Child's talk: learning to use language

_.

I call them "idealized" for se'•eral reasons. To begi n w i t h , a s already no ted they a re constituti,•e and self-contained. Even therr goa l is const i t u ted by the game itsel f: the rea p pearance o f a face from behi nd a screen accompan ied by a \'oiced boo! has no fu nc­ tion al significance outside the "form of l i fe" that is the game of peekabno. I n t h i s se nse , a game is virtuall y syntactic: its object is t c.> be well formed. it is. moreover, com ple tely convent iona l and "nonna t u ral.'1 Even 1f peekaboo depended for rts Ioree upon the child's u n ce r t a i n t y abou t ol�ect pe rmanence (which it may wel l do) , it is nonetheless com posed of com p letely made u p . facti­ tiou !i const i t uents and t ied toge t h e r by a set of only slightly nego­ tiable rules. A nd , of cou rse , it is made up, prec isely, of a · set of constituent acl'l that a re formed in se<Juence ira a pa rticu lar·order a nd transfor11,1ed with re a ni to the rules as well. Game formats, " morcon�r. may >e conce l \·e of as mvmg a "deep stn1cture ;md a set of rea l i 1.ation n t les by which the surface of the game is m a naged . The deep structu re of peekaboo is the controlled dis­ appe;mmce and rea pp earance of an object or a person. The su r­ face structu re (<�s we shall see) can be con s t ru c t ed by the use of scree ns m· c lot h s or what not, by \'arying the time and act i o n het wecn d i s:t ppea ram:e and rea pp earance, by var y i n g the con ­ st i t u t i \"e u u erimce w c ;cd , hy \'ary i n g who or what is ca use to d is­ a p pe:lr. e t c . T h e i d ea l ization , i n deed , makes the fm·mat a l most " l a n g u <�gel i kc." Such · ga m es a l so include a nother design featu re of Jan,

47

. Play, Games, arul Language

guage-the assign men t of turn-ta k i n g roles that are i n ter­ changeable. There is a h i d e r and a hidden, an ac to r and an ex pe rienc;:er. And t h e se can ,be exchanged from ga m e to gam e . T he m e a ni n g or si gn a l i n g value of a n y act or utterance in t h e game depend s, besides, on wh ere in the sequence it occurs and by whom it i s don e . A ga me, i n its way, is a little protocon versa­ "

"

tion .

not a m i nor one), games provide an for dist ribu t ing atte ntion over an o rde red sequence of e ve nts 'f he ga me as t he topac a&>u t wh1ch each oi the moves A nd fi n a l l y (the point is

opportu n i ty .

may be con sidered a com me n t . And so me com ments, indeed , are not acce ptable to th e child : some variants that " push" the ga me beyond its ru le li mits will be objected to. Specific elem e n ts of the game are being constantly eva l u ated in terms of their rela­ tions to the more extended sequence that "carries" the ga m e and this too is very languagelike. And (as i f i t n eed e d saying!) children love to play , and at the t ender age with w h i ch we are concerned , they love to play games. There see m s to be t he same Funktionslust, Karl Buhler's word for pleasure in the activity i tse l f abou t ga m e playing as the re is about early talking. Whatever motivates such process p leasure, it serves the chi ld well in kee pin g h i m at it. A t what? A t some sur prisi ngly com pl ex activity , as we s h a l l ,

,

see i n a moment.

Two Case Studies: Richard andJonathan

Richard and Jonathan, whose language development will be the cente r of ou r attention th roughou t t h e rem a i nder of the book , we re studied at home once a fortni ght and sometimes more o ften when thi ngs were moving fast or when their parents had noticed som e t h i n g they thou g ht we should be l o o k i n g at. We hegan the observations w hen Richard was five mon ths ol d and J o n a t h a n three months. Each fortn ight we (one o f two other observers and I or the two others together) would visit their homes for abou t a n h o u r and make half-hour video and audio

Child's Talk

tapes of the mother and child playing at what happened then to usual playti me acti vity. These visits continued u ntil Richard was twenty-fou r months old and Jonathan e i g h te e n months. The children were from middle-class homer-theh· fathers were a schoolmaster· and a physician respectively, their mothers housewives who had not attended university . We observers became friendly with the families over the year or so of associa­ tion, and though we stayed in the backgrou nd during the recording session, we did respond natu rally to the approaches of the children or their parents. The parents kept noteboo ks and recorded new forms of speech when they emerged, though these were not subjected to detaile� analysis. From the start we made it clear that we were studying langua ge development and shared with the parents, when they asked , any id eas or hypotheses we had about their c h i ldre n s develo pment . It was as operi a relationshi p as possible. They were interested in the gen­ eral course of the study, though not very i n te res t ed in the tech­ nical details. V ideo and audio tapes were transcribed as soo n after record­ ing as possible, usually within a week, aided by context notes and memory. The transcripts took the usual three-colum_p form of temporally orde red notations of mother's : utterances, child's utterances, and context descri p tions. These then served as the data base for analysis and categorization of utterances, a id e d by further v i ew i ng of the tapes to resolve ambiguities as they arose. Since much of the technical detail of the particular studies has been published elsewhere, the reader can be spared a tedious recounting of the rather traditional method of analysis employed. The "games" selected for discussion here were all built around the appearance and disappearance of objects. Jonathan, whom we shall .consider first, was very taken with s uch "games. " What­ ever the "motivation" of the game--w hether a concern with "object pe rmanence," as suggested earlier, or with other aspects of achieving predictability-Jonathan's mother could count on his interest and very early began to elaborate a game com posed be their

'

..

Play, Games, and Language

49

of predictably li nked segments. Th is game inmlved

a

liule toy

down that cou ld be move� so a s to rise <�hm·e or dis
Jona­

t h a n was 0;5--a fler he and his mothe r had been pl
peek
pally, either h id her ow n face or Jonathan's.* A t the start, Jonathan was li ttle more than a s m i l i n g spectator

as the clow n disappeared and then rea ppea red . He soon

began

to anticipate what would h a p pen next . The clown and cone game continued, along with other forms o f peekaboo, u n t il 0;9, dis­ appe ared and t h e n reappea red at 1 ; 2 of which more p •·esently. A s i n g l e game �om prised an A n tecedent Topic and a Su bse­ q u e n t To pic, t h e former consisting of the down's i n i t ia l d is a p­ pearance , and the Iauer of h is reappearance. Each of these :T«;> p ics was com posed of two com ponen ts . The com pon ents of the ,

A ntecedent Topic

w ere

P R E PAR A T I O N and D I S A PP E A R ­

A N C E ; those of t h e Subseq u e n t Topic were R E A PPEA RA N CE

and REESTA B L I S H M E N T . Each compon e n t consisted of two

or mor� co nstituents by which

a

com ponent co uld be "1·ea l i zed"

of t he ga me is presen ted in Ta bl e 3 . 1 , along with exa m ples of each of the ten constituents that make u p this "su r face structu re" to which the in actual behavior or utte rance. T h e over-all st nacture

child w a s exposed .

Each constituent w a s segmented- by

a

pa u se or some ot her

appropriate means for m a rk i n g it off from the n e x t co nst i t u e n t .

T h e pa uses or other markings between the fou r com ponents were longer or more salient . A nd the pause between A ntecedent and Subsequent Topics was pa rticu l a rl y lon g and p r e gna nt w ith suspense. Those are t h e st ructu ra l bones o f the game. Let me il�ustrate them less abstractl y-in t h e spirit of the illust rat ions given 'at the bottom of the "game ta·ee ." PREPARATION involves an i nitial constituent in which the mother first cal ls the ch ild's auemion to the dow n by jiggling it around or using some such Atttntional vocativ� as Who's this ' w i th •The expression 0;5 refers to five mom hs; 1 ;2 . 1 0 to one yea•·. days, etc. �e follow this convemion throughout.

ten

t wo

mont hs, and

/ topic "

A ntecedent ,....--

/ topic "

PREPARATION

AIUnti� .1

roem-n

}onathtln , looi Who's thil?

�:

.i

A g1ncJ ISIDbHshmt!rtt

' ,

. ·

-�

Sta�arch .·:�1

Mu,i;,,

�

�

;·�1

.•;

hitk him? ShaU Jonathan do it. HI'S going .

n

:·; Compl1tion 7\

,,.

��

r. ::!

�

�\

�

•

.-.

,

1\

7

Start ·. ,

� �1 f: j :.i

n

·

;

•

t:

�

�. Wh1nis ��

Ht!� going ;. go-o-il; ;: � Gon1! H1'1 ron

,

Subsequent

REESTABLISHMENT

REAPPEARANCE

DISAPPEARANCE

:jhall'-n ,ai-�,1. ·s

._

A

Arousal ·; '

CompllliOrt

. . .A.F�r�uh Start

�-� �j

•·.,

�

·�

}:: '

M

�·;

a

,; ·i'

iJ.

gon��

I

H1n h1 comts. H1'1 coming to 111 Jori. Boo! HeUo,

j

.:j

?j... .... ,· 'l

:

. ..;: ;

:�

:�� -�

i

·. . .::

�.!

. .. ,

1.'4t

�! :o i.

:.-2

�i

·· ·

i

� ��·

"'

Jolltllhalt� �·� _. ,

�·

Then ht! il.

,iJ

�

J

Constraint .·

·i

· ' ,

.

.

i

,.j'

!#t

�!

�'l

;:

�

� J

�

Ji I it

;

:i

'l

BabaiMboo! { lllOY i ft& clown to ... belly).

j

Don't 1a1 him •

.

Play, Games, and Language

SI

a marked i n terrogative contour. O n ce attention is ga ined the mother settles the question o f who is to be a ge n t and who expe-:­ ri�ncer: Agency e.Jtabli.Jh�nt. ,Then D I SAPPEARANCE begins. I t has three constituents. The Start, the Completion, a n d the Search: Here he goes! He�J gone! Where is he'f Then there is a long pause, followed by the Start of REAPPEARANCE, w h i ch can be han­ d led either s low l y or ex p lm;ively , followed then by Completion: He:f coming. Boo, Jonathan! Here he if. Then, after another pause, the REESfABLISH MENT component begins with ATOUSal when the mother attempt� to excite Jonathan w i t h the down, followed by Constraint wh e n she succeeds: Bababoo (moving · the down toward him) ! Oh, don't eat him! All of the constituents can be but are not always accom p ani ed by words. What is i nvariant i n the game is its deep structu re-disap­ pearance and r ea p p e a ra nce of an obj e c t I t remains so across a wide range of surface reahzat1ons. I here IS no su rprise in the ,

.

baSic game. Su rprise is always achieved by

varyi ng the

constitu­

These co n st i te nts then become real­ ized and marked by moderately predictable (but only m od� ra tely ) variations il'i u tterance and prosod y . For exam ple, the va rious constituents were rarely all. a cco m pa n ied by mother's vocal u tterances. Sometimes only one was so marked� And when the games followed one ri gh t after the other, the mother usually accompa nied different constituents by their appropriate, famil­ iar ''ocal accom panime n t . It was as if she were pu rposely creat­

ents by which it is

realized .

ing vocal place holders i n

the sequence of constituents. The same

held for her prosodic marking of the utterances she actuall y used. The y were cunningly varied to produce ch a n ge and suspense. On REA PPEARANCE, for exam ple, the Start would over time be very slow, Here he co�s. and the next time delivered with breakneck speed . So too with the emtrgence of t h e down. .

.

.

.

.

.

Th us wh ile the overall game became routinized , the constituents that made it u p were forever being varied : utterances, prosody , pause lengths, whatever. J onathan's "entry" into the game was gradual. From 0;5 to 0;9 he paid increasingly more active attention. His mother altered

.S l . her role accordingly. The ten constituents that she could mark with a vocalization became increasingly elaborated;. Take, for example. Where's he gone1, the Search constituent. She used this standard question forty-three times between Jonathan's fifth and ninth month . At 0;7, she added to this standard p h rase Where i.f

he1; at 0;8 , /s he in there, Can you see him1; and at 0;9, Where's the cloum 1 (introducing the nom ina l)-al l supplemental forms. I t was "

evident that as these new features became

"expectable," Jona­

�ait for his mother to utter the m-looki n g up at her either in amidpation or after she spoke. Her richer l a n gua ge was becoming a part of the

t h a n wou ld

from the clown-and-cone and s mili ng

game. I ncreasingly, he , too, would vocalize d u ring these j u nc­ t u res between the constituents.

The om ission of expected u t terances was handled in a n

i n te res ti ng w a y

by Jonathan's

mother. Early on, she voca l l y

accompanied nearly every co n stitu e n t o f t h e ga me. A t 0 ; 5 , for

ex am ple

,

she marke� as many as nine of them in

one

roun d ,

seven i n another. By 0 ; 9 , her utterances had d ropped t o a max­

imum of fou r per game. Three constituents in particular were

sacrificed · to sua.tain

Jonathan's interest:

the

start

p h a se of the

disappearance (IUs going); the start ehase of the reappearance

(Htre he comes); and the completion of the rea p pea ranse -(T/aere he is). What remained were the quick withd [a\Yat (Gone!) and explosive reentry (/Joo!) and a far greater use ofconsJ raints (Don't eat him or No, I don't tlainl& you'd better put that in your mo1tth )­ u tt e ra nces that by their nature were much more closely ti ed to the child's actions and presu med i n tentions and fa r less ritual­

ized in ch a racte r The .deletions were paced in such a way that .

t h ey coincided with Jonathan's mas te ry of th e game. When a

constituent, in e ffect, could

J

ization was deleted.

It was

v_ention o f presu pposition .

be

a

pres u p posed , the mother's vocal­

striking

way of

establishin g

a con­

onathan's responsiveness to his mother's voc a lizatio n s also re v ealed an interesting trend At 0;5, attempting to grab the

clown do mi na ted the scene.

.

By 0;6, he accompanied

his attempts

to re ac h or grab the clown with undiffe rentiated vocalizations.

