Re: Why can't daddy?

Ruud Harmsen wrote:

Mon, 08 May 2006 11:08:39 -0400: Harlan Messinger
<hmessinger.removethis@xxxxxxxxxxx>: in sci.lang:

peng@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
Why can't an adult pick up a language simply by listening to the sounds

A child doesn't pick up a language simply by listening to the sounds of
it. A child spends months rehearsing the phonetics, then attempts to
pronounce words, then spends more months putting the words together in
longer and longer sequences while refining its grasp of the language's
grammar. Over the course of this process the child continuously
incorporates the feedback it receives from others into its efforts.

Yes. And all that time, it is also living and learning about life and
the world. Language learning is fully integrated in life and
non-linguistic learning, in a way that hardly any immersion language
course in later life can achieve.

No matter how many times you repeat it, it doesn't become true.

There _is_ a "critical period," and L2 learning is _utterly different_
from L1 learning.
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@xxxxxxx
.

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