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The Infinite Gift: How Children Learn and Unlearn the Languages of the World
A child's very first word is a miraculous sound, the opening note in a lifelong symphony. Most parents never forget the moment. But that first word is soon followed by a second and a third, and by the age of three, children are typically learning ten new words every day and speaking in complete sentences. The process seems effortless, and for children, it is. But how exactly does it happen? How do children learn language? And why is it so much harder to do later in life? Drawing on cutting-edge developments in biology, neurology, psychology, and linguistics, Charles Yang's "The Infinite Gift" takes us inside the astonishingly complex but largely subconscious process by which children learn to talk and to understand the spoken word.
Yang illuminates the rich mysteries of language: why French newborns already prefer the sound of French to English; why baby-talk, though often unintelligible, makes perfect linguistic sense; why babies born deaf still babble -- but with their hands; why the grammars of some languages may be evolutionarily stronger than others; and why one of the brain's earliest achievements may in fact be its most complex.
Yang also puts forth an exciting new theory. Building on Noam Chomsky's notion of a universal grammar -- the idea that every human being is born with an intuitive grasp of grammar -- Yang argues that we learn our native languages in part by unlearning the grammars of all the rest.
This means that the next time you hear a child make a grammatical mistake, it may not be a mistake at all; his or her grammar may be perfectly correct in Chinese or Navajo or ancient Greek. This is the brain's way of testing its options as it searches for the local and thus correct grammar -- and then discards all the wrong ones.
And we humans, Yang shows, are not the only creatures who learn this way. In fact, learning by unlearning may be an ancient evolutionary mechanism that runs throughout the animal kingdom. Thus, babies learn to talk in much the same way that birds learn to sing.
Enlivened by Yang's experiences with his own young son, "The Infinite Gift" is as charming as it is challenging, as thoughtful as it is thought-provoking. An absorbing read for parents, educators, and anyone who has ever wondered about the origins of that uniquely human gift: our ability to speak and, just as miraculous, to understand one another.
Yang illuminates the rich mysteries of language: why French newborns already prefer the sound of French to English; why baby-talk, though often unintelligible, makes perfect linguistic sense; why babies born deaf still babble -- but with their hands; why the grammars of some languages may be evolutionarily stronger than others; and why one of the brain's earliest achievements may in fact be its most complex.
Yang also puts forth an exciting new theory. Building on Noam Chomsky's notion of a universal grammar -- the idea that every human being is born with an intuitive grasp of grammar -- Yang argues that we learn our native languages in part by unlearning the grammars of all the rest.
This means that the next time you hear a child make a grammatical mistake, it may not be a mistake at all; his or her grammar may be perfectly correct in Chinese or Navajo or ancient Greek. This is the brain's way of testing its options as it searches for the local and thus correct grammar -- and then discards all the wrong ones.
And we humans, Yang shows, are not the only creatures who learn this way. In fact, learning by unlearning may be an ancient evolutionary mechanism that runs throughout the animal kingdom. Thus, babies learn to talk in much the same way that birds learn to sing.
Enlivened by Yang's experiences with his own young son, "The Infinite Gift" is as charming as it is challenging, as thoughtful as it is thought-provoking. An absorbing read for parents, educators, and anyone who has ever wondered about the origins of that uniquely human gift: our ability to speak and, just as miraculous, to understand one another.
275 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2006
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September 10, 2014
Yang's book is interesting and provides a nice outline to language development, but I feel that some of his theoretical premises are not very well defended. The statement that children learn their first language(s) by unlearning all other languages is confusing, because the assertion he is actually making is that we are born with language parameters that are gradually "switched off" in order to leave us with the parameters for our first language(s). To be fair, I work in Construction Grammar, which has a different view of language acquisition, but I still feel that his assertion that a toddler learning English is "speaking" Chinese when they use Chinese word order with English words is an awkward argument.
Even supposing that we do have parameters for phonological and grammatical structures hard-wired in the brain, language involves a great deal more than just grammar and phonology - most of which is acquired in our environments.
It's a very readable book, and it's a reasonably coherent introduction to a Chomskyan view of first language acquisition, but it is presented as if it is the only theory of first language acquisition, which it is not. However, I did enjoy the book, even if I disagreed with his theoretical stance.