Play, Games, and Lonpoge

These were dist ri buted

53

throughout the game . B u t by 0 ; 7 , J ona­

'

than began responding to the game s pred ictable rhyth m . He

lost interest in grabbin g a nd now reacted at appmpriate points by s m il i n g a nd la ughter. Duri ng the Search phase ri g h t after

the

DISAPPEA R A N CE, for exam p le, h is smiling and vocalizations were "sha red" w ith

mother

as

they establ is hed eye comact

while she talked the down back i n to R E A PPEA R A N C E .

Soon after,

Jonathan

began taking a more a ge n t l i ke role ,

t rying cl u m si ly to prod uce the disappearance and reappearance himse l f. No longer pleased to be merely su rprised by t h e dow n , b y 0 ; 8 h e was ready to get t h e clown u p out of t h e cone by h i m ­ self. When h i s mot her l i m i ted h i s efforts, his attention lagged . I n effect, she was forced to let h i m take the lead i n order to hold his interest . When she fa iled to y i e l d (as observed on thi rteen occasions at 0;8), Jonathan a ban d o n e d t he game on half the occasions. She gave in and let h i m take Jl9Ssession of the clown wheneve r he demanded it. To help h i m mana-ge this,

e

she

con­

densed the surface struct u re of the ga m e to t wo essent ial con­

stituents

(gone!

at DISA PPEARA NCE a nd boo!

A NCE). B u t by 0;9, h

ue l).t-o �� r y. gam�.

il t REA PPEAR­

was permi tted to touch and hold the

clown d uring some constituents of nearl y eve ry round. By th e n he was .vocalizing a lo ng w ith his mothe•· on at least one constit-

,

�

� K11?Wlh of Jonathan s motor pa rllcJpauon t he pme · i $,��d in Table 3 . 2 . At the start, it was most l y u nre-

_ ,_

··'�..

•

.

.

acuve,.

.

.

ta1Jll �.2 • PERCENTA G E O F G A M ES I N W H I C H ... JONATJ-".N .�ELD; TOUCHED, OR M O UT H E D T H E Cl.OWN �.....,

\ ··j<.· . .


•.

.. · •••

·

0; 5·\' 0;6 ;, 0;7 0;8

0;9

: ·; Percentage · -�-· of Games _

�.

..

,.

.

S6

Total Number of Games 11

4S

23

53

17

6

75

16 8

.

m

Child's Talk

54

la ted to t he structu re o f the ga m e as a l ready noted. By 0;7, th is random manipulation and grabbing stops--o n ly 6 �rcent of the rou nds cont a i n i n stances of it. But from then to the end of the ni nth mon t h , t hey increase aga i n . Now, however, they a re in t u n e w i th t he struct u re of the game. ,

Finally, towa rd the end o fthe n i nth month , he became bored .

The gmne was not. enough to hold h i m . I t bega n losi ng i ts a ppea l when his interest ,in man ual ex ploration began to donu nate. He beca me more mtcrcsted 1 11 the dow n-and-cone as a toy than as a game. ft.s a tt e n t ion tno\'ed to other ol�ects that gave g rea t e r scope to 1 t i s grow i n g sensory-moto r powe rs B u t his i n te rest i n appearance a n d d i s e1 ppea ra nce did not altogether wane . Toward .

t he end of his ni nth month p e ek a bo o resu rfaced . But it had a

new twist . The sc1me deep structu re was there , bu t w i th a new !!U rlace f(mn . H i s mother would h ide a toy ani mal behind her hack, then "sm·prisc" Jonathan with i ts sudden appearance, m a rked by her boo! Now for t he fi nu time Jonathan m atched his mot he r's u t terances with a standard one of his ow n (a labial "i bra to, or "mspherr>•") . From this small begi n ni ng , an expanded pattern began to ela borate. A mon t h later his mother h i d herself behind a chair and J onath a n waited on the othe r side , wa tching, vocalizing, and

laugh i n g in a � tici pation o f her rea p pea rance . H is \'ocalizatioo.o; we re s i m p l y exnhera n t cal l s as she disa ppeared and reappeared.

But note

that

he

regu la rly looked o.ul(ly immedi;uely a fter h e r

t·c;t ppea nmce , h u t l'i t·t u a l l y always joi ned gaze w i th h e r

before

her next disa ppearance . I n ;mot her two months (m idway th rough his t wel ft h mon t h ) , Jonat han hid h;m.feif be h i n d the same chair. l-I e nut onl)' i n i tiat ed the h id i n g but t e mt i nated i t on reappear­ a nce with a near-sta nda rd ooo ! . During the sc1m e episode , when the expe ri menterjoi ned i n a nd disappeared , Jonath;m cried gum! He now could initiate t he game as agent, with another in the role of expe ri e nce r, and was e'·en ahle to take on a new expe­ rie ncer-the expet· i menter! Two months lcner, at I ;2, the down-and-cone game retu rned to f'
Play, Games, and Language

55

With Richard, peekaboo was more personal- and direct from

the start. I ts structure was classic-he or his mother would dis­ a ppe ar and reappear from behind a screen . Occasionally a toy

Child's Talk

was the object in the game. Their games varied more than Jon­ athan's, Richard's mother being more freewheel i n g about va ri­ a tion s on a theme. Or perhaps "person peekaboo " le nds i tse l f more to variation. Between 0;6 and 0 ; 1 1 , w e observed se ve n ty -o n e games on twenty different occasions. As w ith the clown-and-cone, their game then went underg ro u n d , not to surface again u n t il I ;2. We then observed it in altered form for another twenty-nine games until 1 ; 3, when it went u nderground again. At 1 ;9 it reap­ p ea red , but this time in a form that could be played by Richard alone, without a partner. Conside r the ea rly game (0;6-0 ; 1 1 ) . Roughly, it exhibited t he same "deep structure" as clown-and-cone , t h o u g h its surface structure more readily permitted Richard to take o ve r the role of agent in all constituents since no manual skill was req u i red . I n the begi nning, however, agency was almost completely m o nopoli zed by the mother (Table 3.3); she always in i t ia ted h i d ­ i ng during those early games. By the time the game rea ppe a red at 1 ;2, the pa ttern was transformed : nine out of ten times, Rich­ ard did the h i d i ng. At reap pe a rance i n the earl y game, the mother again initiated, invariably rea p pea ri n g with a smile and hello! Richard " hel ped " by reac hi ng toward i.he mother's. mask only one time in five. D u ri n g the resurfaced gam� }lfter 1 ; 2 , he generally unmasked himself. Later in the first. phase, if he did the h i d i n g , which he did i nc reas i ngly . he did all his own unmask­ ing. He had moved from the role of experiencer. in the first set of games to that of actor in the second set. H is vocalizations also c h ange d in the second se t . I n peekaboo o ne can vocalize before or after the rea ppearance of the hidden s ubject , in anticipation or upon compktion of an act. I n t h e ea rl y games Richard's vocalizations were equally divided . I n the sec­ ond set, however, there were six completion. vocalizations to one an t ici pa tory (Table 3 .3). I n the earlier games his voc a lizations were invariably excited babbles; in th e later ones they were lex­ e me li ke i n len gt h and contour. At first h is sou nd s were p rinc i ­ pally diffusely directed; by the time he played later games, they

Table 3.3

• T H E STR U CT U RE A N D A N A L Y S I S

' R I C H A R D S PEE KA BOO G A M E

o•·

Structure

�(;ame'"----

Subseq uent

A n teced ent top ic

�

eara nce

Prepa ra

topic

�

Rea p pea

is h me n t

Analysis PERCENTA G E OF G A M ES D U R I N G

WHICH

M OT H E R

O K C H I L D I N ITIATED H I D I N G

R ichard's Age

M ot h e r init iated h id i ng C h i ld initia ted h iding

0;6 -0; 1 1

1 00.0

(73

games)

2 1 .9 78. 1 ( 3 2 games) 1 ;2 -1 ;1

P E RCENTA G E O F G A M E S D U R I N G W I I I C tl TtiE MOTI I t: K ,

T H E C I-Ji l . D , O R A N

Mother hidden Child h idden Object hidden

O HJ ECT

W A S I I I D D t: N

R ichard's Age

0;6 -0;1 1

1 ;2 -1 ;J

43.8 28.8 27.4 ( 7 3 games)

6.2 93.8 (32 games)

P E R C E N T A G E Ot" G A M ES D U I U N G W I I I C H MOTII E K , C H I L D , O K BOTH R t:III O \' t:ll M A S K

Rich a rd's Age

M o t h e r removed mask Child removed mask Both removed mask

0;6 -0;1 1

1 ;2 -1 ;J 12.5 . 78. 1 9.4

75.3 . 24 . 7

(73

games)

(32 ga m es )

' P E R C E N T A G E OF t : A M ICS D U R I N G W I I I C II C I I I I. D S V OC A U ZA T I O N S

OCC U R R E D B E F O R E O K A fT E R R E A PPEA R A N C E P H A S E

Before reappearance f»

A fter rea pearance N o vocalizat ions

R ichard's Age

0;6 -0;1 1

1 ;2 -l ;J

20.5 20 . 5 63 . 0 ( 7 3 games)

6.2 37.5 56. 2

(:�2 games)

Child's Talk

sa

were di rected to his pa rtner. They i ncluded such "words" as

(at

1 ; 3 . 2 1 ), peeboo, dtt, hi da, dere, ahh . Since man y of these were also U!;ecl in contexts otlier tha n peekaboo , function i ng as greetin gs (Iii ) or demonstratives (ahh, da, fine), it is possible that by the later

ga m es , peekaboo was no longer

a

self-con tained format. The

mi gration of hi and da into peekaboo suggests that the game was be i n g o pe ned to make way for general greeti ng and demonstra­

tives.

d u ring the t h ree-mon th demise of peekaboo (0; 1 1 Ri c ha rd had begu n a nother a ppea rance-disappea rance format i n volving active search for objects h idden inside contain­ ers o r closed fists. The h iding was always done by a n adult-his mother o r the experimenter-and the searching a nd fi n d i ng by Richard himself. Perhaps it wa.t a form of peekaboo , but I doubt it, for its "drama" was very d i flerent . It seemed more a "guess­ I ndeed ,

l ;2),

i n g ga me."

When peekalx)o

proper reappeared

ye t a ga i n at I ;2, Richa rd

took total control o f t h e role of a ge n t . On wa tc h e d h i s m o t h e r hide her face behind a

fi rst occu rrence, he

box twice o w n face beh i nd the same box each ti m e respond i ng to his pa rt­ videotape

and t h e n "took over." H e hid his

sixteen ti mes consecutivel y ,

'boo ! on his reappearance with a smile and an occasional vocalization. B y J ;3, the game had been conve rted into an. eveq more acti ve form ; Richard no l o n ge r h id be h i nd a box or ·pu t �. cloth in front of h is face, but actuall y moved behind a sofa or c h a i r to "d i sa ppear," then •·eappearing t he same way. H e had easi ly i ncorporated wal k i ng i nto the slots of the ga me that before requ i red on l y moving a screen be fore his face . In fact, the new game afso i ncorporated elements of h ide-and -seek as well , for he also va ried where he hid . A fter 1 ; 3 , Richa rd and h is mother ra rely played peekaboo i n any usual sense of the game. B u t object hiding continued . Yet pee k aboo su rfaced six months lat e r ( 1 :9. 1 4), a ft e r Richard had acq u i red a f;t ir amou nt o f la ngu age . This time, however, it was a solo ga me, between Rich " rd and objects he had h idde n a nd t h e n cau sed to reappear. I n !1pi te of this c h a n ge , t he ga m e was ' ner s

Play, Games, and Language

59

still standard ly ritualized , even t ho u g h it was a "pretend" game in which rea p pea ri n g o�ects were greeted socially as if they were peo p le Richard , for �xam ple , filled a la rge kettle with pieces from a puzzle. He then greeted each piece with h.I.ID howe! when he spied it in the pot that he u ncovered , sharing a smile or lau gh with his mother as he did so He repeated t h e routine again and again, ea c h hei.ID house followed by a 17yt-bye howe as he replaced the lid . Once d u rin g this rou tine , the doorbell rang. Richard swung a rou nd, pointed to the door, ca lling out heUo!, experienc­ ing no difficu lty in sh i fting fmm the pretend he l los of the game to the con v e ntio n a l mode of greeting. He could use his contras­ tive h.llo and bye-bye systematically either i.n a game or in real .

.

"

greeting and departu re . He could also handle

"

the

inte rchange­

a b l e roles i n volved with ease . The fol lowing month , for exam­

ple, h e cal l ed out Where mummy r w hen she hid and then hello

w h e n she rea p peared-much as she wou ld h a ve done had she controlled the ga me. The final e pi sod e in the sa ga of Richard's peekaboo occu rred

at 1 ; 1 1 . 1 4 . He had lost an objec t

behind

t he sofa cushion. He

h a d been able for mont hs to deal w i th such situations by search­

i ng a nd fi n di n g what. was lost on his own or by ca l l i n g for aid . But now t he act of fi nd i n g " for real" was assi milated to the old p l a y format. Searchin g in earnest, he called out allu down fkre, followed by "effort" sounds -that he used i n ca ll i n g for aid (see Chapte r 5 ) . H av i n g succeeded at that, albeit w i th the h e l p of the ex pe rim enter, h e t h e n re\·erted to the play format. He no w hid pe n c i l s intentioMlly be h i nd the so fa cushions whe re before they had gone accidentally, greeting their retrieval by the experi­ menter o r h i mse l f with his call of allu. Richard and his mothe r, then , li ke Jonathan and his, g rad u ­ ally established a · ritualized game in which t he y shared i nter­ changeable roles. The game diversi fied and p rov id e d a pl a c e for · the ch ild'li increasing ini tiative, as he l ea r n ed both how to initiate the game and how to execu te t.he moves. Both c h i l d re n learned easily how to keep the deep structu re of the

ga me constant while

va ry i n g the surface structu re. And both children managed before

60

Child's Talk

they were done to relate the game format to broader, more inclusive formats. The game provided a special occasion, free of pressure, to try out variations on the theme of appearance a nd

disappearance. But in doing so, it also provided an o pportuni ty for the child to participate in the establishment of the sorts of social convention u pon which language use is based.

