Hands-on experience designing, conducting, analyzing, and presenting experiments on the structure and processing of human language. Focuses on constructing, conducting, analyzing, and presenting an original and independent experimental project of publishable quality. Develops skills in reading and writing scientific research reports in cognitive science, including evaluating the methods section of a published paper, reading and understanding graphical displays and statistical claims about data, and evaluating theoretical claims based on experimental data. Instruction and practice in oral and written communication provided.

All languages vary across geographic space and between social groups, and languages are always changing. It makes sense to study these phenomena together because they are intimately related: language change is the basic source of language variation. So studying language change can help us to understand variation, and the nature of linguistic variation provides evidence as to how language changes. Both illuminate the nature of grammar. The course will focus largely on variation and change in phonetics and phonology, and most case studies will be drawn from the English language.

This course covers some of the basic ideas in the subfield syntax, within the framework often referred to as “Generative Grammar”.

This course will acquaint you with some of the important results and ideas of the last half - century of research in syntax. We will explore a large number of issues and a large amount of data so that you can learn something of what this field is all about. From time to time, we will discuss related work in language acquisition and processing. The class will emphasize ideas and arguments for these ideas in addition to the the details of particular analyses. At the same time, you will learn the mechanics of one particular approach (sometimes called Principles and Parameters syntax).
Most of all, the course tries to show why the study of syntax is exciting, and why its results are important to researchers in other language sciences. The class assumes some familiarity with basic concepts of theoretical linguistics, of the sort you could acquire in 24.900.

6.863 is a laboratory-oriented course on the theory and practice of building computer systems for human language processing, with an emphasis on the linguistic, cognitive, and engineering foundations for understanding their design.

Parallel structure isn’t a set rule, but more of a stylistic choice: it helps sentence elements maintain a pattern. This is a very special episode because it’s Paige’s last video with us as a KA intern! We will miss having Paige as a contributor to the Grammar Team.

A phrase is any collection of words that behaves like a part of speech, like a noun phrase (“my brother Stu”), an adjectival phrase (“in a different shade of blue”), or an adverbial phrase (“with elegance and tact”). A clause is any noun phrase plus a verb; they can be sentences, but they don’t always have to be. You’ll see!

An antecedent is “the thing that came before”. When you use a pronoun, it’s standing in for a word you used previously—that’s the antecedent. Join us as we demonstrate how to make sure that your pronouns and antecedents match up with one another: that’s called agreement!

Psychology is designed to meet scope and sequence requirements for the single-semester introduction to psychology course. The book offers a comprehensive treatment of core concepts, grounded in both classic studies and current and emerging research. The text also includes coverage of the DSM-5 in examinations of psychological disorders. Psychology incorporates discussions that reflect the diversity within the discipline, as well as the diversity of cultures and communities across the globe.Senior Contributing AuthorsRose M. Spielman, Formerly of Quinnipiac UniversityContributing AuthorsKathryn Dumper, Bainbridge State CollegeWilliam Jenkins, Mercer UniversityArlene Lacombe, Saint Joseph's UniversityMarilyn Lovett, Livingstone CollegeMarion Perlmutter, University of Michigan

By the end of this section, you will be able to:Define language and demonstrate familiarity with the components of languageUnderstand how the use of language developsExplain the relationship between language and thinking

Quiz on Caroline Pari’s “La Famiglia to Academia:

A Dutiful Daughter Becomes an Academic Doubter” (also models syntax)

A sentence fragment is a chunk of language that hasn’t made it all the way to being a working sentence; it might be missing a verb, or there might not be a subject. Learn how to turn a fragment into a sentence in this video!

A relative pronoun is a word like “that” or “which” or “who”, so a relative clause is a clause that begins with a relative pronoun. In the sentence “The dragon who breathed blue fire has retired,” “who breathed blue fire” is a relative clause. Learn more about these constructions by watching the video!

A run-on sentence doesn’t separate any of its independent clauses with the punctuation that it needs, and a comma splice incorrectly separates two independent clauses with a comma, instead of a comma-and-coordinating-conjunction.

A simple sentence contains one independent clause. A compound sentence contains more than one! Put another way: a simple sentence contains a subject and a predicate, but a compound sentence contains more than one subject and more than one predicate.

A subject is the noun phrase that drives the action of a sentence; in the sentence “Jake ate cereal,” Jake is the subject. The direct object is the thing that the subject acts upon, so in that last sentence, “cereal” is the direct object; it’s the thing Jake ate. An indirect object is an optional part of a sentence; it’s the recipient of an action. In the sentence “Jake gave me some cereal,” the word “me” is the indirect object; I’m the person who got cereal from Jake.

A subject is the noun or pronoun-based part of a sentence, and a predicate is the verb-based part that the subject performs. Let’s explore how that works in context.