Even supposing that we do have parameters for phonological and grammatical structures hard-wired in the brain, language involves a great deal more than just grammar and phonology - most of which is acquired in our environments.
It's a very readable book, and it's a reasonably coherent introduction to a Chomskyan view of first language acquisition, but it is presented as if it is the only theory of first language acquisition, which it is not. However, I did enjoy the book, even if I disagreed with his theoretical stance.
October 1, 2015
Subtitle: "How Children Learn and Unlearn the Languages of the World". It's a book by a linguist, about linguistics, and the author cautions in the introduction that it is not intended specifically for parents of small children. Nonetheless, I think it may have helped me to understand why Juliet constantly referred to the cat as her dad when she was little.
The good thing about linguists who study how language is acquired, is they get to play with puppets a lot, and they get to confuse small children for a living. There are serious linguistic topics being investigated, but the real fun of the book is learning things like:
1) small children will talk to a puppet, when they won't talk to you
2) small children who won't answer your question because they're too shy, will gleefully shout out when Kermit the Frog gets the answer to that same question wrong, because it's always fun to point out when others are wrong
3) small children in a laboratory environment have a curious tendency to want to say "yes" to all questions, even if the self-same child is in the stage where they like to say "no" everywhere else. The author laments that even the researchers who are parents have not found a way to replicate this behavior outside the lab
4) small children who make grammatical errors themselves, will still often notice (and comment with disapproval) when you make the exact same errors back to them.
5) in some areas of Papua New Guinea, adults make a point of never talking to children too small to talk back. They talk in their presence all the time, of course, but they don't talk to them. These children learn how to talk just as early as any other group of people.
6) "motherese", the style of speech where adults use a softer, higher voice and simplify the sounds of words, does not appear to do anything to either speed up, or slow down, when children learn to speak.
7) in case you needed anyone to tell you this: kids understand what you're saying, way before they can say it themselves.
If you can deal with the too-frequent references to the Boston Red Sox, this is a fun read. The gist of it is that children start off with an instinct for all grammars, rather than none, and progressively "unlearn" all but the one that becomes their native language. In a similar fashion, they can distinguish all possible human language sounds, which means they are easily confused about which ones matter, and gradually learn to ignore the distinctions that don't matter for their native language (for example, Koreans learning to ignore the difference between "l" and "r"). It makes sense, even if it doesn't really change anything about how I will teach Juliet to talk. But if you've ever wondered "why is this so hard?" when learning a foreign language's grammar, it's fun to read a quick and light overview of what we know about how we learned the first one.
Oh, and about the fact that Juliet kept saying Julian (our male cat) was her dad:
Ok, actually she referred to the cat as "dada". I always responded to this by saying, "no, I'M 'dada', you are not actually a cat." Apparently this kind of thing is a normal error, and she was actually getting "cat" about 50% correct. The first sound has three distinct tricks involved: tongue near the back of the mouth, explosive burst of air, and not voiced (if it were voiced, it would be "g" instead of "k"). She was getting the explosive part right, so that's 1 for 3.
The "a" sound was right.
The "t" sound should be tongue near the front of the mouth, explosive burst of air, not voiced. She was getting the first two correct, but she was making the sound voiced, so it was "d" instead of "t". So 2 out of 3.
Multiply that out and add it up, and she's getting it half-right. Ok, there was an extra "a" at the end, but close enough. At least, she didn't actually think Cassandra cheated on me with Julian. So far as I know.
The good thing about linguists who study how language is acquired, is they get to play with puppets a lot, and they get to confuse small children for a living. There are serious linguistic topics being investigated, but the real fun of the book is learning things like:
1) small children will talk to a puppet, when they won't talk to you
2) small children who won't answer your question because they're too shy, will gleefully shout out when Kermit the Frog gets the answer to that same question wrong, because it's always fun to point out when others are wrong
3) small children in a laboratory environment have a curious tendency to want to say "yes" to all questions, even if the self-same child is in the stage where they like to say "no" everywhere else. The author laments that even the researchers who are parents have not found a way to replicate this behavior outside the lab
4) small children who make grammatical errors themselves, will still often notice (and comment with disapproval) when you make the exact same errors back to them.
5) in some areas of Papua New Guinea, adults make a point of never talking to children too small to talk back. They talk in their presence all the time, of course, but they don't talk to them. These children learn how to talk just as early as any other group of people.
