This document discusses emergentism in language acquisition. Emergentism posits that language develops through complex interactions between simple learning mechanisms when exposed to language data, rather than being predetermined by innate linguistic properties. The document provides examples of emergence in nature and discusses how neuroplasticity challenges the idea that language functions are fixed in the brain. Emergentists believe language develops dynamically through time-dependent interactions, and focus on the language acquisition process over final states. Connectionism is seen as a tool to explore how emergent properties arise from learning.

1. Emergentism in Nature.
Is language similar?

2. Nature & Emergentism
• MacWhinney (1998) has pointed out that nature is replete with
examples of emergence: "the form of beaches and mountain
ridges, the geometry of snowflakes and crystals, the movement
of the Gulf Stream; the hexagonal shape of cells in a
honeycomb, the pattern of stripes on a tiger, fingerprints….”
(Ellis, 1998, p. 643)

3. The Challenger!
• Neuroplasticity
challenges the
idea that brain
functions are
fixed in certain
locations.
• Emergentism
challenges the
Thus, given the properties idea that
of neuroplasticity, “it is hard to see how language is fixed
genetic information might prescribe rigid
representation of UG in the
like notions in
developing cortex.” (Ellis, 1998, p. 639) Universal
Grammar

4. Instead…
The brain may be functioning with language:
• Attainment of modularity may be the result of
learning and development of automaticity
(Elman et al, 1996)
• Proliferation of language areas including
Broca’s and Wernicke’s, in other words :
• Parts of the brain associated with language
are not exclusively designed for language use
“Not every difference is a difference in kind”
(Bates, at time in press found in Ellis, 1998)

5. What do Emergenists Believe?
• Language: dynamic, complex, non-linear
system where timing effects outcomes and
developments. (Ellis, 1998, p.
642) LIKE TRAFFIC!
• Simple learning mechanisms in perception,
motor-action and cognition when exposed to
language data ARE EAGER TO EXPLOIT the
functionality of language (p. 657)

6. What do Emergentists do?
• 1) substitute a process description for a state
description
2) study development rather than the final
state
3) and focus on the language acquisition
process (LAP) rater than the language
acquisition device (LAD)” p. 644
• “Look to connectionism because it provides a
set of computational tools for exploring the
conditions under which emergent properties
arise” p. 645

7. If not language, then idiolects?: Name that
Professor!
"What dat?"
"I have heard that some of you are fed the expletive up with group
work."
"Some questions are best answered over a glass of wine but that
one requires a double scotch."
"If I were Peter Shaw I would have all of us sit in a circle and talk
about how we feel. But I could never pull that off."
"It’s the Monterey Way."
"So, I am very curious to know what you think and how you
interpreted the grading system, and I would be happy to
incorporate that if other people also agree."

8. For additional information and
fun! (MacWhinney, 2006)
http://applij.oxfordjournals.org/content/27/4/729.full
• The TalkBank Project (http://talkbank.org) is now making
available several large databases on second language
learning. These databases include transcripts of learners’
written productions, as well as spoken productions linked to
audio and/or video.
• In addition, the CHILDES database (http://childes.psy.cmu.edu)
now includes 12 in-depth longitudinal studies of childhood
bilingualism, along with additional cross-sectional data
• Within the context of online courses in French and Chinese,
developed by the Pittsburgh Science of Learning Center (
http://learnlab.org) we are now able to track whole terms of
online student responses to vocabulary training, pinyin dictation
for Chinese, tone discrimination, sentence repetition, and other
methods for training second language skills