of her closest colleagues and former students. The book covers a brilliant career of wide-ranging interdisciplinary interests, such as the brain bases of language in children and...

"The Gestural Communication of Apes and Monkeys" is an intriguing compilation of naturalistic and experimental research conducted over the course of 20 years on gestural communication in primates, as well as a comparison to what is known about the vocal communication of nonhuman primates. The editors also make systematic comparisons to the gestural communication of prelinguistic and just-linguistic human children. An enlightening exploration unfolds into what may represent the starting point for the evolution of human communication and language.
This especially significant read is...

The Gestural Communication of Apes and Monkeys is an intriguing compilation of naturalistic and experimental research conducted over the course of 20 years on gestural communication in primates, as well as a comparison to what is known about the vocal communication of nonhuman primates. The editors also make systematic comparisons to the gestural communication of prelinguistic and just-linguistic human children. An enlightening exploration unfolds into what may represent the starting point for the evolution of human communication and language.

This especially significant read is...

This collection brings together for students the essential readings from the broad and fast-moving field of child language development.