Understanding Linguistics: The Science of Language

(36 lectures, 30 minutes/lecture)

Course No. 2270
Taught by John McWhorter
Manhattan Institute
Ph.D., Stanford University
AUDIO ONLY 128 bit MP3
jpeg guidebook included
We all use language every day of our lives. Language, regardless of the particul
ar dialect spoken, is the tool we use to express our wants, our needs, and our f
eelings.
Recently, many experts who study language have become convinced by an idea about
this remarkable human trait that was, only a few decades ago, utterly revolutio
nary. These experts believe that the capacity for spoken language and the rules
for its structure are not cultural but universal a set of rules shared by humans i
n every culture and that even may be hardwired into our brains. Moreover, these
rules apply regardless of which of the world's 6,000 languages are being spoken.
But what are these rules? How do they work? And how can knowing them enhance you
r experience of the world?
The 36 lectures of Understanding Linguistics: The Science of Language taught by ac
claimed linguist, author, and Professor John McWhorter from the Manhattan Instit
ute are your opportunity to take a revealing journey through the fascinating terra
in of linguistics. You focus on the scientific aspects of human language that we
re left out of any classes you may have taken in English or a foreign language,
and you emerge from your journey with a newfound appreciation of the mysterious
machinery built into all of us an appreciation likely to surface time and again in
your everyday life.
Course Lecture Titles
1. What Is Linguistics?
2. The Sounds of Language Consonants
3. The Other Sounds Vowels
4. In the Head versus On the Lips
5. How to Make a Word
6. The Chomskyan Revolution
7. Deep Structure and Surface Structure
8. The On-Off Switches of Grammar
9. Shades of Meaning and Semantic Roles
10. From Sentence to Storytelling
11. Language on Its Way to Becoming a New One
12. Recovering Languages of the Past
13. Where Grammar Comes From
14. Language Change from Old English to Now
15. What Is an Impossible Language?
16. How Children Learn to Speak
17. How We Learn Languages as Adults
18. How You Talk and How They Talk
19. How Class Defines Speech
20. Speaking Differently, Changing the Language
21. Language and Gender
22. Languages Sharing the World Bilingualism
23. Languages Sharing a Sentence Code-Switching
24. The Rules of Conversation
25. What Is This Thing Called Language?
26. Speech as Action
27. Uses of Talk from Culture to Culture
28. Does Language Channel Thought? The Evidence
29. Does Language Channel Thought? New Findings
30. Is Language Going to the Dogs?
31. Why Languages Are Never Perfect
32. The Evolution of Writing
33. Writing Systems
34. Doing Linguistics With a Head Start
35. Doing Linguistics From the Ground Up
36. The Evolution of Language
http://www.teach12.com/ttcx/CourseDescLong2.aspx?cid=2270&pc=Social%20Sciences
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This is an audio extraction from ssafe05's video upload.