# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
FEW disciplines are so strongly associated with a single figure: Einstein in physics and Freud in psychology, perhaps. But Noam Chomsky is the man who revolutionised linguistics. Since he wrote "Syntactic Structures" in 1957, Mr Chomsky has argued that human language is fundamentally different from any other kind of communication, that a "linguist from Mars" would agree that all human languages are variations on a single language, and that children's incredibly quick and successful learning (despite often messy and inattentive parental input) points to an innate language faculty in the brain. These ideas are now widely accepted.

Over the past 60 years, Mr Chomsky has repeatedly stripped down his theory. Some aspects of human language are shared with animals, and others are part of more general human thinking. He has focused ever more narrowly on the features of language that he reckons are unique to humans. All this has led to a remarkable little book, published late last year with Robert Berwick, a computer scientist. "Why Only Us" purports to explain the evolution of human language.

Other biologists, linguists and psychologists have probed the same question and have reached little consensus. But there is even less consensus around the world's most eminent linguist's idea: that a single genetic mutation created an ability called "Merge", in a single human whom Mr Chomsky has called "Prometheus", some time before the human exodus from Africa. That mutation was so advantageous that it survived and thrived, producing today's 7,000 languages from Albanian to Zulu. But the vast differences among the world's languages, Mr Chomsky argues, are mere differences in "externalisation". The key is Merge.

But what is it? Merge simply says that two mental objects can be merged into a bigger one, and mental operations can be performed on that as if it were a single one. The can be merged with cat to give a noun phrase, which other grammar rules can operate on as if it were a bare noun like water. So can the and hat. Once there, you can further merge, making the cat in the hat. The cat in the hat can be merged with a verb phrase to create a new object, a sentence: The cat in the hat came back. And that sentence can be merged into bigger sentences: You think the cat in the hat came back. And so on.

Why would this be of any use? No one else had Merge. Whom did Prometheus talk to? Nobody, at least not using Merge. (Humans may already have been using cries and gestures, as many animals do.) But Merge-enabled, hierarchically structured language, according to Mr Chomsky, did not evolve for talking at all. Rather, it let Prometheus take simple concepts and combine them in sentence-like ways in his own head. The resulting complex thoughts gave him a survival advantage. If he then passed the mutant Merge gene on to several surviving children, who thrived and passed on the Merge gene to their children, Messrs Chomsky and Berwick believe that they must have then come to dominate the population of humans in Africa. Only later, as Merge came to work with the vocal and hearing organs, did human language emerge.

Many scholars find this to be somewhere between insufficient, improbable and preposterous. The emergence of a single mutation that gives such a big advantage is derided by biologists as a "hopeful monster" theory; most evolution is gradual, operating on many genes, not one. Some ability like Merge may exist, but this does not explain why some words may merge and others don't, much less why the world's languages merge so differently. (Not a single non-English example appears in "Why Only Us", nor a single foreign language in its index.)

Mr Chomsky says those who disagree with his ever-more contentious ideas are either blind or hucksters. Critics refer to a "cult" of "acolytes" around a "Great Leader", unwilling to challenge him or engage seriously with the work of non-Chomskyan scholars. (One critic has said "to be savaged by Chomsky is a badge of honour.") Linguistics is now divided into a Chomskyan camp, a large number of critics and many more still for whom the founder of the modern discipline is simply irrelevant. He is unlikely to end up like Freud, a marginal figure in modern psychology whose lasting influence has been on the humanities. Mr Chomsky's career is more likely to end up like Einstein's-at least in the sense that his best and most influential work came early on.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
FEW disciplines are so strongly associated with a single figure: Einstein in physics and Freud in psychology, perhaps. But Noam Chomsky is the man who revolutionised linguistics.

# data[].attributes.body
To log in to e-mag:
User Name: hncemag2015
Password: emag2015

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
EMC Child Language Acquisition - an Introduction to the Main Theories

# data[].attributes.body
The Guardian

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The vocabulary of children from the poorest backgrounds lags more than a year behind that of their classmates from richer homes by the time they start school, a major new study showed today.

