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Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the argument that children have an innate capacity for language. What other explanations of children language acquisition have been offered?
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| Submitted: Mon Jun 20 2005
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Theories of language acquisition Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the argument that children have an innate capacity for language. What other explanations of children language acquisition have been offered? The theories of language acquisition are essentially centred around the nature nurture argument. The theory that children have an innate capacity for language was created by Noam Chomsky (1928- ) an American linguistic. This nativist approach states that learning language is part of the genetic makeup of human species and is nearly independent of any particular experience which may occur after birth. Once a childs brain has been exposed to speech for the very first time it will receive and make sense of these utterances, due to its particular programming. Chomsky believes that there is a language acquisition device somwehre in the brain which enables children to distinguish between linguistically acceptable and non-acceptable language.it also provides children with the basic rules of...
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