19.2128, Books: Cognitive Science/Neurolinguistics/LinguisticTheories: Moro

Thu Jul 3 14:22:49 UTC 2008

LINGUIST List: Vol-19-2128. Thu Jul 03 2008. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 19.2128, Books: Cognitive Science/Neurolinguistics/LinguisticTheories: Moro

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1)
Date: 01-Jul-2008
From: Diane Denner < denner at mit.edu >
Subject: The Boundaries of Babel: Moro

-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Thu, 03 Jul 2008 10:21:22
From: Diane Denner [denner at mit.edu]
Subject: The Boundaries of Babel: Moro
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Title: The Boundaries of Babel 
Subtitle: The Brain and the Enigma of Impossible Languages 
Series Title: Current Studies in Linguistics  

Publication Year: 2008 
Publisher: MIT Press
	   http://mitpress.mit.edu/

Book URL: http://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262134989 

Author: Andrea Moro

Hardback: ISBN: 0262134985 9780262134989 Pages: 257 Price: U.S. $ 35.00

Abstract:

In The Boundaries of Babel, Andrea Moro tells the story of an encounter
between two cultures: contemporary theoretical linguistics and the
cognitive neurosciences. The study of language within a biological context
has been ongoing for more than fifty years. The development of neuroimaging
technology offers new opportunities to enrich the "biolinguistic
perspective" and extend it beyond an abstract framework for inquiry. As a
leading theoretical linguist in the generative tradition and also a
cognitive scientist schooled in the new imaging technology, Moro is
uniquely equipped to explore this.

Moro examines what he calls the "hidden" revolution in contemporary
science: the discovery that the number of possible grammars is not infinite
and that their number is biologically limited. This radical but
little-discussed change in the way we look at language, he claims, will
require us to rethink not just the fundamentals of linguistics and
neurosciences but also our view of the human mind. Moro searches for
neurobiological correlates of "the boundaries of Babel"--the constraints on
the apparent chaotic variation in human languages--by using an original
experimental design based on artificial languages. He offers a critical
overview of some of the fundamental results from linguistics over the last
fifty years, in particular regarding syntax, then uses these essential
aspects of language to examine two neuroimaging experiments in which he
took part. He describes the two neuroimaging techniques used (positron
emission topography, or PET, and functional magnetic resonance imaging, or
fMRI), but makes it clear that techniques and machines do not provide
interesting data without a sound theoretical framework. Finally, he
discusses some speculative aspects of modern research in biolinguistics
regarding the impact of the linear structure of linguistics expression on
grammar, and more generally, some core aspects of language acquisition,
genetics, and evolution.

"Andrea Moro has gained a unique position in formulating and implementing
constructive approaches to? difficult and demanding tasks. He is able to
address them with a deep understanding of modern linguistics, a field to
which he has made a major contribution of his own, and mastery of the
relevant technology and its potential. His new book is a lucid introduction
to these exciting areas, superbly informed and imaginatively presented,
with intriguing implications well beyond biolinguistics... A rare
achievement..."
--Noam Chomsky, from the foreword 

Linguistic Field(s): Cognitive Science
                     Linguistic Theories
                     Neurolinguistics

Written In: English  (eng)

See this book announcement on our website: 
http://linguistlist.org/get-book.html?BookID=36359

MAJOR SUPPORTERS

	Brill          
		http://www.brill.nl	

	Cambridge Scholars Publishing          
		http://www.c-s-p.org	

	Cambridge University Press          
		http://us.cambridge.org	

	Cascadilla Press          
		http://www.cascadilla.com/	

	Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd          
		http://www.continuumbooks.com	

	Edinburgh University Press          
		http://www.eup.ed.ac.uk/	

	Elsevier Ltd          
		http://www.elsevier.com/linguistics	

	Emerald Group Publishing Limited          
		http://www.emeraldinsight.com/	

	Equinox Publishing Ltd          
		http://www.equinoxpub.com/	

	European Language Resources Association - ELRA          
		http://www.elra.info.	

	Georgetown University Press          
		http://www.press.georgetown.edu	

	Hodder Education          
		http://www.hoddereducation.co.uk	

	John Benjamins          
		http://www.benjamins.com/	

	Lincom GmbH          
		http://www.lincom.eu	

	MIT Press          
		http://mitpress.mit.edu/	

	Mouton de Gruyter          
		http://www.mouton-publishers.com	

	Multilingual Matters          
		http://www.multilingual-matters.com/	

	Narr Francke Attempto Verlag GmbH + Co. KG          
		http://www.narr.de/	

	Oxford University Press          
		http://www.oup.com/us	

	Pagijong Press          
		http://pjbook.com	

	Palgrave Macmillan          
		http://www.palgrave.com	

	Peter Lang AG          
		http://www.peterlang.com	

	Rodopi          
		http://www.rodopi.nl/	

	Routledge (Taylor and Francis)          
		http://www.routledge.com/	

	Springer          
		http://www.springer.com	

	Wiley-Blackwell          
		http://www.blackwellpublishing.com	

OTHER SUPPORTING PUBLISHERS	

	Association of Editors of the Journal of Portuguese Linguistics
		http://www.fl.ul.pt/revistas/JPL/JPLweb.htm 

	Graduate Linguistic Students' Association, Umass
		http://glsa.hypermart.net/ 

	International Pragmatics Assoc.
		http://www.ipra.be 

	Langues et Linguistique
		http://y.ennaji.free.fr/fr/ 

	Linguistic Association of Finland
		http://www.ling.helsinki.fi/sky/ 

	Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics / Landelijke - LOT
		http://www.lotpublications.nl/ 

	SIL International
		http://www.ethnologue.com/bookstore.asp 

	St. Jerome Publishing Ltd
		http://www.stjerome.co.uk 

	Utrecht institute of Linguistics
		http://www-uilots.let.uu.nl/ 

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