6) "motherese", the style of speech where adults use a softer, higher voice and simplify the sounds of words, does not appear to do anything to either speed up, or slow down, when children learn to speak.
7) in case you needed anyone to tell you this: kids understand what you're saying, way before they can say it themselves.
If you can deal with the too-frequent references to the Boston Red Sox, this is a fun read. The gist of it is that children start off with an instinct for all grammars, rather than none, and progressively "unlearn" all but the one that becomes their native language. In a similar fashion, they can distinguish all possible human language sounds, which means they are easily confused about which ones matter, and gradually learn to ignore the distinctions that don't matter for their native language (for example, Koreans learning to ignore the difference between "l" and "r"). It makes sense, even if it doesn't really change anything about how I will teach Juliet to talk. But if you've ever wondered "why is this so hard?" when learning a foreign language's grammar, it's fun to read a quick and light overview of what we know about how we learned the first one.
Oh, and about the fact that Juliet kept saying Julian (our male cat) was her dad:
Ok, actually she referred to the cat as "dada". I always responded to this by saying, "no, I'M 'dada', you are not actually a cat." Apparently this kind of thing is a normal error, and she was actually getting "cat" about 50% correct. The first sound has three distinct tricks involved: tongue near the back of the mouth, explosive burst of air, and not voiced (if it were voiced, it would be "g" instead of "k"). She was getting the explosive part right, so that's 1 for 3.
The "a" sound was right.
The "t" sound should be tongue near the front of the mouth, explosive burst of air, not voiced. She was getting the first two correct, but she was making the sound voiced, so it was "d" instead of "t". So 2 out of 3.
Multiply that out and add it up, and she's getting it half-right. Ok, there was an extra "a" at the end, but close enough. At least, she didn't actually think Cassandra cheated on me with Julian. So far as I know.
March 27, 2017
I'm sorry but this book was so unnecessary.
February 18, 2009
I was looking for a book focused on child learning. This book was actually more like an intro to linguistics with a child-learning slant. I did learn some more things about child language acquisition, but mainly I got to get Yang's version of the story of modern linguistics.
If you're looking for a first text, Pinker's books are certainly more engaging and better written, but I do have a fondness for Yang's writing, and he doesn't have any crackpot theories of his own to advance (like Pinker's crazy-ass reading of "could care less"). The one theory of his own Yang pushes here is his variant on the parameter theory of language, and I think it's a reasonable and interesting one.
So, overall, a pretty good read. If I were a parent interested in learning the basics of linguistics, I'd go with this book. If you're like me and you've already read a lot of popular linguistics materials, you might do well to sit this one out. The one place he goes substantially deeper than Pinker is in the parametric theory of language. If I were choosing between this book and the "Atom of Language" book that's out there on the parameter theory, I'd choose Yang's -- there's a good bit of material that was confusingly presented in the "Atom" book that was made much clearer here (though I did learn a lot about Mohawk from the other book...)
If you're looking for a first text, Pinker's books are certainly more engaging and better written, but I do have a fondness for Yang's writing, and he doesn't have any crackpot theories of his own to advance (like Pinker's crazy-ass reading of "could care less"). The one theory of his own Yang pushes here is his variant on the parameter theory of language, and I think it's a reasonable and interesting one.
So, overall, a pretty good read. If I were a parent interested in learning the basics of linguistics, I'd go with this book. If you're like me and you've already read a lot of popular linguistics materials, you might do well to sit this one out. The one place he goes substantially deeper than Pinker is in the parametric theory of language. If I were choosing between this book and the "Atom of Language" book that's out there on the parameter theory, I'd choose Yang's -- there's a good bit of material that was confusingly presented in the "Atom" book that was made much clearer here (though I did learn a lot about Mohawk from the other book...)
February 6, 2017
It was a decent introduction to some modern theories of language acquisition, but I think it lost focus on the main topic near the end, with the sudden shift to historical linguistics. I would certainly recommend this as a primer for those wishing to know more about linguistics.
