Cracking the Language Code: From Babbling to Phonemes

The "Guts" of Language ● ● ● ● ● ● ● In Mysak's Model we discussed the Governor. It is the seat of consciousness, where an idea, we might wish to communicate, becomes the focus of our attention. We call this idea Deep Structure. The process of transforming this Deep Structure into its final symbolic form which is suitable for communication is called Surface Structure. This is basically what language is all about. All of the other processes, such as transduction, perception and the comparator are necessary for the development and use of language, but they are ancillary processes. To get from Deep Structure to Surface Structure, a child must first learn and then be able to apply simultaneously five levels of linguistic rules. These are abstracted by the child from his/her language environment. There are (as Moses undoubtedly discovered) FIVE Levels of Linguistic Rules to be learned and applied to go from Deep Structure to Surface Structure. ● ● ● ● The five levels of rules are: o Phonologic Rules o Morphologic Rules o Syntactic Rules o Semantic Rules o Pragmatic Rules The first three sets of rules are typically discussed in the literature as the FORM of language. The fourth, Semantics, is referred to as the rules of CONTENT. And the fifth, Pragmatics, is described as the USE of language. ● ● ● This module will address the first three, or Language Form. Because language is discursive, I must list and discuss them in order, but they are learned by the child simultaneously. Ironically, the first I have chosen to discuss, Phonology, is often the last to be completely mastered by the child. The Phoneme is the smallest unit of a language that can change meaning. ● ● ● ● ● ● Phonology is the study of sounds (phons) that humans can make for oral communication. Humans are capable of a great many of these sounds. The hurdle that the baby has in learning language is that each language has its own personal selection of sounds to serve as individual units. We call them collectively phonemes. The child must learn what those units are for his/her language. The phoneme is the smallest unit of a language that can change meaning. Hence, when I go to the doctor after a fight with my wife, I may report that she either bit me or beat me. In English, the "i" (as in "bit" ) and "ee" (as in "beat") sounds make a difference in meaning, so they are phonemes. ● In Russian, those two sounds are not distinguished as seperate, so that my Russian friend may say his wife beat him when there are clearly teeth marks in his arm. A Phoneme is really a bundle of sounds called Allophones ● ● ● ● ● There are approximately 41 to 48 phonemes in English depending upon the dialect etc. Spanish has less, and Hawaiian has only about 13. Does that mean that Hawaiian is a more primitive language which is too unsophisticated to serve in today*s complex society. Definitely not! The number of phonemes in a language has no bearing on the complexity or effectiveness of the language to communicate. Few languages if any have more than 50. However, I have unconfirmed reports of some Russian dialects in the Caucasus Mountains that have 76. Regardless, the problem for the child is that a phoneme is not typically a single sound (phon). It may be somewhat arbitrarily made up of a bundle of sounds. One example in English is the /t/ phoneme. Babies must separate the phonemes from the allophones. ● ● ● ● ● The /t/ phoneme in English is actually four different phons. They are as follows: o The aspirated /t/ as in "take." o The unaspirated /t/ as in "steak." o The unreleased /t/ as in "cat." o The nasaly released /t/ as in "cotton." You could use them interchangeably in the word "cotton" and it would still mean a piece of fluff. Sounds that are different, but are accepted as the same phoneme in a language are called allophones. In English those different /t/ phons are allophones. In some other languages, the degree of aspiration changes the meaning and hence the /t/s would be considered phonemic. Babies certainly have their work cut out for them, to separate the phonemes from the allophones! It truly is a job that separates the men from the babies. Babies do not hear the phonemes of a language, but they do hear the building blocks of the phonemes of all languages. ● When a man hears speech, he hears discrete sequences of phonemes. This is because he has learned the phonemes of his language, and now has an internalized perceptual overlay of those phonemes to place over and interpret the speech stream. ● ● ● ● ● Babies, however, have no knowledge of phonemes and no overlay. They hear only a continuous stream of sound including a host of discriminating features, like noises and tones, that rapidly change. Ironically, for learning a new language, the baby has the advantage over the man. Babies are born with the neural connections to hear all of the discriminating features in the stream of sound. These are the building blocks of the phonemic system of every language. The "perceptual overlay" that the man uses to understand speech, masks out many of these discriminating features. Hence, the man will hear only the sounds he expects to hear and miss what is really being said. Babies should be stimulated in more than one language to keep neural connections alive. ● ● ● ● Babies are born, as we said, with the neural connections in place to hear all of the building blocks of phonemes for all languages. But if these connections are not stimulated they will die out. Hence, it is important that families with multi-language backgrounds should make these resources available to the babies. Family members speaking different languages should talk to the babies as much as possible. ● ● ● Some folks play language tapes to the baby, but I am skeptical of this approach, since it is not accompanied by the sense of vision or touch, and may be tuned out. We shall have to wait for some research in this area. I don't recommend a multi-language approach for children who are at risk for a language delay, such as premature babies, blue babies or babies with a history of language delay in the family, etc. NOTES: Here are some hints for increasing phoneme awareness. Hundreds more, check out Google. To encapsulate, if we are talking speech sounds, we are talking phonemes and allophones. The phoneme is the smallest unit of a language that can change meaning. So now lets go to the next level--the level of meaning and the morpheme. This we will describe as the smallest unit of a language that can carry (have) meaning.