One final point before we bring our excursion into peekaboo to a close. I t has to do with what &Fore I caRed the Language Ac U lSJtlon Sup ort System . The peekabOO games of &ith chil­ dren were re p ete wn transltaons m w ac mot er wou mtro­ duce a new procedure and gradually "hand it over" to the child as has sktlls lor executm g It developed . It is at the heart of any su r t s stem mvolvin ames--" lay" games and language

games alike. I f the "teacher" i n such a system were to 1ave a motto, it would surely be whe re before there was a spectator, let there now be a participant ." One sets the game, provides a scaffold to a ss u re that the child's ineptitudes can be rescued or rectified by appropriate intervention, and then removes the scaffold part by part as the reciprocal structure can stand on its "

own .

This "handover princi le" is so ubiq uitous that we hardly notice its p resence. We wi 1 see its operauon in the fodowing chapters in the child's acquisition of reference and -request. But it begins a s early as the first interactions. Daniel Sterr,'s work on the build-up of !'turn taking" and "attunemem" of mother a n d child, Kaye and Charney's study of how "turnarounds" in early exchanges a re scaffolded by the mother u ntil t he child can take his own part in them, Brazelton's accou nt of the mother and child's m utual interaction adjustments--a ll of t liese point to the same process of "setting up" the sit uation to make the child's entry easy and successful and then grad ually pt,�lling back and handing the role to the child as he becomes skillful enough to manage it. Indeed , early in our research with jonathan and Richard , I had become aware of this pattern w h e n analyzing the structure

K

.

61

PIGJ, Games, and Language

of "give-and-take" games. Shorl ly after Richa rd reached his f i rst birthday, we went back over the tapes to determine t h ree t hings : (a) when he became the "hande r-over" or agem i n these ames; (b) w )en e

it. l'en·e nl

t i m�

iU l u h

- Adult agent

or

child <�ge m

- - - Child

agem

I I I I I

��-..

�

1 1 .0 Age i n mmu hs- a nd weeks

1 2 .0

1 2.3

·child's Talk J'crn:m exchanges i n i t iOJI Ctl hy ch il. l

1\gc in n11m1 h � and weeks

I a polog ize fm· t h e deta i l in which th ese sim ple games h ave been reco u n ted . B u t th e d etails high l ight t h e ge neral poi n l_s with . whic h the c h a plet· opened . They do i n d eed , eac h of them , creat� . a h igh t r !ll n tctu red com;t i tu t i ve real ity. a Wi tt genste i n i a n " form of l i fe" on w hich t h e child learns to conce n t ra te in a sey voca t7.aUon a n t 1 e n �mticipated by it. These voca!iza­ tions provide a skeletal or formal structu re into which rich a n d more l angu age l i k e val"iants can later b e introd uced . They also provide a veh icle for p racticing in terchangeability o f roles and for n egotiat i n g a ge n c y and oth er of the a rguments o f actio n . A n d t h e y provide a u n iq u e opport u n ity for t h e c�ild t o shift . from "n atu ral " to co n ventional means of med iating the action .

Play, Games, and Language

C h i l c l '!i

pmse!l�inn

t i me

(senmcl!i)

Poi nting

A ge

in

munt

s t ; n·ts

Ju

In the dlaJ>ters t h a t follow I pro pose to show how these same gamelike s tructu res are i m posed on such "bread-and-bu t ter' � for m a ts

as

ind icating a n d requesting-indeed , a re essen tial to

developmen t and elaboration of these com municative fu nc­ tions. They p ro v id e the veh icle that makes possible their com·en­ t he

and, fi nally, their transformation from for m a ts into flex ible and movable s peech acts. To this we turn nex t.

tionalization more

FO U R

--------��-

The Growth of Reference

T

HE

is to explore some of the Steps toward the m aste ry of linguistic re fe re nce B u t before pl u nging into that task, we wou ld be well advised to pause ove r the thornier complexities of that ancient topic. It is, to begi n with, impossible to proceed to a n em pi rical A I M OF TH I S CH A PTER

.

study of reference without adopti n g a p h ilosop hical view with rega rd both to a philosophy of m i n d and a philosophy of lan­ guage. Ne u t r a l i t y creates mud d l e. Yet t h i s is not the p l ace to review the e m pi ric al fru itfulness of conten ding philosophica l views. I shall content myself sim ply by exposing my biases so that the reader may be forewa rned . The general or philoso p hical theory of r e fer en ce that I h ave

fou nd most com pa �ible with my ow n search for the psychologi­ ca l roots of reference is o n e put forward by Hilary Putnam. For , m y i n te rest, like his, is in the causal historical chain that Jinks� introducing referential event (when one person tries to ind icate, however crudel y , what he has on his m i nd) and so m e later refer­ ode (when ea ch member of a communicatin g pa ir assigns ential a ,-e fe rential i n ter p retation to a message t at passes etween them). This framework resu oses fou r thin s . The first is that ·

can signal to each other that they have a referentm inttnt. The second is that reference c a n vary in pre- 1 cision from a ra ther wool l y va ueness to a proper singular, de ­ in ite referring ex pression. In ee two parues to a conve rsation may refer to the "sam e" to p ic with widely different degrees of precision . The "electrici t y" t ha t a ph ysicist m oth e r has in m i n d will not be the "same" as what her child com prehends when she w a m s him about getti n g a shock. Still the t wo may carry on about " electricity" in spite or th is i n d e fi n i t eness. Their con ve rsation�ll negotiation may even incrtast her ch ild's defin iteness. Tru th - is not all that is invol ved in such ca usal chains. The ch i l d's concepi n d ividuals

o,-

i n d ica tin

,

68

Child's Talk

tion of electricity may be vacuous or �ven wrong, yet there is a referen t that not only exists in such asymmetric conversa­ tions, but that can be developed both for its truth value and its

joint

definiteness .

A th i rd presu pposi tion is that re fe re n ce is a form of social interacuon havmg to do with the management ofjoint attention.

h is not simply a relation between some th i n g in one pe rson's

he ad and something in the world, as in the classical "refe rence

trian gle ". of Ogd e n and Richards. I t is characterized , rdther, by

a division of labor. In ou r example, one member of the pair may know all about electricity , th e other only e n o u gh to have a place­

holde r for fu rther specification . That is e nou gh for an ini tial

interaction.

The fou rth and final presu pposition of P u t n a m 's position is that there is a goal-struc.ture in referring. It is sustained not only

by intent to Tefer, but by appropriate means for doing so a n d by

specification as to w h e n one has succeeded . The means comprise

t h e set of proced ures by which two people establish 'joi ntness"

in their atte ntion. They vary from such evolved li ngu istic dev ices

as anaphora (re ferring back to

text)

and deixis (refe rring back

to context) to simple ostensive pointing. Achieving the goal of re fe rring has li ule to do with agreement about a si ngular· defi­

n ite refe rent. I t i s enough that the pa rt ies to ·a�Tefe rential

exchange know they sha re enough

ove rla p

in their

focal

atten­

tion to make it worthwhile continuing, as Werner De u tsc h and

Tom Pechmann have noted . When the physicist mot h er tells her four-year-old that he has j ust been shocked by "electricity," she

does not

a nd need not assume that he has either the same exten­

sion or i n te n s ion of the concept as she does. Nor need she ca re , if the conversation can only continue. The pro blem of how reference develops can� accordingly, be restated as the problem of how people manage and di rect each other's a tten tion by linguistic means. We may properly ask how linguistic attention-management is superimposed on preli ngu is­ tic means and i nquire as to how the first extends a nd modifies the second.

I f we make the reasonable ass u mption that at some poi n t the

The Growth

of Reference

child begins to

develop some primitive notion of semantici t y­

that patterned sounds stand

for

part ic u lar thi ngs or classes of

th ings i n experience-then i t is no great mystery that such sou nds

will at first accompany ostensive referential gestu res and even­

tually

e ven re p l ace them. The child may even i nitiall y

use no n ­

sta ndard but in terpretable sou nd patterns that, in the i n te rest of k ee p in g the negotiation of attention goi n g , t he ad u lt comes to imitate . B ut the l inguistic com m u n i ty can be coun ted on to move

forms of r e ference or community. Li nguis tic conven­

the language l ea rn e r towa rd t he standard towa t·d forms accessible to the

tions and s tand a rd forms do n o t leap full gro w n from the egg.

j

They usually a re slow transformations of initially prim itive

or

"natural " proced u res that become socialized in negotiatio n .

Bringing a not h e r s attention '

to a oint focu s is wides p read in

the pr i m a te order. M ichael Chance, describing the hierarchial

orde ring of Old

World

monkeys, n o t e s that even dominance

posit ion cim be defined by the distribution of attent ion in the

grou p-less d o m in an t animals attend ing u p the h ierarch y , more dom i na n t ones being freer to extend the i r attention elsewhe re .

animals force attentio n on themselves. Chimpanzees pr9bably othet· Great A pes habitually follow t h e line of reg-.ud of animals to determine the "target" of the ot hers' search . It is not plain whether they ever solicit or pro ff er infor­ Dom inant

in t he wild and

mation about a referent. Wha t is u nique abou t man, of cou rse , is that he m a na ge s joint attention

by j ust such soliciting and

p ro­

ferr i n g through the m edi um of indexes, icons, and symbols . I t

i s not

surprising

that six-month-old human infants, given t h e i r

primate inheritance, redi rect their a t te n t i o n by following anoth­

e r's l i ne of rega rd . What is - su r p rising is that even during the i r fi rst year, they

begin

redirecting their attention i n response to

subtle conventional cues that are featu res of ad ult language , such as cha racteristic u pward changes

in

referential s stem seems to be a ver

or

i n to n a t i on

"o

.

The putalive

n" one . I t shifts ve r

'

70

.

Child's Talk

ut�rance i n a context. Any account of the ontogene�is of reference

must take this deictic feature into account. I ndeed, John Lyons argues that deixis is the source of reference, that "locating in context" rather than simply "tagging" is the heart of reference, whether in early commu nication or later. One might reasonably expect to find, then , that the acquisi­ tion of referring procedu res is heavily dependent on the "arranging'" and si m p l i fying of contexts by the adult to assu re th;tt deictic demands be manageable for the child . Routinization of contexts would assu re fa m i l ia r easily i n terpretable settings in which mothe r and child cou ld locate o r "place" objects and events to which they referred. The fact that the child already knows how to manage and in terchange roles w ill, moreover, be of great help to him in relating his ow n refe rent ial acts to the acts of his partners i n di alogue. For context and deixis depend on being able to shi ft and exchange perspective . The kinds of "game" skills discussed in the p recedi n g chapter, including skill in negotiating turns and conditions, are crucial to referential activity-as we shall shortly see . We tu m now to how a mother and child in a highly recipro­ cal interactidn attempt over the better part of a year to reach agreement (be it only a Putnam-like, pa rtial overlap agreement) about what a th i ng s ha l l be called . ,

The

Management ofJoint

Attention

Fi rst steps take place early. As Robson and others since have noted , the earliest and most primitive phase of joint attention is the establishment of sustained eye-to-eye contact. Its beginning is an im portant m i les to n e for the mother. I t is the point when the mothe r o ften re ports that her child has become a "real human being." It provokes much vocalization from the mother and , shortly after, from the child . By the end of the second month , eye-to-eye contact with vocal accompaniments has become well establ ished . Mother and child begin to show turn taking in "turning on" and "turning ofT. " Nobody has described this join­ ing process better than Daniel Stern.

Tlae Grotl}tla

of Refereru:e

71

____/( See the pretty dolly*

She characteristically accom panied

the

vocalization by moving

cflila's line of regard and shaking or other­ wise " ore rontm at. Her secon approac was . to pac up an object the child had al ready focused u n an to move at mto the ob'ect into the

"

t e space tween erse an the c al , again shaking or loom­ i ng it i n as sfle vocalized. Table 4 . 1 presents a sam ple of such object-play formats, some 303 in a ll for the two children. It records the number of i nstances of object highlighting and the number of discrete utterances. Object highlighting is p la in ly a fixtu re of the early · months. B y the: end of the first year it has virtually dropped ou t. With respect to accompanying utterances by the mothers, it is striking

during precisely those months when the two infants s how �ast si gn either of u nderstandin g or of pro­ ducing lan guage. Once language appears, the frequency begins

that

they _are most

frequent

to drop-although in J onathan's case, it rises again, though

with a quite different pattern and content, as we shall see. The "implicit" lesson being o ffered i n these early object-play formats',

is that la nguage accompanies attending to and handling objects­ a way is phased to the actions in progress. VOca lization at this stage is a "place-holde r for later la nguage that will be used w hen ol?jects are being hand led . and in

..

• The l ine superim posed on the utterance is an appt"oximation or the stress in

the mother's in tonation.

·

7l

Child's Talk

Table 4. } IN

• OBJECT HIGHUGHTING A N D DISCRETE UTTERA N CES OBJECT·PLA Y fORMATS BY THE C H I LDREN'S MOTHERS

Jonollaa11

Richard

rnontla1 10-16 1 1 -1 8

Age in

J-9 I nstances of highlighting H ighlight ings per episode Discrete u ue ra nces

U t tera nces p er episode

1 24

2.03 704 1 1 .5

N u mber of

episodes

62

•

Age in rnontla1 6-12 lJ -1 6 1 1-1 9 21 -:H

15

75

0.29

0.82

0. 03

0.06

253

1 30

830

1 86

65

1 00

4.87

8. 1 2

9 . 02

4 . 76

4 . 06

3 . 85

52

16

92

39

16

26

Once the child ren showed a reliable , readil y e voked orient­ i ng reaction to objects p resented in this way , each mother

.develo ped a characteristic,

routinized way of p repa r i n g for

presentation when the child was nol in eye to-e ye contact with -

her. This took the form of an individually standardized auentional vocative based on the child's name .

�

Richard

_f\_

Jonathan

By five months such vocatives had become workaday mea ns for

getting the child to look tow ard the mother or to search for an

attentional target.

"Proper name" vocatives were soon after expanded by addi­

tions of the following kind :

.._/

Oh, look

�

See what I have

'

73

The Growth of Reference

" u n d i fferentiated deictics" that spedfy t h a t t he re i s somet h i n g

somew here i n

the en vironment t o

a ttend to. By the end

of the

fi rst year these expressions become genera l alerting signals the ch ild about the possibility of a shift i n a ttention focus

to

. .

Here the wo r k of Maire Loga n Ryan is pa rticu la rly relevant .

She worked with mother·baby pairs, infants aged twelve mom hs,

whose mothers were all nat ive speakers of Glaswegian English . These mothers, she found, were m uch more likely to use a rising intona tion pattern w hen s h i ft i ng reference to some t h i ng other than w hat their children were atte n d i ng to. A second , associated

fi nding was more striking: A baby was mo r e likely to c h ange the

focus of h e•· atten tion to the object that ·her mother was hold ing when the mother spoke w it h a rising i n to n a t ion pattern than w he n she did not. C u rrent work o n the res ponsiveness of chil­ d a·en to such u n d i fferen tiated deictic i n tonational cues suggests that the fas t-rising stress may ha ve a " natu ral" powe r to a t t ract an i n fant's attention.

The fi rst phase of managing joi nt attent ion , \'ery much und�r

the control o f the mot her, thus appears to resu lt in the child

d i scoveri ng signals

in

the mother's speech that indicate that the

mother is attc:nd i ng to "something

to

look at.

"

Seyen months

s ee m ed to be t h e age at which o u r children reached sensit ivity to " u nd ifferentiated deictics."

A concomitant p h a s e in development is more s pecific a nd

relates Jo the child being able better to spot what it is that occu ­

.,.,itJeer's atten tion. I n its sim plest form

pies child's .

M ic.. Sca i fe and

,

it consists of the

rc'Jtfbwing another's line of regard to a target at a distance

from the t�o of them.

I

d id the fi n t simple

experiment, i n volving an adult sitting opposite an i n fa n t (sub­

jects ranging from th ree months to somewhat over a year), first

m a ki n g eye-to-eye contact and then turning ninety d egre es eit her

to left or righ t and looking outward intently. The turn was

look." By eight to ten momhs, two-thirds of ou r infants we re following the shi fted of regard. and by one year all of them were . The experiment was done more carefully by Butterworth, and he noted seveml add itional featu res i n ' the gaze-following pattern . The first and most accompanied by a stressed "oh ,

line

Child's Talk

74 important was tha t the

one-year-old child

· the li ne of rega rd, search for

an object,

wou l d

look out

along

and if h e found none,

would retu rn to the adult's face for a seco nd look, following which he would t u r n outwa rd again. There seemed to be an ex pec­ tancy that a target could be found. The second feature was that the i n fant would not tu rn outward a greater a n g u l a r distance i n search of the 9bject tha n the point a t which h e still held the adult's face in the periphery of h is gaze . In effect, he was looking for an object, bu t doi ng so while keeping the adult in his visual field . The concurrent search for a t a rge t and the maintainin g of con­ tact su ggest that we a re i ndeed de a l i n g with a very much m ore specific form of attention management than th�t provided by the u ndi fferentiated

deictic.

U n fortunately,

this

type of

m ore

specific deictic marking of a putative referent has not been ex pe rimentally combined with the nons pedfic attentional voca­ tive d iscussed earlier, but we did note i n formally t h a t the likeli­ hood of a child following ga ze di rection i nc re ased when the experimenter's turned gaze was accom panied by some such ex p ression as "oh, look." I m ust digress for a moment to com m e n t on the seem i n g ' depa rtu re from egocentrism these in fants showed . After all, they 'JJJeTe able to "take another's penpective" in searchi ng the envi­ ronment. Doubtles.o; there a re many respects i n which infants a. n d . young chi ld ren are egocentric i n the sense Piaget and others have imended, bu t I t h i n k it is necessary to recognize that there is an important cou n tervai li ng tendency operative. The briefest way of cha racterizi n g it is to say that infa nu and you n g children from very early on appear, like adults, to be N aive Realisu who believe tbat there is a world of objects "ou t there" a n d that others are e"periencin g the same world that they a re . And , indeed , what­ eve r philosophical position we adulu may eventually take, how­ �er const ructionalist ou r e p istemology may become, I think Naive Realism is everybody's working belief-a point that has bee n made with some phi losophical force by Hilary Putnam and argued psychologically by William Hoga n . By the si x th or seventh month, the child's attention becomes ·

Tlu! Growth of Reference

75

dominated by h is efforts to reach and take objects, to exchange

them , a n d so on. We shall speak of this later in connection with

the growth of req uest. Hr:: re it su ffices to

say only that joint

atte ntion , in the months after reaching is w el l developed, beco mes

the child deve lo ps the ki nd s of "action schemas" and �CI"ipts a bout the world t h a t were discussed

domina ted

by joint

ea a·l i e r. The

action w hi l e

and is not just im'Olved i n comprehending and decodin g othe rs' that

the child

pri nci pal achievement during this active p h a se is now becomes a giver of signals about objects desired

efforts to direct his attention .

A crucial n e xt hase be 'ns w i th the emer ence of i ntin by t e child . "Pure.. pomting, so-called , e m e rged at nine and a_ hal f mon ths . in Jonathan and at thirteen months in Richard . 1"he d a li e re n c e m ages may have h ad to do w ith the earlier age

w h ic h Richard

at

began

walkm g .

Jonathan,

required a s i gn a l i n g system to the objects he

easily. Poi n ti n g does

n ot

a "slow walker.'' cou l d

not get to

appear to be an e xtens i o n or m odi fi ca­

tion of re ac h i n g , even of ostensiv� or co n ven t i on a l i zed reach ing

of that efTortless kind by w h ich the child (as w e shall see) i n d i ­

cates an

o�ect that he w i s h es to be obtained for him withou t

q uite re ac h i ng

for

it.

I t seems more l i kely that poi n ti n g is part

of a pri m i ti ve markin g s ys t em for singling out th e noteworthy.:)

poi nting by adults, and ability to com p rehend an adu l t point precedes his own pro­ d u c t io n by a m o n th or two in o u r records. In Jonathan's case the Obviously, t h e child has been exposed to his

first observed poin ts are toward near-distant ol?jects seen th rough the gard e n wi ndow, h is pqi nt sometimes being accompanied

a

protodemonstrative

um.

by

Richard's fi rst points (someti mes

acco mpan ied by da) a re for old objects seen in new contexts (cu p

that mother has put on her head) and for new objects in fam i liar

c on texts

(as

when magpies Ay into the field next to his

summer

cottage). Pictures also evoke poiming-familiar pictu res partic­

u l a rly, w h en seen in a boo k . Poi nting, it appears, also occ u rs i n efforts t o give "abstract" or u ncertain re ferents a locus. I must say a word about a concurrent developme n t be fore I can suggest w hat this last development m igh t mea n .

Child's Talk

"ind icate" o �ects. t a

pears to

t e start

o a enuine seman­

ucuy ypot esas-t at particu lar, non standard voiced sounds indicate partic u l ar classes of objects. These voaced so u nds took the pl ace of t h e demonstratives dti a nd um. I n any case, Richard · had by this time begun to produce such forms modeled loosely on adu l t speec h , e.g., apoo for apple, boe for bird , etc. I t was in connection with boe that we observed pointing as a rather "abstract" locative act. Richard had (as earlier noted) been obse rv i n g roo ks and magpies (new to him) fl y i n g abou t that afternoon in a field next to the summer cottage in which he was staying. That eveJ!ing when he was indoors, seated on the floor, fo rt u n a tely being videorecorded, ·he sat quietly for some moments, then pointing u pwa rd he uttered (rather absently and tentatively) his word for "bird," boe. He seemed to be locating in his p rese n t space a n object recalled from m e mo r y His lexeme, boe, served as a nominal specifier of hi� poi n t with a spatial deic­ "

"

.

tic in the absence of an actual object. Magda Kalmar has observed and photographed a similar phenomenon in which a chi ld , i n much the same stage of development a s Richard, i s listening to a clock held to his ear. He seems puzzled as to where the sound is coming from . Finally, he points upward as he listens,. as if giv­ ing the so u nd a spatial context. Let m e briefly co mment on the refe re ntial specificity of pho­ netically consistent forms. Boe was quite specific. I ts sem antic scope was l i m i t ed to H y ing b i rd s But take Richard 's ghee. H e seemed t o u se it in m uch the s a m e way a s one might u s e a n expression like thingumabob. Ghee referred either t o "new" objects that were i m pressive in appearance but small in size or to famil­ ia r objects for wh ich he knew no name o r to objects that were som ewhat surprising in con tex t-uses si mila r to those d is c ussed earlier for poi n ting. Ghee was used rath e r like a ph1ceholder for .

"name-worthy" objects. Once pointing and ph o ne tica l l y consist�nt forms appear, they are very soo n recrmted mto the lamahar "Where" and "What11

•

Tlae Growth of Reference

77

games that had lon before been established . onathan's mot her ' at go. as early as fou r months, ga n e r eres e and Richard's started her What's tAis7 for prese n t i ng objects at n i n e months-in n e i t h er case with any possibility of appropriate

response. Bm once pointing appears, WhiTe's the X7 becomes a real request for a poi nt. This rou t i ne is well established l(n· Jon­ athan by twelve m o nt h s and for Richard by t hirteen to fourteen months. At fifteen months, this query is incorpora te d by the parents of both ch ild ren i n to the fo r m atted ga m e of " Bod y Pa ns." Where's 'JIIUT nose7, etc. (answered by an appmpriate poi nt) is soon followed by What's that7 (mother pointing to the child's nose). What's that 7, of cou rse, evokes vocalizations, then nonstand a rd lexemes, and fi nally names. What's thatr and WhiTe's the X7 go hand in glove. They a re classic instances of indexicals-in the sense of re la t i ng a sign to an e le me n t of immed iate nonli nguistic cont.ext. The child's mas­ tery of such i ndexicals now makes possible the development of new d iscourse pa tte rns that permit movement to a more advanced le vel of de a l i n g i n t ralinguist icall y w i t h language­ words relating to other wo1·ds and not simply to e le m e nts of nonlingu istic contex t . To that w e turn next . "Boolr

A nat

Readin1":

N i n io and I

m o th er " reading

The Growth of Discourse Labels

kept a pa rticu l a r watch on Richa rd and his

books" d u ring

the cou rse of Richa rd's second

year. I t was one of Richard's fa vo ri te games, and �e simply made video recordings of its natu ral occurrence without having to request any "performances. " It seemed like a pa rticularly good w ind ow through which to observe not only how naming was managed , bu t also to observe descriptions of actio�all in t h e context of d i sco urse and dialogue. The boo k s, of course, were "pictu re books. " .Earlier forms of this kind of "dialogue" were about body parts or about things, the names of concrete objects serving as topics. Those eadier forms also took on a gameli ke

, Child's Talk

format as i n give-and-take and the kinds o f exch a n ge s d_escribed

in the preced ing chapter. Tho11e games, recall , im pose rolell, t u r n attention, <md a seq ue n tia l structure. Book reading is built on those a l rea dy established skills. But now there is exchange about nonconcrete, pictu red topics. The previously established skills, li ke turn taking, a re virtually perfect right from the start of hoo k readi ng. Only abou t I percent of the two par­ taking. joint

ticipant.s' u t tera nces,

than alterna tel y .

for example, occu r

si m u ltaneously r a t h er

Throu ghou t, t h e mother tailors h e r pa rtici pation in

boo k

apparent competence. I t is hard to know how "conscious" she is of what she is doing, for this match i ng is so au tomatic-even when fou r-year-olds talk to younger ch il­ reading to the child's

d ren , as Rochelle Gelman a nd Marilyn Shatz have so ele ga n t l y

shown.

The \'ariet o f the mother's utterance ty pes in boo k re adi n g

ou r ey utter­ of variant toke n s of each. I hese types were (I) the Attentional Vocative, e.g., LOok; (2) the Query, e.g. , What's that7; (3) the Labet, e.g., /t's an X; and (4) the FeedbaCk Utterance, e.g., Yes. They a re ill u strated below by an exa m pl e from a session at I ; I. L

is st rikingly 1m1te ance types, wnh

MOTHER: ctm.o:

a

1e

.

rna

es repeate

u� o

su rpnsmgly small number

Loo k ! (Atten tional Vocative)

(Touches

pictu re)

(Query) ( Vocalizes a babble string and s m i l es) Yes, they are rabbits. ( Feedback and Label)

MOTH ER : What are those? cm w :

MOTU ER: cmw:

(Vocalil:es, smiles, a n d looks u p at mother) Yes, rabbit. (Feedback a n d Label)

JttO THER : (Lau ghs)

CH i l.D: ( Vocalizes, smiles)

MOTH ER :

Yes. (Laughs) (Feedback)

Table 4.2

contains

the distribu tion of each of the

types and thei r to ke ns

fou r u tterance

.

The fo u r u ttera nce types and their tokens accou nt for vir­ tuall y all of the mother's utterances in the "reading format" for

TabU 4.2

• UTTERA NCES CLASSIFIED AS TO KENS

THE FOUR

MAJ O R

TYPES

I. Allenrional Vdeatiw1

6J

61

Lookl

II.

Loo k a t thatl

4

Query

85

57

Wh at's that?

Wh a t are th ose ?

What are they doing?

What is it?

8

6

5

What a re they?

What'!'l on that page?

1

1

What have we got here?

I

What's ove r here?

1

What's

the next one?

What else can you see th e re?

Wha t does that do? What do you

1 I

there?

see

What can you see ?

111. Label

X

( = a stressed label)

I t's

an

X

Th at's an X

6 6

T�� � x X-ing

(e .g., going

.

to

More X

. .

bed)

They a re X

These are the X

The X You

can

That

see the X

one is an X

Loo k at the X It says : X

We'll call it

Kind of X

34

12

That's X

a re

91

12

An X

Lot11 or x

216

28

Th ere is an X

They

an

OF

OF THE MOTH ER'S SPEECH

X

5

5

3 3

S

2 1 · 1

1 I I

I

So

Child's Talk TabU 4.2

(continued)

Tyjw I ToAens W. Feed6aclc

80

50 8 5 3 .2 2 2

Yes

Yes, I know

It's not an X

That's it! Isn't it?

N ot

X

Yes ,

it is

You

a re

No, it's

Th at's

not

X

charming

No, i t's

right

an

X,

.

not a

No, it's an X

Y

Yes, they are Yes , very good

That's not an X

I

I

l

I

1 I

the · whole of the pe riod studied. For each of the type s a si1tgk token accou nts for from nearly half to more than 90 pe rcem of the i n stance s Mor.eover, the intonation of these utterances i s vir· ,

.

tually unchanged from t he earl y to the late sess�on� _!with .a few

exceptions to be noted

later).

The key u t t era nce types, moreover, were governed by strict discourse and ordering constraints. Within a gi ven cycle , the orde r of utterances was remarkably stable . They occu r almost exclusi vel y in the or.der: ·

(1) (2) (3) (4)

A ttentional Vocative

Query Label Feedback

Variations a re al most a ways m the form of a deletion of a n ele· ment. One or two steps m a y be left out for reasons that will be plain in a moment. In short, if an Atten � ional Vocative occurs it will almost sut·ely be the first utterance; if a Query occurs it will

The Growth

of Referenee

be before a Label

81

or Feedback.

I n con seq uence, the tou r

ance types form an ordered Guttman scale of over 85 reprod ucibility, far in excess of chance . ·

utter­

percent

When a step is left out, it is for good reason , as noted. Rich­ ard's mot her n�sponds to what he does . I f he initiates a cycle by poi nting Of \'OCalizing,

she

a·esponds with

A uentional Vocative. Or, i f he

offers

a Query and omits the

an acce p table label afte r

her Query, she will virtually always ski p the Label and j ump to

Feedback. I n a word, she is responding to him as she wou ld to a "real" partner in an exchange . That premise prov ides the basic struct ure of their fommt . Table 4 . J

•

D ISTR I B UTION OF M OTHEtt ' S A N D C U U.D'S

LABELS B Y REFERENTIA L FOCUS

Percent of Motl&er's Labels

Common nouns or whole objects Common nouns or parts or objects Pro pe r names Other (actions, attributes, etc.) Total percent Total number or labels

Percent of Child's Labels

88.9 2.9

89 . 8 4. 1 4. 1

4. 1

2.0

4. 1

1 00. 0

1 00.0

1 70

49

The mother bypasses the Wiugensteinian d i lemma ("What

feature o f a

90 pe rce nt 4 .3), and since ha l f

refe rent does a label refe r to?") . Nearly

of her labels refer to whok objects (see Table of the remainde r are made. u p of proper names tha t also stand for the whole, sh e creates few difficulties about feature e xtrac­ t ion . I f, as both Willard Q u i ne and l tzak Sch lesi nger propose , language leamers a re "bOdy-minded" rctther than "featu re­ minded," Richard's mother is on their side; · Body-minded ness may not solve all of Wmgenstein's dilemmas, but it see m s to bypass this one. For there were virtually no con fusions as to what Richard's mother's labels referred. I n respon�ing to Richa rd's e fforts, his mother appe�1red to

82

Child's Talk

be

operating on a fresh ly u pdated, detailed "i nvedtory" of his

know led ge of o bj ects and events, of the words he had previousl y u ndcntnod , 3nd of the forms of expression of which he was capable. In the main, she gave him the benefit of the doubt when he made an am biguous utterance (of which more presently) or "excused" a wrong response to her Qu ery with kind words and expression. You haven't seen one of those; thal's a goose. Or You don't reaUy lmow what those are, do you1 They art mittens; wrong time of the year for those. Or /fs a tkJg; I know yott know that one. We 'U find you something you know very weU. B u t she could a l so i nsist: Come on, you'vt lmrnttd 'briclt.t. ' On the whole, as with the games reported in the preced ing chapter, th e mother created an acce pting a n d supporting situ ation. Exceptions to this rule (like exce p tions to Grice's maxims of conversation) were reasoned ones whose fu nct i o n we w ill p resen t ly ex a mi n e

Tlbie 4.4

.

sets out ' the rate and nature of Richard's partici­ pation in boo k reading. H i s active re s po nses i ncluded vocaliza-

Table 4.4

• PROPORT I O N

THE

CH I LD

Pn-cnt of Cycl•s in Wllith Child · Number Madr: at Lmst

Agr:

ofRr:aJing Cycl••

0;8. 1 4

2

1 ;0.25

7

0; 1

1 .7

I ; 1 .7

On• At:tiw Rr:sponsr: 50.0

OF

MA DE

REA D I N G

Num�r of

At:tiw Turru by the Cltilrl 4

Vot:alimlion 0.0

Laica�. La�l• 0.0

35.3

6

83.3

13

76.9

0.0

38.9

28.6

7 1 .4

JO

37.5

17

26

18

1 ;3. 1 3

36

43.8

18

35

1 : 5.8

19

I ;6. 1

7

1 ; 5.22

Containi"B a

Pu-ent of VOt:Glations That ore

17

40

1 ; 3 .2 1 1 ;4. 1 4

Pr:rcnat of Active Tums

55.6

9

1 ; 1 . 22 1 ;2.7

CYCLES I N WH I CH

ACTI V E RESPO N SES

4

86. 1 88.9

60 22

80. 2

32

1 00 .0

5

1 00.0

12

77. 1

50

90.0

4 1 .2

93 . 3

95.4

92.0

1 00.0

1 00. 0

1 00.0

0.0

0.0 0.0

50.0 . 6 1 .9 54.3 28. 1

20.0

50.0

Tlu

Growth of Reference

tio n , gestu re, smile, eye con tact with mother, and sear.ch for

a specified object. Note that, not surprisingly, participation in­ creases steadily with �•ge. A n� obviously he vocalizes more and his vocalizations become more j n te r p re ta ble at the same time.

The appearance

of some

standard lexical labels at

I ;2

encouraged Richard's mo th e r to believe that he had m a s te red

the "semanticity h ypothesis"-that he knew now that sounds .have meani ngs. She bega n to act as if h e r child were ca pa ble of words ra t h er than mere babbles. Her i m pu t a t i o n rules" for the chi ld's "

vocalizations cha n ged shar p ly. Now she treated them as i f they "meant" something or, when they were am biguou s , as if they

should mean some t h i n g In the latter case, if she could not make out w h a t they meant, she pressed him to repeat or to rep a i r his u t terance. She became much fi rm e r in he r demands, thou g h still .

penn issive in her i nter p retations.

After the a ppea rance of those fi rs t lexeme-length phono­ logiqdly constant babbles, she treated h is babbling in a new way.

Whereas before she accepted his babbling efforts permissively, if th ey were auempts at la be l ing to w h ich she sup p l ied a cor­

as

rective label·, now she demanded that he respond more lexically.

She wou ld repeat the - What's thal r Query, often with the tag You

/mow, dun.'t you r She still m a intained the o rd e r of u t tera nce types described earl ier, bu t now she wou ld repeat one of them , th e Query , u ntil Richard gave a satis factory performance. A shorter, lexeme-length babble would do. She had plainly u p ped . her req u i rements.

Once the ch i ld. was plainly ca pable of p rod u ci n g words, or wo rd l i ke sounds, his mother raised the ante agai n . J ust as before she would not accept incoherent lo n g babbles but only lexeme­ length o nes now she insisted on word s Even then, she rema ined t u ned to h i s capacities an d would avoid pressing him too h ard ,

.

.

The game remai ned a game. There were few confrontations.

A crucial step occurred i n the labeling game when

the mother

knew th at Richa rd knew the label she was asking for. Now she

began to use a s h a r p l y d i ffe rent intonation pattern in her Query to signal that "I know that you k n ow Her W/mf.f llmt1 Query was ."

now given with a falling intona t ion when she asked about words

Child's Talk

that

(in her estimate) the child already knew. Mother and child

the given and the new. When the presuppositionally marked Query was given with a fallin g intonation contour, Richard looked know­ i ngl y at his. mother and smiled and m i gh t even "tease" her by delaying response a bit. Wallace Cha fe makes the interesting point that the distinc­ tion between old and new information is closely akin to that between topic and comment or subject and predicate. And it is of more than passing interest that the old or established labels were the ones around which the mother began elaborating com­ ments and q uestions f� r new information, such as , · were on to the presuppositional distinction between

MOTH ER:

What's th a t ?

CHILD: fis hy.

(falling intonation)

he doing? . Now the rising intonation is shi fted to "doing" in her fi nal tur� as i f a predicate of action (so m e t h i ng new) is being called for. And soo n the game shifted from labeling to predication. What . psychological "engine" d rives the child's mastery of labeling? Is i t, as Saint Augustine would have us belie�e; some sort of imitation ? Obviousl , there must be 59me. iplitative ele· ment, but it is certainly not "direct" Imitation; · ' er ev1 ence as against 1t. Take first the chdd1s repeuuon of a label provtded by his mot he r at the appropriate place in the cycle. He repeats it abou t half the time. But thi s rate of repetition i s J1o higher than that which occu rs when hi h imse l f provides the label as a �sponsc to his mother's Query a n d then repeats himself. He also repeats about half the l im e after his mothe•·'s feedback o r after her rep­ etition of his label. Looked at another way, we can ask whether he is more im pelled to reply to a Query that asks for a label or to repeat a labei just uttered by his mo th e r . What's thatP prOduces MOTH ER:

Yes, and

what's

eight times as many labeling responses as imitations of his

moth­

label. The child is trying to answer a question . The mother's label provides him with a model for doing so. But the model word is to be used in rqdy to a tpU'Stion-not as an imitation of the e t·'s

The Growth

of Reference

ss

parem. He, the child , i s responding to the intmt her label.

question . He rarel y mirrors How did

preceded

he

c om e to

by months the

o f his

mother's

u n de rs ta nd that inten t ? That intuition

beginni ng of the

boo k -reading format .

I ts "m·igin" is probably "natural," whmever t h a t means. Like g-.ue following or "point following," both also "na t u ra l , " appreciation of Query in tent is soon incorporated by the mothe r into a con ­ ventionalized format t ha t pe r m i ts the introduction of signs, anticipations, and the l i ke The mother in all th e se cases conven­ t io n al i zes her sign ali n g of "intent ions," "objects," and "events" as fast as the chil d can manage "uptake" of her conventions. She then mo ve s on a nd embeds these ne wl y establ ished skills into still newer rou ti ne s ra i si n g the ante when she j udges t he ch ild to be ready. At each ste in this progre�sion , s he is establishing a place­ holder at wh ich mo re symbo ic routines can be su su t u te later. Undifferentiated deictics a re replaced by pointin Undifferen­ tiated babbles in res nse to Qu e ne s m the - rea mg ormat are first re l aced b lexeme-len th babbles and then by wor s. One is led to conclude that a s t e in a n t masters t t e rou t mes of one level, e nou gh processing capacity is freed for him to man­ .

,

.

forward , as Marilyn Shatz has suggested . What freeing to occur, of cou rse, is the oppor-· tunity to use and thus pe rfec t communicative ro u t i nes in mother­ steadied, formatted d i alogu e If you should now ask what leads the child to take his steps forward , why he does not stay at the level where he was, then we s h a l l have to speculate alxmt t h e o peration of a Language Acquisition Device or of some more gener.al push to co�petence . I t is ob v i o u s ly not su fficient to say only that the ch ild h as more processing ca p acit y "freed u p" . by his increased mastery. There m u st also be some push t h a t mo\•es hini toward more evolved linguistic perfoa·mance as wel l What that is remains as mysterious as before . But that the m o t h e r and the adult world provide a st e ad y i n g sup port system for that growt h is p lain e no u gh What we have seen is that over this cru­ caal pe nod an \he growth of reference, the mOther remains steady in her p rincipl_ed responses to the child 's efforts, c h a n gi n g only age the next step

pe r m i ts this req u isite

.

.

.

•

Child's Talk

86

enough to take account of his emergi ng skill, promoting it and .pushing it ligh tly. She remains steady, so to speak, s o that the 'child can try ou t and consolidate his changes. ·

Tlreory Rm1ited

Several issues ra ised at the start of the ch a p te r can now profit visi ted aga i n . Recall Putnam's discussion of asymmetl")' in reference, as with the physicist mother warning her child about electricit y . I th i n k the e xa m ple w e h ave explored-Richard a n d his mother dealing with reference-underlines his point. Their interchange seems to be governed by the principle that no speaker is entirely igno­ rant-an ex te n sion of his Principle of Reasonable I gnorance, · which assert'l that no speaker is e n t i re ly omniscient. We operate with the belief that any_ topic can be referred to (or brought to the atten tion of) anybody by some m e a n s that will be compre­ by being

hensi ble to them� I t is the ground principle, I t h i n k , u po n which refe rence is ne gotiated .

.

and "refe rence teaching" is pre­ know what their children have i n mind when they vocalize or gestu re , nor a re they s u re their own speech has been u nderstood by their children . · :Bu·t ' they are prepared to negotiare in the tacit belief that .swuthing .,.comprehensible can be establ ished . Ta ke the followin g example 'rrom Richard's boo k reading at twe nty-th ree months. Mothers' early i ndicatin g

Cisely of this order.

MOTHER: •.

CJU LD:

·;

MOTHER:

;;:.:

...�

cn n.o :

/MOTHER: •

\,

.•< "

What's that?

CHILD: Ou s e .

MOTHER :

C H U.D:

They often do not

Mouse , yes . That's a mouse. More mouse (pointing to another picture). No, those a re MJUi rrels . They're like mice but with long tails. Sort of. Mouse , mouse , moulle . Yes, all right, they're m ice . Mice, m ice .

On later occasions, doubtless, the negotiations will continue and Richa rd will e ven t u a l l y settle on

a

reasonable referential han­

dling of rats and squirrels much as, for example , the subjects in

the experiment by Susan Carey and Elsa Ba rt lett settle down to a

reaso na bl e way of h an d l i n g

Chromium after

negotiating their

alternative hypotheses about w hat color it might stand for. Chil­

dren de pe n d u pon such corrective possibilities in the linguistic com m u n i ty they have en tered I t starts early, as we have seen , and it can becom e strikingly complicated very early . Take th is e x a m ple at twenty-two months. Richard is trying out the sem an t ic scope of a word in the hope o f finding where the bOunda ries can be d r aw n He and his mother are examining .

an English penny togeth er RICHARD:

.

.

(Points to picture o f th�,_ Queen on coin) N ann y , .

nanny.

MOTHER: What? That's

lady, isn't it?

RI C H A RD: (Poi nts to

coin

\

"

n ot Granny. I t's a lady, yes. N i n i is a again) N an ny, nan n y.

think that's G ra n n y ? Oh well, I don't th ink she'd

MOT H ER: You

mind too much .

RICHARD: Layly (with smile to mot h e r)

.

MOTH ER: Queen .

R I CH A R D : . Nan ny,

nann y . MOTH ER: It's not. R I C H A R D : Nini (smiles and nods). MOTHER: Yes.

RICHARD: (Points and says) Nini. MOTH ER: Have they all go t

ladies on ?

R I C H A RD : Nanny, nanny ( points). MOTHER : No,

it isn't.

R I CH ARD: Nini.

And so he is on his way t o distinguishing Granny from the Queen a�d both from generic ladies. Note that this negotiation has been going on lor a long while. At eigh teen mo nths, nini and nann1 were both indicators for ju ice. At twenty months, etni was for

88

Child's Talk

lemon a nd nana was used to indicate "nothing there" when

someth ing was e x pected A t the time of this exam ple, nani may be money a n d nini lady, and there is m u c h sorting still to be d one By twenty-three months, for example, nini disappears, and at twenty-four mo n t h s Richard says, There's a lady. One can conc l ude I think, that the achievement of refe rence by the chi ld depend s u pon his mastery o f discou rse and dialo g ue ru les as much as u n fits mdlVIdual sk t lis at h n kmg percepts with sou nds and with representations of t e wor in is ;ead. For re ference is dependent, as we have seen, not on ly u pon mas­ te ri n g a relationship between sign and significate, but upon using social proced ures in concert with one a n o t h e r to assure that the sign and the si gni ficate that become l i n ked overlap in some negotiable way with the uses of ot hers . The starting para d i gm for all of this is the achie\'ement ofjoint attention, but as we have seen with our subject, Richard , by the time a cou p le of years have passed, he is calibrating his joint attention not on n a t u ral objects in t he perce p lUal world , bu t on such matters as whether the Queen , his grandmother, and ladies in gene ral shall be brought to attention by one or by several linguistic distinctions. What fi nally emerges is i ndeed the result of a historical process, as Hilary Putnam argues. John Lyons (as I mentionefl earlier) once en t i t led an essay "Deixis as the Sou rce of Reference." Dou btless he had a strong case . I think an equany strong case h a s been made in this chapter for the claim tha t discourse and dialogue are also the sources of refe rence . If they were not, each speaker would be locked in a web of isolated reference triangles of his ow n making-i f i n de ed he cou ld const ruct such a web on his own. .

.

,

,

"

"

F I V E

------�-���--

The Development of Request

is bound to be

s, serv1ces, or mere reco n i ­ t i o n , we must accom m ate t e 1earer's ca pac i t ies , his con­ st ra m t.s , our relauon to h 1 m , and the convention s to w h 1c h he adheres both in language a n d in the real world . The object o f _

request

m

orma t1o n , gooc

� goo
request IS to get some&>dy to dehver t e

are in the real world, not only in language .

·

Requesting is, consequently, a rich topic in the study of prag­

matics, and it

has been stud ied with a variety of aims

in

view­

for its underlying logic by H intikka, for its grammatical forms by Jerrold

Katz, and for its part in speech act theory by John

Searle. But there is a surprising lack of work on the acquisition of

acts of requesti ng,

a lt hough we do know something about

th e

chi ld's acqu isi tion o f the syntactic inversion rules in the i nterrog­

ative mode, or that a surprisingly large proportion of interrog­

atives are addressed to prel i n gu istic c hildren or (more to o u r

poi nt ) t h a t very ea rly on t h e you n g child i s sensitive to t h e fe l i c it y conditions on request, as Garvey has shown.

Our o bje<:t i n th is chapter, as in the last, is pragmatic : to

explore the growth of requesting i n our two young subjects,

Ric h a rd and Jonathan. As with reference, requesting begins di f­ a way that is interp retable, i n d 1catmg that he IS m want, but not indicating what he wants . I n no sense are these "signs" conven­ fusely and "natu rally," the child gesturing and vocali zing in

tional at the start: fretting, c rying, reaching, etc . There is some

evidence from the work of D. M. Ricks and

others that th e mother

is able , when the child is three or four month s old , to

distinguish

d i fferen t kinds of crie&- h un ger , pai n , e tc . But in t h e main her

correctness is attribu table to the mother's skill in ;,,,,prrlillg what

91

Child's Talk

the ch ild "needs" rather th a n

virtually all .

vocalizing.

how he is

Context is

There are imeresting developmental ch ange s in t h e forms of inference that guide the mothe r's interpretations. Ch ri sto p her Pratt in his Oxford thesis on the social i za tio n of crying repo r ts that u p to about twenty-six weeks of age , an infant's cry is typi­ cally interpreted by his m ot he r as i ndicating frustratio n , discom­ fort, hunge r, or a wish to be p ic ked up. The i n fa n t s needs a re seen as "physical." Pratt fi nds, moreover, that be fo re twenty-six week s the child is in fact more likely to stop crying whe n the moth er responds by ministering to these physical needs by feed­ ing, resett li ng or comforting the child. A t about twenty-six weeks the mothet· begi ns i nterp re ting the ch il d s cries a� d,.ue to more psychplogical ''causes." And just around t hen, he is increasingly l i kel y to respond to her "psychological" interventions: being offe red a n object, being engaged in "conversation," and the like. The next real c h a nge occurs a fe w weeks later, at about ei ht m o n t h s when t e c i ld gins to s ow t h e rst re erentially inter retable indication of what he is requesting. By this time, his demand signa mg h a s become qUlte soc1a tzed . It ta ke s the form of a much more ritualized cry : less pe rsistent, more p u nc­ '

,

'

,

tuated by pauses du ring wh i c h the child checks on u pt�e by the mother or by other adults. Acou s t ica ll y as well, ¥his cries also become more "conventional," h is i nitial "flat" sou nd s pec trum

· being

replaced

by cries

w i th

a more

pronou nced fu n d a me n tal ,.

frequency . The child's signaling of request progresses s teadily

toward com•entionalization in this ma n ner even before he can what he wants. The illocUlionary aspects of request gro w 1-before the referential element is present. So long as the mot h e r can provide an interpretation of a n appropriate referem from context, the child ada pts his cries to suc.h felicity condi tions as the mothe r i m poses-p rohibitions on "sc•·eami ng," waiting foa·

lsignal

somethi �Ji· bft t what it is that he wants, conventionalizatiol} moves at a mt:uilfi!IOre rapid pace. The mothe � accuracy and speed in interpreti ng w h a t her

u ptake, etc. B u t

wants

once

the child is able

to

signal not only tJaoJ he

93

The Development of Requelt

)

child wants obviously depends on h is s k i l l s as wel l . But t h i s prog­ ress is interesting. The poi n t at w h ich ou r two mot hers began successfully to i n te r p re t refe rent ial i n tent in their sons' signaling was just abou t when we, as "onlookers ," we re a ble to do so . I t has ent i re l y to d o with the child's fi rst "request ive re ferential" m aneuver : a nn extension toward a desi red object, occurring at abou t eight months in both child ren. At fi rst , t h is reach is as if "real": it is e ffortful, the body is incli ned with t he reach, and the child makes "effortful" noises w hile opening and closing his extended hand . In a few mo n t h s , this reach h as beco m e stylized and conventional. Th e reach is now open-handed , noneffortfu l , a nd its accompanying vocalization (as we shall see) becomes dis­ tinctive. I t i s , in e ffect, an "ostensi ve reach" that se e ms to be in tended to i n d i cat e an obj e c t of desi a·e . B u t it is not a poi nt. It is onl y much later t ha t the chi l d combi nes a "pu .-e point" with a request lO i ndicate what he wants. Rather, it is a st riking instance of a mode Qf indexing that is s pecifically tied to req uest. We distin u ish three main types of req uest in the two c h i l J and �he s i m lest rocedu rally , is re uest or a�& d r� n . Th� : ol!jtct. Ob,¢�� � st 1s e a rated rom an ea.- y p hase w h en 1 t is d i re,ted extl'-'�iv'Cfy:��� present, c l ose, and visi ble ol �ect often in pos��o}\·�(al\ '!4t�i�:�.l)_Q _ may be offe ring i t to t he child ; to ·· later fonrit.4iie'cted . to .re·ffime·p�t visible objects out of rea,h; . a n d finally to a f()nn desig ned to-�q�est objects that a re out of

· .� ·t

view .

., :: · · · .

·.·

:.;::

I h ave called a second

"'\

. .'_ ·

·

"-:

;:/ad ult to share a role relatioruhip tR.

c

·: . ' ;; :. .-

games

lay o r

o v10usl y , a re contex tualized 10 h1g

obj ect e x ha n ge and the

ly

.

· -inviJation, for it is a request to an 10

a game .

uc

req uests,

amihar rou tines like

d iscussed

in

a

preced ing

cha pter. A third t is a re est o r s u ortive action in which the child ries to recru i t an adult's ski l l or stren t o hel h i m ac h i e \' e a desir goal . These requests often requil·e t h e child to have some knowled ge of the structu re of the task at hand , but t h,is may not be so at the start. But supportive requests, as t h e y become more specialized , d � pend as much u pon the child's representa tion

i)

Child's Talk

94

of tasks as they do u pon h is com m u n icative com petence. I nvi­ tations can ta ke adva n tage of establ is hed game procedu res; requests for su pportive ac t i o n req uire the c h i l d to combine his k nowledge of a task with ·his knowledge of how to signal. The mother's role di ffers i n each type of req uest. In one, she must figu re out what ol�ect the child wants ; in a nother what the i n \'itation is f(,r ; �md in the thi rd , what kind of help h e needs. But in all t h r·ee types of request, she has a common "teaching" fu nction as well, however i n formal it may be. She is the "agent of the cu ltu re," so t o speak, and it is she who e n forces the felicity condit ions on requesti ng-and , as we shall see , by a great deal

o f negotiation .

The incidence of the th ree type s o f request at d i fferent ages..

is set forth in Table 5. 1 . Table J. J

• PE RCENTAGE O F REQU ESTS O F

MADE BY J O N A T H A N

8 -1 0

AND

RICHARD AT

Child's Age in Month1 l l -12 1 J -1 4 15-1 6 1 7 -18

Requests for:

Near and visible

object

Remote or absen t

mcnt

action

Total number of requests

Minutes of record ing

20 --24 •

(perctnlagt) 65

1 00

object Joint role enactSupportive

DI FFERENT TYPES

VA RIOUS AGES

35 t 26

23

63

49

23

I L - ,

11

23

II

24

19

14

25

39

7

14

41

26

27

22

54

38

210

1 50

1 50

1 50

1 50

1 50

1 .2

1 .5

1 .8

1 .5

3.6

2.5

N u m be r of requesl'l made evet-y I 0

m i n u t es

• Richard on ly t Jonalhan only

9S

j

06jttct Rttquttst The child's first requests for o b e ct s are usually rec i p roca l s

e e rby ol�ects reque!ited by the two chilch·en, fort y­ seven (82 pe ce n t ) were in another'_s possession . The reach ing was often accompanied by a fret or effort sound . Fi rst o bj e ct of adult o ffe rs : the mother holds out a toy i n v i t i n gly , and the

child reaches tQward it, extend ing his arm as noted earlier, and

the adult h a nds it over. Fmm eight to fo u rt en months, of the

fi fty-seven n

a

r

counterpart of "taking posses­ sion" of so meth i n g possessed by another. Up to about n i ne months, the chi ld's gaze is di rected exclusi vely to the object he is requestm g . I ndeed, the two chddren only looked at thetr moth ­ ers' faces when they failed to take possession of the objects sought. Susan Sugarman has described the "object schema" of the child as initially be i n g i ndependent of his " mother schema." But it requ esting, then , appears to be a

could not be completely so. Else w hy would he

request objects princi pally in

be

p

tem ted to

obj ec t and pa u sing . Only one instance of an ou tright (at eleven months) and that was when a desired her possession? Nor does he seize

the held object straightaway. He gestures first, extending his hand

toward the

in this early

grab was recorded

object was held by anothe r i n fant. This surely suggests that the

period,

way of

by n i ne months that the two ch il d re n glance at thei r mothers concurrently with reaching for the object. Whether initially independent or not, the "object schema" and t h e "mother child , even

recognizes request as a

altering possession by indi rect means.

But it is true that it is on ly

schema" do seem to become better coord i nated with time . Two things

happen

next. The first is that the child's reach

for the o�ect becomes converted into what I referred

�

to earlier

as a stylized or ostensive reach , without signs of effort or fret­

ting.

The

accompanying

effort sounds

were

concurrently ,...._

replaced · by stylized requ est calls: huhmm for jonathan and heaah for. Richard . The children , however, wer e still deficient

in

acknowl edging receipt of the object when it was handed to them.

Child's Talk Glancin g to wa rd the mother on receipt occu rred o n l y one time in five u ntil the sixteenth mon th . B y that age, the children were

qu ite regula rly looking toward the mother's face both w hen they

vocally accom panied ostensive reach and on receipt­ as t heir "eagerness" was not excessive. More usually, they

made their

s o long

reco g n ized the role of the m o t h e r as i n pos se s s i o n a n d as d u e

a

request. l f t h e y were o ve reage r they regressed back to fretting ,

In any case, the fo rm a t of this more variant of object-request was well establ ished by eig h­ teen months. And at that Po int it bega n to serve as a "canie r"

and effortful re a c h i n g

.

social ized

for m o re s peechl ike forms .

A t s i x t ee n month s , for example, Richard re pl ace d h i s re­

questive

heaah

vocalization with an extraordinarily wel l a rticu­

l at ed ghee of wh ich mention was mad e i n the preced i ng chapter.

.

J \.;__ - J

That i n tu rn was replaced by sentencelike babble strings in the

same pri vileged position , accom pa nying the ostensive, e ffortless rea c h , a fa vo r i t e being n-gah-gho-ah-di. Shortly a fter e ig h te e n

months, these d elightfu l , rather interrogatively contoured str i ngs

d rop ped out to be replaced in the same pos itio n by idiosyncratic lexemes like bauble (apple), accompa n ying a reach toward a book on the shel f containin g a fa vo r i te p ict u re of an apple. And i n d eed by twenty months the ostensive reach was begmning to d isa p pe a r repl a ced by a new i n tonation pattern: lleaah or ghee now became the head word in an u t te ra n c e containin g an idio­ s y ncratic l e x e me in terminal position . The lexeme rather than ,

,

the "req u est marker" re ce ived the stress-as in Heaah

�-louse

(" Want the mouse") w ith the first syllable, moo, st ressed . And not

long a fter, at twenty-two mo n t hs heaah is d roppe d altogether ,

a nd two-word combinations signifying Recu rrence (mtn·e mouse ) and Po ss ession (Richtird cau) make t h e ir a ppeara nce in the request format. In a wo rd rammatical forms and semantic relations a re used in the same format to rep ace t e mvent form s used initially to signal both requestive intent and the object desia·ed. The format was very much the st ead y vehicle of the ,

development.

The

DewloptMnt of Re q uest

There seemed

to be

97

no evidence of any deli berate m od e l i n g

by the mother of the grammatical f(>rms t hat emerged in the

child ren's speech . Correct gramma tical forms , ra t h e r were o ffe red as disa m biguating interpretations of the child's re
,

,

-

lhe

ultimate effort. By

a ffiliative cond i t ions I mean the ch i ld hav­

an adversa ry : give it to you. There was a ge n t le pressu re f.-om 1 he mothet· to ge t her child

in g to resp ect his mother as an ally rather than as

Don't shout

or

I

won't

to use the advanced fomts he had alreotd y show n h i msel f ca pable o f in earlier discou rse . It was m uch the same as w i t h growt h of refet·ence whe1·e the mothe1· wou ld not acce p t a less advanced form when she bel ieved a higher form was in her chi ld's range . She did not alwa ys accede and even seo l ded on occasion : No, banging won 't produce it or What's all that about 7 It's not very irifor­ tnative. you know. I n d ee d lmlf of Ric h a rd's mother's responses to his o bj ec t a·eq uests up to fi:m rteen mont hs i nclude some eflu n ro m a ke him carry o u t the act on his ow n ono specify more dearly what- he wan ted. A ft e r that, she rel
'

Child's Talk

cat ion not needed when an o bject is within reach or sight. A n ob·cct o u t o f s i h t •·c ui r·es t h e u se of nomi y s peeffi: ey were cation . And nomin�ls su rged mto use at t IS ume. there b e fo re , but now they had a new fu nction and the new fu nction a p pe a red to stim ulate their fu rthe r growth-a nd fur­ t her teach i ng h y t.he mother, mostly in su ppl y i n g "words." Th is gn)lY t h , o f n m r� . w : � s conn1n-e n t with the development!! dcsui bed in the letst chapt er. / Another way of speci fy i ng a remote refe rent is by indicating '1 not b name bu t by "canomcal locus"--e .g. , pomung to or even .... n a m i n th e 1 ce JOX w ere some estre oo ts ocate . 1 e this p rocedu re e pen s upon contextua mterpretation by the m ot her , it red uces u ncerta i n t y ve r y considerably . I f you have no n a m e for an object, pointing to its usual location serves nicely. Both c h ildt·en U!lcd it a s a standby u nti l their lex icons were u p to t h e range of ol�jects they des i 1·ed . Remote or displ:rced requests beg:m at t he l a n d m a t·k :tge o f fou rteen months in bot h child•·en . Cu riousl y , canon ical-locus indicating ns its \'ch ide prod uced something o f
�

}

·

.

l
Tlae Development Table 5.2

•

of Reque.sl

99

MOTH ERS ' VERBA l. RESPONSES TO JONATHAN'S AND

RICHA RD'S REQUESTS FO R R E MOTE / A BSENT OBJECTS AT VARIOUS AGES Example• of Mothers' Typical Utterances in Each Category

Child'.s Ag.r in Month.s 1 4 -1 6 1 1 -18 2 1 -.24 l'c rc.:c n l l y pc or qucsl iun

m·

lopic.: of'

u t l c ra nce hy mot h e r

46

36

24

18

11

5

Ope n question fo•· more i n for-

3

5

12

I m posi n g cond i t ions on req uest

3

37

25

Closed

yes- no <JUCstion d i s­


Open "what" question about re fe rent

rnat ion

about t
M a rk i n g u p t a ke of req uest

15

5

22

" Phonolo g y" and "politeness"

10

5

9

lessons by re petition

O t her

3

5

Do you want Is

this what

a fter?

you r book?

you were

What do you want? Where is it?

Where a re you goi ng?

Darli ng, it's n ot timt.

You \•e got

can't

so m e .

You

ha\'e more.

A l right.

I 'll get

it. I 'l l

bri ng you some more.

N ot sauceman, sauce­

pa n, with a p, p i n the middle. ThanA you . (not directly rel;lted to requC5t; e.g., You're

not by a n y chance

"Yll"?)

Tot al

re q uest!'!

by c h i l d

Tol :tl u u e r;mces by mother Mean adult u t tera nces per

rC<)UCSt

between

R

39 4.8

4 19 4.8

9 45 5.0

them becomes more interpersonal . The child not only looked more often toward his mother when making a remote req uest; he. was now more l i kely to ack nowledge receipt of the object. In rou g hl y six of ten displaced req uests, Richard "acknowledged" with an excited , "pleased" aoh-huh-a p ro-

Child's Talk

1 00

lo nge d version of his acknowledgment for near objects ..

Smiling

also occurred i n about o ne- t h i rd of Richard's displaced requests, a n d e ven

J o na th a n

prod u ced the occas iona l smile in acknowl­

ed g m e n t. Both child ren see med to be more sensitive to the mother's role as a vol u n tary agent in co m p l y i ng with requests. 1

think t h i s may have had to do with their recogn i tio n of h e r

uncertainty in fi gurin g out what th e y were asking for. Jonathan le ft us at e i ghtee n months. Richard , by that age, was regu l a r l y requesting w i t h nominals. Even at sixtee n months, he asked for a boo k on a far shelf by combi ning ghuA with his ostensive re ac h . At e i gh t ee n months, familiar food and drink from the kitchen were regularly labeled� .g. , ghilthi a n d an-ni for biscu it and ju ice respectively. So too familiar but distant toys like Teddy. These nominals were always com b i ned with an initial ost e n sive reach. But by twenty-one mon th s (when he had a good stoc k of nomi nals) he began a request for th e fi rst t i m e not with • a reach bu t wi th one of his nominals. Sos-man ( sa uce pa n ) was spoken bqore he gestu red req uestively for it. A nd s h o rt l y after, request gesturing d rop ped out altogether. The nom i n a l alone

su fficed though no distinctive request intonation had et been i m posed on Jt. O n l y w en IS nomanal exeme a il e d to com mu­ mcate did he revert to gestu res. And th e s e were accompanied by .;. such vocauves as mummy; gtt up,· need mummy. I n fact, - R.i chard was moving from object req uest to requests for s u p portive action-e.g. , s teering h is m o t h e r toward his goal, which we shall

d iscuss l ater. A word abou t "canonical locus," a n idea first d iscussed by . Jo h n Lyons. I t is, I suppose , a classical de ict ic procedu re. Both

child ren

began displaced requesting on objects to be found at

standardized locations: food , drink, and boo k s. Until seve n t ee n

months, for example, ne a rly -all Richard's displaced req uests were

for book s, habitually lodged on a high shelf. Once he began usi n g

nominals, these req11ests ex p l od ed in d ive rs i t y. For they w e re no

longe r tied to p l ace . But nonetheless, it was· for place-tied boo k ,

biscu it, and juice that

Richard

used these fi rst I}Ominals, though

he knew perfectly well where they were and how to indicate their

101 canon ical locus. The first nom i na l s used in this way were not adopted out of shee r necessity . Table 5.2 summarizes how the mothers responded to their children's displaced requests. More than half th e respo�ses u p

months were about reference: What do you want , Do a booU, etc. As Richard came to use words more pro­

to ei g hteen

1uu.

want

l as t quarter of h is second year, his mother's em ph asis shifted . She bega n to press for refi nements in phon­ ology. His request for a sos-man was counte red w ith No, not sauce-man, saucepan. with a •p•, 'fl in th8 middle! A n d she bega n fic i e ntly in the

asking for real words rather than fo r h is "baby" ones .

RICHA R D :

( points to

ball in fi re place , requesting )

ogho-wa-wa-

wa-wa

MOTHER: Fire RICHA RD: wa

MOTHER: Don't say "wa-wa." Fire, Richard .

RICHARD: Fire MOTHER: That's better.

But more strikin gly , displaced requesting proves fertile for enforcing felicity conditions. More than a third of the mmhers' responses at a year and a half had to do with "speech act lessons," and a quarter of them thereafter. In the main, these lesson s were the standard ones about felicity conditions.

grou nd

( 1 ) Requests must reflect a genuine need for hel . Don't

a bit of tffort and

JONATHA N : ( still chew ing on biscuit, i n dicates that he wan ts

another ) haven't finished that o ne

MOTHER: You

still eating it.

J ONATH�N :

�

yet , have you? You're

. ) unmmmmmm h ( reach "ang agam

1

1 02

·

MOTHER:

Child's Talk

You're getting to be a g ree d y little b<Jy, aren't you ! �

JONATH AN: ( turns to mother then points again ) 'mmmmmmh ( reaches with other hand ) m m-uuh MOTHER: Mu mmy'U give you a nother half when you've fin­ illhed that o n e . m m . Have you fi n ished that one? (2) 'Timetable" conditions m u st be honored . Mother replied Richard's request for a b1scu1t between m ea l s , Darling, it's not ti�. Upon R ich ard's persistence, hi s mother continued : to

Do yo u want a drink 7 . . . Ifyo u want a drink yo u can haw o ne. . . . Do you want a drink7 Beoouse that's all you're having. . . . A nd wh e n Richard stil l . frets: That's yourfault because yo'!' didn't eat enough breoAfast. I n this case, not only did she teach timetabling bu t she also intro­ duced the idea of a substitu tion , offe ring an alternative to his ina ppro p riate request.

ue s ts must not demand u n reasonable effort from oth­ The child shoul not, or msta n ce , ex pect 1s mot a journey for thi ngs that are not really necessary : (3) R

ers.

You want your other boo/c . WeU, tlw.t's upstairs. 4 The voluntarism of the requestee must be res pected in the child's requests. The mot er rem m s 1tn t at er to e 1s that of a "volunta ry agent" by em p hasizing the use of i ngrat-ia.. tives and by u t te ring an exaggerated thanlc you as she grants th�

request. . (5) Finally, whe n the mother can n ot or will not comply, she expects her child to u nderstand and accept her verbal reaSons where previously she relied on distracting h i m by simply supply­ ing an a l te r n at i ve object: ( holdll cu p

/

to mother ) more MOTHER : You've got some. You can't h ave more.

RICHA R D :

RICH A R D : ( gestures M OTH ER:

What

a re

out

towa rd boo ks hel f )

come _from up there? aren't any more books , you know.

you expectin g to

H m m ? The re

The Development of Request

1 03

RICHARD : ( setting out plates and spoo ns at pretend tea

more . . .

party ) (-) spoo ns ( ru ns toward kitchen ) .

MOTH E R : B u t we've got enoygh s poons, one for each plate .

/

RICHARD: p l a te ( returns to mother, smil ing ) MOTHER:

Each plate has a s poon .

RICHA RD: ( resumes tea pa rty )

In other contex ts , as we s hall see, she requires him to give

reasons.

I n a vari e ty

of

j

ways, then-and

some

quite subtle-these

mothe rs teach their c hild ren ust as they are on the brink of

speech that requests ask rather the n com l, that t �y are ma e on y for serv1ces t h a t one cannot do for one­ self, and that they must not demand "excessive" effort from another. Requests, she also makes pla i n e a rly on , relate to time­ texico-gra mmatical

tables a nd scarcity cond itions. They are, moreover, accou ntable:

they can be justified by reasons, of which more presently. The "lessons" are obvio usl y as much cultural as they are lin g uistic.

