Table of Contents
Foreword Noam Chomsky ix
Preface xi
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction 1
Language as a Uniquely Human Trait 1
Language as a Specific Cognitive System 3
Language as a Brain System 5
Part I 13
1 Language Functions in the Brain: From Auditory Input to Sentence Comprehension 15
1.1 A Cognitive Model of Auditory Language Comprehension 15
1.2 Acoustic-Phonological Processes 20
1.3 From Word Form to Syntactic and Lexical-Semantic Information 27
1.4 Initial Phrase Structure Building 32
1.5 Syntactic Relations during Sentence Processing 43
1.6 Processing Semantic Relations 56
1.7 Thematic Role Assignment: Semantic and Syntactic Features 62
1.8 Processing Prosodic Information 71
1.9 Functional Neuroanatomy of Language Comprehension 82
2 Excursions 85
2.1 Language Comprehension and Production: A Common Knowledge Base of Language 85
2.2 Language Comprehension and Communication: Beyond the Core Language System 95
Part II 101
3 The Structural Language Network 103
3.1 The Neuroanatomical Pathways of Language 103
3.2 Pathways in the Right Hemisphere and Cross-Hemispheric Pathways 112
3.3 The Neuroanatomical Pathway Model of Language: Syntactic and Semantic Networks 115
4 The Functional Language Network 121
4.1 The Neuroreceptorarchitectonic Basis of the Language Network 121
4.2 Functional Connectivity and Cortical Oscillations 125
4.3 The Neural Language Circuit 134
Part III 143
5 The Brain's Critical Period for Language Acquisition 145
5.1 Neurophysiology of Second Language Learning 146
5.2 Critical and Sensitive Periods of Learning: Facts and Speculations 155
5.3 Universality of the Neural Language Network 157
6 Ontogeny of the Neural Language Network 163
6.1 Language in the First Three Years of Life 165
6.2 Language beyond Age 3 183
6.3 Structural and Functional Connectivity during Development 191
6.4 The Ontogeny of the Language Network: A Model 196
Part IV 201
7 Evolution of Language 203
7.1 Theories of Language Evolution 203
7.2 Processing Structured Sequences in Songbirds 205
7.3 Comparing Monkeys and Humans 207
7.4 Paleoanthropological Considerations of Brain Development 219
8 The Neural Basis of Language 221
8.1 An Integrative View of the Language Network 223
8.2 Epilogue: Homo Loquens-More than Just Words 231
Glossary 233
Notes 241
References 245
Index 281