- "Language acquisition is the process by which humans acquire the capacity to perceive and comprehend language, as well as to produce and use words and sentences to communicate."
The study of how human beings acquire and learn languages, including first and second language acquisition.
Bilingualism: This topic explores the acquisition of two languages by an individual or a community.
First Language Acquisition: This topic considers how children develop their first language, and how their language use changes as they mature.
Second Language Acquisition: This topic examines how individuals learn a second language or additional languages.
Sociolinguistics: This topic deals with the social aspects of language use, particularly how language use varies depending on social context and how individuals use language to reflect their social identity.
Language Teaching Methodology: This topic involves understanding the methods and techniques for teaching languages to learners.
Pragmatics: This topic examines how language is used in context and how language use relates to social interaction.
Psycholinguistics: This topic deals with the psychological processes involved in language acquisition and production, including memory, perception, language comprehension, and language production.
Phonetics and Phonology: These topics focus on the sounds of language, including how they are produced and how they are used to convey meaning.
Morphology and Syntax: These topics examine how words are formed and how these words are combined to create meaningful sentences.
Discourse Analysis: This topic explores the organization and structure of larger stretches of language, such as conversations and written texts.
Language Learning Strategies: This topic examines the various strategies and methods that learners use to acquire a new language.
Language Processing: This topic considers the cognitive processes involved in understanding and communicating language, including comprehension, memory, and problem-solving.
Language Development: This topic explores how language changes over time, both in terms of individual development and in terms of the evolution of language structures over time.
Neurolinguistics: This topic studies the neural basis of language processing, including how different brain regions support language processing, and how brain damage can affect language use.
Corpus Linguistics: This topic involves the use of large-scale language databases, known as corpora, to study language patterns and usage.
First language acquisition: This type of language acquisition refers to the process through which children learn their native language(s) in the first few years of their life, without any formal instruction.
Second language acquisition: It is the process of learning a second language after learning the first language. This is often influenced by a learner's motivation, age, innate language ability, social context, and exposure to the target language.
Bilingual acquisition: It is the process of learning two languages simultaneously or in succession, beginning at an early age. The way this process is acquired, and how proficient the individual becomes in both languages, varies based on age of learning, the language background of the learner, and the amount and quality of input in each language.
Sequential bilingual acquisition: This type of language acquisition occurs when a child learns one language at home, and then later begins to acquire a different language in an educational or social environment outside of the home.
Third language acquisition: This type of language acquisition occurs when a person learns a third or subsequent language after already acquiring two or more languages.
Heritage language acquisition: It refers to the acquisition of a language other than the majority language of the society, by a person who is a member of a linguistically and culturally diverse community.
Immigrant language acquisition: It involves the acquisition of a new language by an individual who has migrated to a new country and must learn the language of the new country to communicate effectively.
Language attrition: This occurs when an individual's existing language abilities weaken or erode as a result of reduced exposure to or use of the language.
Sign language acquisition: This type of language acquisition refers to the process by which people learn natural sign languages, which are visual-gestural languages used by deaf individuals.
Simultaneous bilingual acquisition: This occurs when a child is exposed to two languages from birth, and begins to learn both at the same time.
Language revitalization and maintenance: This involves efforts to revive or maintain a language that is in danger of being lost, by encouraging its use and teaching it to new generations.
Foreign language acquisition: It refers to the process of learning a language that is not spoken in the learner's native country or community, often for purposes such as education, travel, or business.
- "The capacity to use language successfully requires one to acquire a range of tools including phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and an extensive vocabulary."
- "Human language capacity is represented in the brain."
- "Even though human language capacity is finite, one can say and understand an infinite number of sentences, which is based on a syntactic principle called recursion."
- "These three mechanisms are: relativization, complementation, and coordination."
- "Speech perception always precedes speech production, and the gradually evolving system by which a child learns a language is built up one step at a time."
- "The distinction between individual phonemes is the initial step in language acquisition."
- "Language acquisition usually refers to first-language acquisition, which studies infants' acquisition of their native language, whether that be spoken language or signed language."
- "It refers to an infant's simultaneous acquisition of two native languages."
- "First-language acquisition deals with the acquisition of the native language, while second-language acquisition involves acquiring additional languages."
- "In addition to speech, reading, and writing a language with an entirely different script compounds the complexities of true foreign language literacy."
- "Linguists who are interested in child language acquisition have for many years questioned how language is acquired."
- "The question of how these structures are acquired, then, is more properly understood as the question of how a learner takes the surface forms in the input and converts them into abstract linguistic rules and representations."
- "Language acquisition involves structures, rules, and representation."
- "Language can be vocalized as in speech, or manual as in sign."
- "Language acquisition involves acquiring phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and an extensive vocabulary."
- "Even though human language capacity is finite, one can say and understand an infinite number of sentences."
- "These three mechanisms are: relativization, complementation, and coordination."
- "Speech perception always precedes speech production in first-language acquisition."
- "Language acquisition is one of the quintessential human traits."