Pinker Summary #1

I’m reading Steven Pinker’s The Language Instinct. In this book Pinker makes the claim that language is an innate ability that we have as a species. He continues this claim by saying it is an specialized skill that develops spontaneously in children at an young age. He argues that language is not a cultural tool, or is something that is nurtured by our environment. To drive that language is an instinct, he proclaims that language evolves from each generation of children of reinventing it. According to Pinker, at times, when two or more groups of people interact with each other that cannot understand each other’s language, they create a choppy string of words used to communicate to each other. This is called a pidgin. How this pidgin develops is based how the next generation contributes to the pidgin. When children are exposed to this at a young age they internalize this language and spontaneously add their own grammatical complexity to the pidgin. This results in a complex language structure known as a creole. Creolization is the concept that claims children reinvent language, not taught by their parents or educators, but by themselves.

Reading this, I came up with a few questions about Pinker’s claim: How can something like language be developed, but still be spontaneous? Since we interact with humans at such an early age how can you distinguish if the child is reinventing language or putting together scraps and pieces from its surroundings?

I believe Steven Pinker is going to drive his claim further that language is an innate process. I Think he will also go more in depth with how we string words together.