August 31, 2023
Ik vond dit een erg goed boek! Het boek was voor mij grotendeels een herhaling van het vak language development (ook aangeraden door een docent van dit vak). Hoofdstuk 1 t/m 6 gingen vooral over de verwerving en vroege ontwikkeling van taal (daarom wel een beegje geskimmed). Hoofdstuk 7 en 8 waren het interessants wat mij betreft. De schrijver nam hier afslagen naar theoretical linguistics, biolinguistics en sociolinguistics om de maatschappelijke gedachte/vraagstuk van taalsuperieuriteit te beantwoorden. Superinteressant!
August 2, 2020
Informative, insightful and well explained.
Being able to write about language acquisition, universal grammar and cognition is difficult in itself, to do it clearly is even harder.
For me, a deeper regard would have been nice.
Nevertheless, a book to read with a highlighter in hand.
Being able to write about language acquisition, universal grammar and cognition is difficult in itself, to do it clearly is even harder.
For me, a deeper regard would have been nice.
Nevertheless, a book to read with a highlighter in hand.
April 22, 2024
This book was basically the same information (presented in less detail) as my freshman level linguistics class. Perhaps the most interesting part concerned The Superiority of the German Language. However the books final argument and conclusion seemed to come out of nowhere. Much like a textbook.
September 5, 2022
Friendly and cool
June 1, 2020
I think Dr. Yang did a great job explaining things in this book, it was very comprehensive and his use of real-world examples makes the material much easier to digest. However, I feel like it got very dense around the middle and focuses more on historical linguistics than language acquisition. The beginning of the book is very interesting and I still would read it again, but for those who are not interested in this field, you should probably steer clear of this book.
June 16, 2010
You'd think I'd learn by now to not judge a book by its cover. Well that's what happened here. I looked at the poorly designed (though what I would find later to be sensible) cover art and dismissed the book as another work shat out by a linguist looking to publish. What I found was a very well written book by a very good and thoughtful linguist who-- as far as I can tell with my basic understandings of linguistics- competently describes hypotheses drawn from observations on children language learning "mistakes" (the opening and very interesting 1st few chapters of the book) and then, applying modern mathematics and biological concepts, discusses inferences of the interplay between an internalized universal grammar and languages in the real world.
A very interesting read but pretty dense if you're not into it.
Recommended.
From the back cover, the always serious N. Chompsky:
"Yang conducts the reader skillfully on a highly instructive and quite delightful guided tour from the feats of infants that charm every parent and pose extremely difficult scientific problems, through the course of language development, and on to the roots of language variation. At every stage, the exposition is based on easy familiarity with the current state of understanding in disciplines ranging from biology to linguistics, and at the same time lucid and engaging. It's an impressive achievement, which should prove most valuable to anyone fascinated by these core elements of human nature and capacities."
A very interesting read but pretty dense if you're not into it.
Recommended.
From the back cover, the always serious N. Chompsky:
"Yang conducts the reader skillfully on a highly instructive and quite delightful guided tour from the feats of infants that charm every parent and pose extremely difficult scientific problems, through the course of language development, and on to the roots of language variation. At every stage, the exposition is based on easy familiarity with the current state of understanding in disciplines ranging from biology to linguistics, and at the same time lucid and engaging. It's an impressive achievement, which should prove most valuable to anyone fascinated by these core elements of human nature and capacities."
July 26, 2013
The book interprets the current research on language acquisition for the non-academic. There is a lot of meat here. While it's presented in a very readable way, it is not for the casual reader.
It gave me a better understanding of how grammar as an organizing concept plays out in first language development and once established provides impediments to learning subsequent languages.
For someone interested in languages, there is a lot of food for thought, such as the compounding of words in Eskimo and that the vowel shift that we see in the US is also observable in the speeches of Queen Elizabeth II.
The last chapter on the superiority of the German language was lost me. As a non academic, I don't have the tools to refute the thesis. It would seem, though, that even on the hypothetical desert island, to predict the surviving language, more variables than grammar should enter into the equation. English (a grammatical child of German) did survive Latin and French on the Islands of Great Britain. I'd be interested in a discussion of the commonly considered factors (adaptivity, King Alfred, literature, etc) against grammar.
It gave me a better understanding of how grammar as an organizing concept plays out in first language development and once established provides impediments to learning subsequent languages.
For someone interested in languages, there is a lot of food for thought, such as the compounding of words in Eskimo and that the vowel shift that we see in the US is also observable in the speeches of Queen Elizabeth II.
