Presentation and Review of four (4) books in the fields of linguistics – Review of the books in terms of their context, their target audience and their contribution in the field of linguistics – Comparison and contrast of each book’s powerful elements and its weaknesses if any detected
[The author’s name]
Abstract
This paper will present you with a review on each one four books in the field of linguistics. The books which have been chosen are ‘Aspects of the Theory of Syntax’ written by Noam Tsomsky in 1965, ‘The World’s Major Languages’ written by Comrie Bernard in 1987, ‘The Cambridge Handbook of Phonology’ written in 2007 and edited by Paul De Lacy, and ‘The Development of Languages’ written by Jean Berko Gleason and Nan Bernstein Ratner and published in 2012. The criteria upon which these books have been chosen is their impact on the writer of this essay and the interest they are witnessed to have provoked upon the date of their publication and their entering the academic field of linguists. The essay will present you with a short description of their context. It will focus on their contribution to the field of linguistics since this is the field which they represent and it will highlight both their positive elements and their negative aspects if any are to be found. In addition, notice should be paid to the fact that these books will by no means be compared between them since each one of them is on a different aspect of linguistics, thus enlightening a different aspect of research findings in the field of linguistics. All books are considered equal as far as their contribution to their field is concerned since they serve corresponding but different aspects of their common field.
Key Words: language, syntax, phonology, development, language acquisition
Presentation and Review of four (4) books in the fields of linguistics – Review of the books in terms of their context, their target audience and their contribution in the field of linguistics – Comparison and contrast of each book’s powerful elements and its weaknesses if any detected
Noam Chomsky is considered to be the father of linguistics as an academic, scientific field. It was in the 1950s when Chomsky approached with his first book ‘Syntactic Structures’ the issue of language as a concept which cannot be researched without taking into consideration its socio-cultural context within which it is developed. Chomsky actually depicted the need for common rules and regulations to be applied on the use of language so that the basic structure of language, that is efficient communication, can be achieved.
The ideas and first theories on the syntax of language are presented in more details and a more evolutionary way in his second book ‘Aspects of the Theory of Syntax’. In this book Chomsky comes back to enlighten all these aspects which had been presented in short in his first book. What Chomsky supports in this book is what has come to be the foundation in the research performed in the field of linguistics ever since.
Chomsky (1965) presents his own theory on the context within which each researcher of linguistics ought to perform and function as a researcher ‘Linguistic theory is concerned primarily with an ideal speaker-listener, in a completely homogeneous speech-community, who knows its language perfectly and is unaffected by such grammatically irrelevant conditions as memory limitations, distractions, shifts of attention and interest, and errors (random or characteristic) in applying his knowledge of the language in actual performance." Chomsky (1965) goes on to present his target audience who are all those interested in the function of language and research in the field of linguistics with one of the most important distinctions ever made in the field of linguistics.
He emphasizes that there is a great difference between the ‘competence’ and the ‘performance’. Chomsky (1965) explains that what a person knows, what one has acquired as his / her language background is long way far from his / her ‘performance’, which is the way that this knowledgeable background will be used and expressed by the speaker according to the socio-cultural context within which he / she will be asked to use the language. Chomsky (1965) in the third (3rd), fourth (4th) and fifth (5th) chapters of his book emphasizes that a speaker’s competence is an on-going process which requires specific grammar rules if it is to be helped so that this on-going procedure proves to be naturally productive. Chomsky’s summary on the use and benefits of grammar is given (‘Aspects of the Theory of Syntax’, 1965, p.141) like ‘A grammar contains a syntactic component, a semantic component and a phonological componentThe syntactic component consists of a base and a transformational component. The base, in turn, consists of a categorial subcomponent and a lexicon. The base generates deep structures. A deep structure enters the semantic component and receives a semantic interpretation; it is mapped by transformational rules into a surface structure, which is then given a phonetic interpretation by the rules of the phonological component.’ So Chomsky clarifies the difference between the semantic and the phonetic meanings and symbol.
The innovation of this book lies into the fact that it is the first time that language is examined under syntactic rules revealing thus its power of being transformed and multi interpreted according to its structure rules.
Thus the contribution of this book of Chomsky to the field of linguistics is of great significance since this book underlies that the structure of language is a structure which is predetermined in the human mind and therefore the language structure can be transmitted from one generation to another. So this book puts across the theory that the socio cultural environment cannot affect the rules of grammar which is examined under the prospective of being transformational and functioning according to transformational rules which if researched can open new paths of variety in language use.