The Sutton Trust, the charity which sponsored the research, said the divide was a "tragic indictment of modern society", showing how educational inequality starts young and leaves children from the most disadvantaged homes struggling to keep up throughout their school years.

The poorest children face multiple challenges, being less likely to be born to well-educated parents, have a regular bedtime or live with both their biological father and mother, the study found. However, it also concluded that "good parenting can triumph", with families able to limit the effects of poverty by, for example, reading to their children daily.

Researchers from Bristol and Columbia universities analysed the performance of a representative sample of 12,644 British five-year-olds in a "naming vocabulary test" during 2006 and 2007. They then produced a "developmental age" score for each child, comparing their test results to the average achieved in the study.

The gap between rich and poor children, and even between middle-income and poor, was striking. Those from the poorest 20% of homes, where household annual incomes averaged £10,300 before tax, had an average developmental age of 53.6 months. The comparable figure for those from middle-income families, on around £30,000 a year, was 64.6 months, or 11 months ahead. Children from families in the richest 20% , on around £80,000, reached a development age of 69.8, a further five months ahead. Income itself accounted for only around a third of the differences in test scores, with some 48% caused by differences in parenting between the income groups.

Reading to a child every day was found to improve performance in the test - among children in the same income group, it raised scores by around two months - while regular library visits improved performance by 2.5 months. But only 45% of children from the poorest fifth of families were read to daily at the age of three, the study found, compared to 78% among the richest fifth.

More than a third of children from the poorest fifth of families were born to parents without a single GCSE A-C grade, while four in five of the richest families had at least one parent educated to degree level.

Some two thirds of children in the poorest income group did not live with both biological parents, compared to only one in 10 in middle-income families. Sir Peter Lampl, chairman of the Sutton Trust, said: "These findings are at once both shocking and encouraging, revealing the stark educational disadvantage experienced by children from poorer homes before they have even stepped into the school classroom, but also the potential for good parenting to overcome some of the negative impacts that poverty can have on children's early development."

The trust is now urging the government to abandon its plans to increase the amount of free nursery education it offers to all three-and-four-year-olds from 12.5 hours to 15 hours a week this year. Instead, it should provide 25 hours a week of education to the 15% most disadvantaged families. The trust also wants improvements in parenting classes for poorer families.

The children's minister, Delyth Morgan, said: "A huge amount has happened in recent years and it's a shame the Sutton Trust fails to reflect much of this. Many of its key recommendations have already been addressed. While there is much more to do, the gap between rich and poor in early years is closing, with the lowest-achieving children not only keeping pace but improving faster than the rest."
Topics

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Poor children a year behind in language skills

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The vocabulary of children from the poorest backgrounds lags more than a year behind that of their classmates from richer homes by the time they start school, a major new study showed today.

# data[].attributes.headline
Why do many young children lack  basic language skills?

# data[].attributes.subject
Why do many young children lack  basic language skills?

# data[].attributes.body
National Literacy Trust

# data[].attributes.body
CLA

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.entities[].name
Secret Life Of The Manic Depressive Part

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Planet Word DVD - http://amzn.to/1C33p2t Planet Word Hardcover - http://amzn.to/1y6rbtC Stephen Fry discusses his five-part BBC series. Fry's Planet Word is an exploration of language in all its forms: from cutting edge linguistic research to the glories of world literature.

# data[].attributes.body
HNCTV: Feral Children

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Welcome to HNCtv the complete media management solution. Please enter your username and password.

# data[].attributes.headline
Begin this section by watching: Baby It's You & Why Do We Talk 

# data[].attributes.subject
Begin this section by watching: Baby It's You & Why Do We Talk 

# data[].attributes.body
You will need to log into HNCTV. Use your college sign in details.

# data[].attributes.headline
‘It’s Sleep Time’ - Children’s Routines and the Language of Bedtime (CLA)

# data[].attributes.subject
‘It’s Sleep Time’ - Children’s Routines and the Language of Bedtime (CLA)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.headline
Delving into the emag Archives: Child Language Acquisition

# data[].attributes.subject
Delving into the emag Archives: Child Language Acquisition

# data[].attributes.body
Helpful Guide to find CLA articles in EMag.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.headline
Louise’s talk - acquiring the language of children (CLA)

# data[].attributes.subject
Louise’s talk - acquiring the language of children (CLA)

# data[].attributes.body
Technonanny

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.headline
Technonanny - language acquisition in older children (CLA)

# data[].attributes.subject
Technonanny - language acquisition in older children (CLA)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.headline
Child Language Acquisition - Sentence Structure and Pragmatics (CLA)

# data[].attributes.subject
Child Language Acquisition - Sentence Structure and Pragmatics (CLA)

# data[].attributes.body
Dan Clayton

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.headline
What Comes Before Words? – the Beginnings of Language Development

# data[].attributes.subject
What Comes Before Words? – the Beginnings of Language Development

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.headline
Child Language Acquisition - Early Language Development Over 18 Months (CLA)

# data[].attributes.subject
Child Language Acquisition - Early Language Development Over 18 Months (CLA)

# data[].attributes.body
Dan Clayton

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
All subscriptions run to the UK academic year (1st September to 31st August), regardless of when you subscribe during the year. Your first print issue of this subscription period is September 2020. Your online access will continue until 31st August 2021.

This subscription costs £110.00. It includes:

1 x print magazine, four times a year (September, mid-December, late February, late April)
Accessing the subscription website

If you are a new subscriber to the website package, follow the instructions to set your magazine username and password as soon as you have placed your order in order to get immediate access to the online subscription content.

If you are renewing an active subscription, please make sure you buy the subscription via the school user account used to set up the magazine logins last year. This will allow you to keep the same magazine username and password.

If you are a finance officer buying on behalf of the English department or library, please let us know the email address of the teacher/librarian who manages the magazine subscription. (You will be prompted to do this at checkout.)

Order this subscription package by selecting 'Web & Print (UK)' in the dropdown above and adding to your basket. Web & 2 x Print Subscription for UK Schools
All subscriptions run to the UK academic year (1st September to 31st August), regardless of when you subscribe during the year. Your first print issue of this subscription period is September 2020. Your online access will continue until 31st August 2021.

This subscription costs £130.00. It includes:

2 x print copies of each issue, four times a year (September, mid-December, late February, late April)
Accessing the subscription website

If you are a new subscriber to the website package, follow the instructions to set your magazine username and password as soon as you have placed your order in order to get immediate access to the online subscription content.

If you are renewing an active subscription, please make sure you buy the subscription via the school user account used to set up the magazine logins last year. This will allow you to keep the same magazine username and password.

If you are a finance officer buying on behalf of the English department or library, please let us know the email address of the teacher/librarian who manages the magazine subscription. (You will be prompted to do this at checkout.)

Order this subscription package by selecting 'Web & 2 x Print (UK)' in the dropdown above and adding to your basket. Web & 5 x Print Subscription for UK Schools
All subscriptions run to the UK academic year (1st September to 31st August), regardless of when you subscribe during the year. Your first print issue of this subscription period is September 2020. Your online access will continue until 31st August 2021.

This subscription costs £180.00. It includes:

5 x print copies of each issue, four times a year (September, mid-December, late February, late April)
Accessing the subscription website

If you are a new subscriber to the website package, follow the instructions to set your magazine username and password as soon as you have placed your order in order to get immediate access to the online subscription content.

If you are renewing an active subscription, please make sure you buy the subscription via the school user account used to set up the magazine logins last year. This will allow you to keep the same magazine username and password.

If you are a finance officer buying on behalf of the English department or library, please let us know the email address of the teacher/librarian who manages the magazine subscription. (You will be prompted to do this at checkout.)

Order this subscription package by selecting 'Web & 5 x Print (UK)' in the dropdown above and adding to your basket. Print Only Subscription for UK Schools
All subscriptions run to the UK academic year (1st September to 31st August), regardless of when you subscribe during the year. Your first print issue of this subscription period is September 2020.

This subscription costs £45.00. It includes:

1 x print magazine, four times a year (September, mid-December, late February, late April).

Order this subscription package by selecting 'Print Only (UK)' in the dropdown above and adding to your basket.
Print Only Subscription x 2 for UK Schools
All subscriptions run to the UK academic year (1st September to 31st August), regardless of when you subscribe during the year. Your will first print issue of this subscription period is September 2020.

This subscription costs £65.00. It includes:

2 x print copy of the magazine, four times a year (September, mid-December, late February, late April).
Order this subscription package by selecting 'Print Only x 2 (UK)' in the dropdown above and adding to your basket. Web+PDF Subscription for Overseas Schools Only
All subscriptions run to the UK academic year (1st September to 31st August), regardless of when you subscribe during the year. Your online access will continue until 31st August 2021.

This subscription costs £85. It includes:
Accessing the subscription website

If you are a new subscriber to the website package, follow the instructions to set your magazine username and password as soon as you have placed your order in order to get immediate access to the online subscription content.

If you are renewing an active subscription, please make sure you buy the subscription via the school user account used to set up the magazine logins last year. This will allow you to keep the same magazine username and password.

If you are a finance officer buying on behalf of the English department or library, please let us know the email address of the teacher/librarian who manages the magazine subscription. (You will be prompted to do this at checkout.)

Order this subscription package by selecting 'Web & PDF (Overseas)' in the dropdown above and adding to your basket.
' emagazine is an invaluable resource, providing our students with an unintimidating route into exploring literary criticism. The texts and ideas explored are of direct relevance to their exams and the essays often help them form their own alternative readings of these texts.'
Rose Page, Woking College
' emagazine is perfectly pitched at just above my A Level students understanding of texts and therefore being both accessible and a lovely 'stretch' of their understanding of literature. Additionally in terms of promoting independence for coursework and research tasks it is great to be able to give students access to an online resource which they can navigate freely and research the texts they are interested in. I know after reading emagazine articles students will be better informed and have ideas ready to bring back to class.'
Grainne McNeill, Morpeth School
'highly recommended in the transition from school to university study'
Dr Emma Smith, Hertford College, University of Oxford
' emag really helped me think beyond the course and refreshed the material we were learning in the classroom'
Sherene, Year 13
'For anyone thinking of applying to read English at university it is indispensable.'
Professor John Mullan, UCL
' emagazine has been an invaluable resource in finding accessible critical analysis on works I've studied at college, as well as widening my awareness of other interesting pieces of literature. I looked forward to the magazine arriving in the college library, as sitting down to read it was educationally enriching, without me feeling that I had to wade through the words on the page in order to understand them.'
Maya Little, A Level student
'I find emag more interesting than other magazines aimed at A Level students because of its freshness; it ventures away from the confines of exam specs without losing its relevance and usefulness.'
Yi Wen Hon, A Level student

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
All subscriptions run to the UK academic year (1st September to 31st August), regardless of when you subscribe during the year. Your first print issue of this subscription period is September 2020. Your online access will continue until 31st August 2021. This subscription costs £110.00.

# data[].attributes.headline
Doing What Comes Naturally – Leonie Speaking (CLA)

# data[].attributes.subject
Doing What Comes Naturally – Leonie Speaking (CLA)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.headline
Learning about Language Acquisition – How the Language 0-5 Project Is Helping Us Find Out (CLA)

# data[].attributes.subject
Learning about Language Acquisition – How the Language 0-5 Project Is Helping Us Find Out (CLA)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.headline
Language acquisition - Steven Pinker’s Words and Rules (CLA)

# data[].attributes.subject
Language acquisition - Steven Pinker’s Words and Rules (CLA)

# data[].attributes.body
John Shuttleworth discusses Steven Pinker's Words and Rules.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English & Media Centre | English and Media Centre

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English and Media Centre (EMC) is an educational charity providing CPD and innovative & award-winning teaching materials to secondary English & Media teachers

# data[].attributes.body
HNCTV: Language

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Welcome to HNCtv the complete media management solution. Please enter your username and password.

# data[].attributes.body
HNCTV

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Welcome to HNCtv the complete media management solution. Please enter your username and password.