Baby's an It (call of the obstetrician?)

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

On Sep 10, 2008, at 7:37 AM, Larry Horn wrote:

> At 10:27 AM -0400 9/10/08, Mark Mandel wrote:
>> "Mommy" and "Daddy" can also be 3rd person -- "Look, Daddy's
>> bringing you
>> your panda!" -- like other kin terms.
>
> Yes, that's what I meant by "illeism".  (See
> http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/004762.html.)
> The motivation for illeism in baby talk is not identity insecurity as
> such, but the well-known (presumed) difficulty that
> indexicality/shifters (as in first and second person pronouns) pose
> for young language-learners.  (I recall a Sesame Street episode when
> our own children were at the appropriate tender age that attempted to
> "teach", or at least play on, such issues involving the proper use of
> "I"/"you", "my"/"your", etc.)

i'm not sure if i've posted anywhere on this (though i've intended
to), but my daughter notes that toddlers' use of their names for self-
reference comes up repeatedly on parenting discussion sites, usually
in the context of blaming Elmo for it.  so these parents denounce Elmo
for serving as a bad example for their kids.  pointing out that
toddlers do this all over the world and did it long before Elmo came
into being (not to mention that Elmo talks this way *because he's
talking like a toddler*) has absolutely no effect on the complaining
parents: Elmo does it, their kids do it, so the first must be the
cause of the second.  (folded in here someplace is the assumption that
language acquisition is entirely a matter of imitation of models from
people around them, any deviations from the adult language arising
from imperfect imitation.)

arnold

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