The last chapter on the superiority of the German language was lost me. As a non academic, I don't have the tools to refute the thesis. It would seem, though, that even on the hypothetical desert island, to predict the surviving language, more variables than grammar should enter into the equation. English (a grammatical child of German) did survive Latin and French on the Islands of Great Britain. I'd be interested in a discussion of the commonly considered factors (adaptivity, King Alfred, literature, etc) against grammar.
May 12, 2015
This seemed an excellent introduction to the acquisition of language and the similarities and differences ("parameters") among languages and language families. I appreciate the author making this information available to non-linguists.
There was one choice the author made that disturbed me, which was, to put it kindly, a "cheap shot." He chose to use the former US President as exemplifying ungrammatical speech. But it was the word he used in describing President Bush that was unconscionable.
I began thinking about why he might do this: Was this for reader-identification? Did Yang assume his readers have only disdain for George W. Bush and would get a good, if mean, laugh out of his dig? Does he, as a corollary, also believe that conservatives/Republicans/political mavericks never read books written by academics, or any 'intellectually stimulating' literature? That only people of a certain political worldview are smart?
I read on, and obviously felt the book was quite worthwhile, but word choice does matter (and in such a book, surely!) and insults degrade the professionalism of the author more than the intended object.
There was one choice the author made that disturbed me, which was, to put it kindly, a "cheap shot." He chose to use the former US President as exemplifying ungrammatical speech. But it was the word he used in describing President Bush that was unconscionable.
I began thinking about why he might do this: Was this for reader-identification? Did Yang assume his readers have only disdain for George W. Bush and would get a good, if mean, laugh out of his dig? Does he, as a corollary, also believe that conservatives/Republicans/political mavericks never read books written by academics, or any 'intellectually stimulating' literature? That only people of a certain political worldview are smart?
I read on, and obviously felt the book was quite worthwhile, but word choice does matter (and in such a book, surely!) and insults degrade the professionalism of the author more than the intended object.
December 26, 2012
This was the first book in the discipline that I read with the explicit desire to find references. Certainly I found a lot of those in the course of reading, but more than that I gained a new appreciation for the work of linguists and of the field in general. Yang presents a very elegant refinement of Chomsky's theory of parameters, using biology, probability, and all sorts of Kathy things that I don't understand, coupled with good ol' corpus data, experiments, and examples from his son "Wussel" (look at his cute inability to form rhotics!) For me, it has sparked a new question (and hypothesis) regarding the grammars of individuals who grew up in bilingual (or near bilingual) environments. While a lot of the material presented in the book seemed like review, it nonetheless is information provided in an interesting and informative way, removed from the jargon found perhaps in his more academic papers. Besides being a good read, this book was also a lesson in asking interesting questions and answering them in a logical manner.
Looks like I have a new linguist to fanboy over. :)
Looks like I have a new linguist to fanboy over. :)
July 13, 2015
This book was written with the intention to be readable by all, linguists and non-linguists alike. The first few chapters do manage to be quite inviting, but then it gets rather dense. Yang makes up for it with jokes and metaphors, and they’re much welcomed even if sometimes I wasn’t quite on board with his witty remarks and comparisons (enough with Microsoft Windows vs. Mac!). For me reading this was more akin to leisurely reading than reading-for-school, even though I was doing the latter.
Recommended for anyone with an interest in language learning and psycholinguistics, but keep in mind that you do have to be on board with biological and innate views on the acquisition of language.
Recommended for anyone with an interest in language learning and psycholinguistics, but keep in mind that you do have to be on board with biological and innate views on the acquisition of language.
February 27, 2012
Yang's explanation of children's acquisition of language was fascinating. The latter half of the book might have been fascinating, too, but for two things. First, he hammered the evolution drum so hard that he broke the drum sticks. Second, I shouldn't have tried reading it when I had insomnia. Latter chapters cured that well.
July 13, 2011
Want to know how language develops without getting too technical? Read this book! The technical stuff is there, but easy to understand, and Yang uses his son to illustrate different phases of development.
September 14, 2008
we all speak Chinese as children
December 12, 2014
The chapter about language change seems most interesting, though its link to language acquisition is ambiguous.
April 15, 2017
Language acquisition 101
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews