How far does a construction grammar approach to argument structure take us in understanding children\u27s language development?

Discusses Michael Tomasello\u27s review of Adele Goldberg\u27s book \u27Constructions: A Construction Grammar Approach to Argument Structure.\u27 Reasons why function and cognitive linguistic approaches are central to work in child language; Determination of how much meaning is carried by constructions; Relationship between constructions and semantic meaning

Context and the dynamic construal of meaning in early childhood

Although for many developmental psychologists, it has become a truism that the study of human development is inseparable from the study of sociocultural context, one of the greatest challenges has been to specify how cultural meanings become internalized or come to be meaningful to specific individuals over time. While theorists and researchers have increasingly stressed the importance of communication for understanding how cultural meanings form the fabric of individual experience, what is less clear is what methods can be employed to fruitfully study this relation. A central figure providing a rich account of the dynamic construal of meaning during early childhood was Ina Uzˇgiris (Uzˇgiris 1989, 1996, 1999). In her own research, Ina Uzˇgiris struggled to clarify the relationship connecting personal meaning, sociocultural context and human development, especially during infancy

Language, practices and the construction of personhood

This paper argues for the central role of language practices in children\u27s construction of personhood. It aims to connect prior theorizing that recognized language as central to developmental issues, with more recent discussions about personhood stemming from discursive psychology and linguistic anthropology. Drawing upon longitudinal observations of caregivers and their preschoolers from three language communities, a case is made that the developmental process is more complex than current theorizing suggests. Although caregivers\u27 discourse provides children with a powerful resource for person construction, children\u27s systems do not immediately match those used by their caregivers and undergo significant developments over time. © 2000, Sage Publications. All rights reserved

The contributions of the interdisciplinary study of language to an understanding of mind

Carpendale & Lewis (C&L) emphasize the importance of viewing language as activity. In this commentary I push further their claim by highlighting how constructions, rather than words, are the appropriate unit of analysis. In addition, I suggest how a discussion of indexicality paves the way for a better understanding of how language provides a powerful tool for children\u27s construction of mind

Building bridges between developmental psychology and linguistic theorizing: Essay review of constructing a language: A usage-based theory of language acquisition by Michael Tomasello

Reviews the book Constructing a Language: A Usage-Based Theory of Language Acquisition, by Michael Tomasello

The linguistic marking of agentivity and control in child language

The present study examines the relationship between linguistic forms and the functions they serve in children\u27s early talk about agentivity and control. The spontaneous linguistic productions of six children ranging between 1;8 and 2;8 served as the data base. Preliminary analyses of who the children referred to and what forms were used in subject position suggest that the children could be divided into two groups. Three children primarily referred to Self and relied on multiple Self reference forms in subject position, while the other children referred to both Self and Other and primarily used the Self reference form, I. A functional analysis was carried out to examine whether the seemingly interchangeable use of Self reference forms could be related to semantic and pragmatic patterns. The findings indicate that at a time before they regularly refer to others, the children systematically employed different Self reference forms to mark distinct perspectives on agency. © 1989, Cambridge University Press. All rights reserved

The linguistic marking of nonprototypical agency: An exploration into children\u27s use of passives

The present study examines how children vary perspective in describing events. In particular, it investigates how children describe events that deviate from prototypical transitive events. Cross-linguistic research suggests that speakers of various languages organize particular linguistic devices around clusters of related notions such as volition, animacy, and control (see Comrie 1981; DeLancey 1984; Givon 1979, 1984; Hopper and Thompson 1980; Lakoff 1977; Slobin 1981, 1985). Prototypical transitive events include an agent who acts intentionally to bring about a perceptible change of state in an object. Deviations from this scene have been noted to be marked by deviations from canonical morphosyntax marking the prototypical transitive scene. Previous research suggests that children reserve the use of specific linguistic devices to mark prototypical transitive scenes in the earliest phases of grammatical development (see Budwig 1986, 1989; Slobin 1981, 1985 for further discussion). Cross-linguistic research suggests that children acquiring distinct languages first give special linguistic attention to scenes involving prototypical agents. Whether children also mark deviations from the prototypical transitive scene has received little attention (see Budwig 1986, 1989 for further discussion of children’s early linguistic treatment of prototypical agentivity and various deviations). The present paper will examine how children acquiring English as a first language make use of particular voice contrasts to shift perspective away from the prototypical transitive scene. It will focus in particular on the use of the passive con-struction. © 1990, Walter de Gruyte

The development of predication: Examining the link between knowledge and practice

The article reviews the book Predicative Minds: The Social Ontogeny of Propositional Thinking, by R. Bogdan

The dynamics of agency and context in human development: Holism revisited

This paper will look at the evolving relational-developmental paradigm (Overton, 2015; Witherington and Boom, 2020) examining how individual and culture are brought together (or not) in metatheoretical discussions of human development. After a long period of the Cartesian split-mechanistic view of human development, we have increasingly witnessed a shift to more relational views. Moving beyond the separation of mind from body, organism from context, and linear accounts of human development based on additive models (all characteristic of the Cartesian split-mechanistic metatheory), the relational-developmental paradigm embraces three key factors: agency, process, and holism. It is this third area, the holistic view of the organism and environment, that is the central focus of this chapter. We will examine three approaches to individual and environment relations in discussions of holism in developmental science, with a focus on two questions. First, how does each account describe individual, culture, and their relationship to one another (the what); and second, how specifically does that interaction take place (the how)? After reviewing Bronfenbrenner\u27s bioecological model, developmental systems theory, and sociocultural approaches, a discussion will examine how historical changes in the notion of context in neighboring disciplines will help developmental scholars move forward in productive ways as scholars embrace more holistic views of human development