Presentation and Review of four (4) books in the fields of linguistics – Review of the books in terms of their context, their target audience and their contribution in the field of linguistics – Comparison and contrast of each book’s powerful elements and its weaknesses if any detected
‘The World’s Major Languages’
Are there major and minor languages? What is the criteria upon which a language is considered major or not? What are the origins of each language? What is the connection between the various languages spoken all over the world?
All the above mentioned questions find their answer in this book ‘The World’s Major Languages’ by Comrie Bernard. Readers regardless of their knowledgeable background, their specialty in linguistics or not, can easily approach the context of this book which presents its readers with detailed information on these forty (40) languages which have come to be considered as the world’s forty major languages.
The book presents its readers with the general informative background on language families and then goes on presenting in each one of its chapters one by one the forty languages in terms of its vocabulary, its grammar rules, its origins, its writing and spelling rules, its usage.
Lots of linguistic enigmas are solved and once more linguistics and readers of other specialties are presented with the common truth underlying the origins and existence of language. Languages are functioning like communicative vessel since they share lots of common origins, words and ways of usage.
The contribution of this book is great in the field of linguistics since it highlights the common background of languages spoken all over the world and at the same time it shows the differences of each one of the forty major languages which prove that even language differences function in such a way that they prove their common role of existence. All languages are born in need for effective communication and express the culture and menatality of each speaking society which gives birth to them.
‘The Cambridge Handbook of Phonology’
Phonology is an independent field of linguistics which is enlightened greatly by books like this handbook. This handbook brings together in tis chapters all the basic theories developed by the experts in the field of phonology in the way that sounds are represented in our minds.
Besides this is what phonology as a field stand for. It is the way that sounds take meaning and concept within the speaking community. The book proves the independence of phonology as a field of linguistics and at the same time witnesses its strong and close bond to the other subfields of linguistics such as syntax, morphology, phonetics and language acquisition.
The book gives a detailed and analytical presentation of each phoneme and the way it works. As a result the book contributes in phonology since it shows the basic cores of each word and how they are to form specific meaning in speakers’ minds. It analyzes the sound patterns in languages proving that there are central ways of combining sounds within languages and it is actually serving the field as a handbook since all questions are answered by theory and examples.
‘The Development of Languages’
There has always been lots of interest in the way language acquisition is achieved. This is a field of linguistics which has generated lots of interest during the recent years since technological advances and innovative linguistic theories have showed that new approaches to teaching languages ought to approached and applied nowadays that people move around in multi-lingual environments conquered by the power of images, visual and listening materials.
In this book readers are presented with a short historical presentation on all the theories developed on language acquisition and the greatest part of the book gives emphasis on the recent methods and theories on language acquisition informing its readers on the results of the latest researches and the most recent theories developed and practiced.
The mechanism of language acquisition holds its own magic and this book empowers it by showing the whole magic lying in the whole procedure of learning a language from infancy to adulthood.
The contribution of this book which explains and examines the issue of language acquisition under the scientific field of how human brain functions in combination with the environmental factors which affect the language acquisition, is of great significance. This book contributes to the field of linguistics offering the researchers and linguists a wide range of information on all theories developed throughout the years. It focuses on the recent results of linguistic research and emphasizes on the importance of the socio-cultural context and its effect on language acquisition.
Conclusion
All the above mentioned books show the truth lying in each one of the important fields of research. The more important a field is considered, the more important the contribution of a book specialized in this field or an aspect of this field, is. There is no doubt that each one of the books reviewed and presented in this essay holds its own significant part and role in the field of linguistics and provides researchers with important knowledge and feedback.
The most important element of all these books is the fact that they lead their readers’ minds to move on a step forward proving thus the power of research and studying to make a science go on evolving.
References
Chomsky , Noam (1965) ‘Aspects of the Theory of Syntax’, MIT Press, Chapters 3-4-5, pg.141
Comrie, Bernard (2011) ‘The World’s Major Languages’, Routledge, 2nd ed.
Lacy, De Paul, (2007) ‘The Cambridge Handbook of Phonology’, Cambridge University Press; 1st edition
Berko, Jean and Ratner, Bernstein (2012), ‘The Development of Languages’, The Allyn and Bacon Communication Sciences and Disorders Series, Pearson, 8th edition