But language use is principally what cultu re is about. So at the end of th is first round of ex am in i n g the simplest fo rm of request-asking for obj ects--we are forced to a tentative conclusion. Language acq uisi tion a ars to be a b roduct and a veh icle) o cu ture transmission . Chi l d ren learn to u se a lan­ gua e initially (or its preli n u istic recursors) to et what the t ose on whom they want, to p arga mes , to sta t connecte wi are de pe ndept. J.!! do i n g so, they fi nd the constraints that prevail iii' the cultu re a rou nd them embodied in their parents' restric­ tions and conventions. Ihe engine that drives the enterp rise is not langu age acquisi tion per se:hut the need to get on with the demands of the culture. Th1s point s hou ld be so obv ious as to need no comment. But i n point of fact, unless o ne keeps one's e ye on the pragmatics of language , it can be easily overlooked. Le�lie Stephen once made the point that people are not melan­ c h o ly becau se they invented Hel l . They inven ted Hell because -

1 04

Child's Talk

they were melancholy. Children begin to use language , by the same token , not because they have a language� using capacity, b u t because th ey need to get thmgs done by a ts u se . Parents assast them m a like spmt: they want to help them become "civilized" human beings, not just speakers of the language . O nce they begin to use l a ngua ge in t h i s "ci vilized" wa y , the y then become creatures of the language , sw a yed b y its cult u ral a nd linguistic constrain� just as su rely as men in the Middle Ages were swayed and fonned

by

the concept of Hell.

When developmental linguistics ignores this ev ident truth , it

from the motives and shaping forces that the cou rse of language acquisition .

risks becoming remote cont rol

/avitations to Joint Aetioa

Ou r children seem to use three forms of "invitation a l" request : (a) an asymmetrical one where the a d u l t is requested to serve as "agent," the child being the 11ex riencer,11 as in "bOOk rea mg" ; ( b ) a pa ra le one where the child and adult share an experience or acuon, as w he n, the child request!! that his mot he r

heir him to carry n mvitation to a one-i.e., a something; game in which the child and adult take turns, as wh�n the mother builds a structure with blocks and the child then knocks it down. None of these forms of request seemed to be "earl iest" or most loo k out the

window wath

and (c)

h a m at the snow or

an alternating

frequent.

The earliest invitations took t h e form of "acting out" by the child. In this ri mitive 'form the child sim u la tes a a rt of the uncmg up an down on;.his parent's knee act i on desired, ake

to get the adult to · bounce

Crawford

him by h is

own

action . Meredith

young chimpanzees attemptin g to recruit the help of anothe r a n i mal in pulling in a baited box too heavy for one an imal to ma nage alone. The requesting animal simulates pulling on the rope attached to the box when the other is looking h is way. Richard not only bounced on his father's knee to request "ride�a�cock- horse ," but h e pushec:l has observed such behavaor

m

The DeveloprMnt

of Request

105

t h e micro phone towa rd h i m t o get him t o La ke a t u r n tal k ing

i n to it. Such invitations a re usually ;tccom pan ied hy vcx:a l iza tions

that a re notably less insiste n t t h a n t h ose acco m pa n y ing

object

oped. With increasing age, the babbling accompa n ying

in vit<�­

re q uests or req ues ts for s u pportive act ion . J onatlmn o ften uses his standard hummh for m , but with a ge nt l y ris i n g &md fall ing pitch . Other odd sou nds occ u r : nyah-110 (med i u m pitch) and da-pe ( p itc h ris ing, questio n i ng) a t t h irtee n months lor book read­ ing� neal•. nngah, nn at e i g h te e n months w he n i nviting fat h e r to joi n i n play with l ego , etc. But l i ttle vocal standard iza tion devel­ tions beca me longer and so u nd e d more sen tence l i ke i n i n tona­ tio n .

because

I n vitations, perhaps

they were less ste•·eotyped i n

vocal accom panime n t , contai ned m o r e lingu ist icoa l l y adv<mced

forms than the other two ty pes of requests at all a ges. The fi rst

rud i ments of two-word grammar occurred in t he

mat. By

�wenty-two

months, for

invitation for­

example, Action-Object or

A gent-Action combinations were occu rring re g ularl y : dowu-slide, mummy-ride, Eileen-do, brrm- brrm- boo-lmee (brnn-brrm w;ts what

adults said w hen bou ncing Richard on the i r knees) , etc. More

then became a pi vot word for recu rrence with nominals, aga i n

u sed fi rst i n the invitational format. Th is format w a s

also _ t he

fi rst in which negation was used to indicate unwi l l i ngness to con­ tinue a joi nt enterprise :

110

ritU, no like. And the fi rst l i n guistic

ingratiatives occu r red in invitation formats : nice mummy,

mummy.

How to

acc:ou nt for

please

t h i s precoci ty ? For one, invitational for­

mats are pla y fu l : t he heat is off. Ou tcome is not

so

crud<1 l . The

sit u ation , being more relaxed , also leaves time and more pro ­ cessing capacity for managing comm u n ication . Perhaps too, t h e ' familiarily o f most invitational formats p u ts less de mand on pro­ cessi ng capacity, so that riche r g ra m m at i ca l combinations

can

be

A n d fi nally, of course, ad ults were often so charmed at being invited by the child that they responded in a pa n icularly su pportive manner . How cou l d they be churl i s h ? Our records

constructed.

show that adults accept ed 95 pe rcent of the c h i ld ren's i n v i l a l ions

Chi Jd•s Talk

1 06 u n t il t he child ren were si xteen

after that,

months ol d . Acceptance decli ned

when the c h i l d re n were being u rged to be }Oore i nd e ­ pendent . B u t e\'en so, accepta nces were a l m ost always cheerfu l : Come on; all right thm; let's go. Pe rha ps, too , the spi rit of an i nvitation engenders in the reci pien t less of a pedagogical reaction, and that itself may m i n ­ i m ize t h e child's antici p at ion of b e i n g " p u t dow n . " Mothers, for exam ple , exert lewe r pressures on the inviting ch i l d to ful fi l l ldici ty condi tions on ret) ues t . I t is the chi ld's show. Not one t·ecorded ad u l t response to an invitation in either c hil d 's cor­ pus-fro m mother, father, or observe r--cha llen ged the adequacy of the chi ld's rcquestive proce d u re! . I ncreasingly, as the chi ldren grew older, adu l ts elaborated on invitations so as to supply the child with lingu istic cues­ though not in a pedagogica l spirit : A re you bringing another book for mummy t o look at 1 What can wefind in this booH Yes, I 'll give you a rUk. Okay, I 'm going to draw a . . . A t other ti mes res po nses would take the form of comments on the c h ild's im pl ied topic. The c h i l d takes the observe r to the rad iator to put her hand to i t : OBSERVE R : Onh , it's

hot!

�ven w hen the adult mrLd ask the child to cla ri fy , her questions are more in the spirit of genuine (rather tha n pedagogical) t·equests for d i rections or i n formatio n . What have I got to do now1 Have I got to put it together1 A rt you going to put the others on for Teddy1 And, as such, they provide the child with u se ful language forms. I n vi tations, the n , have the prope rty of real "ad ulllike" rec­ i procity. They occu r in fa miliar settings free o f pressures a n d i n formats alread nch m Ian ua e usa e. They rovide a setti n that seems to be extraor inari y nc for t e growl o language .

The Developm.nt of Requelf

1 07

Reqwsls for Supportive Action Requests

for

assistance

in

ca rry i ng out the child's goal·

d i rected actwru are initially fra u ght

with difficulties.

as al ready n o ted , must com bine his knowledge

of

The child ,

means.end

real world w i th th� communicative procedures help in execu ting them. K n ow i ng how to ask for h e l p implies kn owi n g at le as t some of the a rgu m e nts of action in volved in the task, if not in a li nguistic sense, then in a co n ce p ­ tual one . I t is not su rprisi ng, then, that ea rl y su pportive requ ests relations in the

for gai n i n g

depend heavi l y for thei r s u cces s upon ad ult inter p retation .

Thwarted

in carryi n g out their own actions, the children began

action over to somebody to "repair" it or somehow get i t back on cou rse. They left it to the adult to per­ form the needed task analysis. There were three kinds of request for su rtive aid : for x o pe ne d , a toy assembled, somety p icall y by giving the

cart, to ri n g a cha1r

m

oors, to open

a

cu pboa 1·

oor) ; a n

for

trarulocatio11lil assistance (to get from a sitting to a standing posi ­ tion, .to ge t down from a cha1r, to be hUed to see out the wm­ dow) . 'I he e a t·l i est requ ests were, of course, translocational--to be

not very frequent or particularly i n ter­ of the other two types exploded at seventeen to eighteen months, w he n they constituted 4 1 percent of all requests made by the two children. Their rise coi ncided less with a new spu rt of sensorimotor competence (none was not­ able then) than it did with a new appreciation of the role of the ad ult as a possi ble in!!tru ment in one's own enter p rises. The chi ld ren literally started by b r i n g i n g incomplete "tasks" to an adult for "fixing"-e.g. , a nindown music box that needed win d i n g u p . Jonathan handed it over to his mother, waited for �ompleti.on, and then recl a i med it. H a nd in g over was perem p­ tory (although often acco m pan i ed by babbling) and, if the ad ult l i fted up, etc.

They

were

esting. Supporti ve requests

108

Child's Talk

got right to work on

the task, the child was patient-in marked

contrast to the usual i mpatience displayed while waiting for an adult to fetch a remote or absent object that the child had requested . Repossession of the re pa i red obj ect was made with­ out a glance towa rd the mother. Here is the twenty-five second episode in which Jona th a n (fifteen mon ths) geu his mother to rewind his music box:

JONATHAN: ( holds music box ; lo o ks a t box ; t h en at mothe r ) ""'

MOTHER: ( chatting with observer )

"

JONATHA N : mm

M OTH ER: ( continues talking with observer )

JONATHAN: ( looks at box ; tries to w i n d it; tu rns to mother )

�m

( tries to wind box ; looks at mother; crawls

'-- r /'....

to mother ) eeh , eega, hmmlli ( holds box

mother)

MOTHER : ( reaches toward box)

A

to m o t h r ) here mummy to turn ( demonstrates how to wind )

JONATHAN : ( withdraws box ; demonstrates a t te m pt

hands box

MOTHER: Do JONATHAN :

you want

( looks at

e

observer;

then

to

out

to

win d ;

it for you ? �Look.

watches mother winding. '

As soo n as music st.1. rts , jonathan reaches a nd takes

back the box , turning

ment )

away

w ithout ack�owledg­

" H a ndover" of the task by the child gets elaborated in two �; both are in stances of "gap indicating." One is a locative procedure: indicating Wline the trouble is by touchang a mtssmg or broken part as m the prece
( examining knob Of pan Jid ) Oh-oh, ah

SCOO

'

The Druelopment of Request MOTH ER:

RICHARD:

Screw ! ( handles lid ;

1 09

screw

...,_, .

falls out a nd k nob drops off;

looks up at m ot h e r ) hah- hah

MOTHER: Yes, now there is a h o l e !

RICHA RD: ( holds up lid and knob to mother ) hah-heh . . . hole hole hole

MOTHER: You've broken it. RICHARD: ( holds up l id and knob to mother ) broke broke broke ( i nsistent )

MOTH ER: You'll have to get

RICHARD: ooh screw

a

screwd l"iver.

driver ( hands

mother·

lid

g r u n ti n g ) MOTHER: Do you want me to get a screwd river? RICHARD: ( - ) broke broke d r iver ( i ns istent ) MOTHER:

RICHARD:

MOTHER:

RICH A RD :

and

knob ,

Shall I get the screwd river from the kitchen? ( gives a fretting moan ) And t he n we ca n mend it. ( looks at lid i n m ot he r s hands ) screw screw ( insis­ tent

wail )

'

MOTHER: ( goes to fetch screwdrive r )

RICHARD: ( rema ins

s.i uing o n

floor, babbling to himse l f d u .-ing

mother's absence ) a coo dider ( screw d river ) s c oo d iver scoo d iver scroo scroo sc roo scroo . . . ( still babbl ing when mother returns with screwdrive r )

The req uest for assistance was,

When h is mothe·r playing on his own .

task.

as

it were, i n te r polated in the

fi n ished helping him, Richa rd we n t

on

The next development (Richard at twenty-two months) involved requesting aid while the action was in progress , in order to lr.eep it in progress. The assistance required was virtually a part of the task being u ndertaken by the child and required his moth­ er's prolonged intervention. She had, moreover, to be guide d . S u c h gu ided requesting occurred only when the c h i ld had a plan of action tha� he could not commu nicate or even formu late in

Child's Talk

1 10

advance. He was Jed , consequently, to sequence hi� requests, to

the adu l t from one step to the next. Richard began, as shown t he followi n g exam ple, by recru iting help with the vocative

lead

in

mummy. When h is mother replied mummy do what7, he followe d with mummy get "P· H is mother then asked , What do you want mummy 16 do7 Rich a rd th en indicated the locus of the action to he carried out by a gestu re and by Up cufJIJon.rd as he took hold of the cu phom·d door. H is mot her then i n sisted upon a "goa l" be fore she wou ld move into the task. H is requests, she insisted , mmt con lel i ri "d isclosu re in advance" abou t goa ls. This had the effect of forci n g Richa a·d to "assemble " his retJ uest in ad vance of action . H ere is the e pisode in ful l : RICHARD: MOT H E R : RICHARD:

mum my , mummy ( remains seated ) Wha t?

muh, mummy

m um m y come

cupboard )

( points briefly to the

( section om itted ) R I CHA R D : ( steps u p to cu pboard , one door of which is open a nd the other, bolted sh u t . Th roughout the fol low­ i n g , Richard alternates between looking at mother and lookin g i n to c u pboard , touching the closed door, or p u tting h is hand just inside the �pen half ) u p ­ l u p-u p

MOTHER: U p t h e

RICHARD: MOTH E R :

RICHARD:

MOTHER: R I CHARD:

MOTH ER:

RICHARD:

M OT H E R :

cupboard ? cu pboard What do you mea n , " u p cu pboa rd"? u p cu pboa rd ; u p cu pboa rd ; u p cupboard u p Do you wa n t m e to get up?

get u p

( mother a n d observer laugh ) cupboard ; cupboa rd ; cupboard-up, cu pboard - u p , cu pboa rd-u p , cu pboard-up

besi d e cu pboard ) I c"n't pick the c u pbo a rd u p ! ( opens cu pboard , talking softly to Richard )

( gets u p, j o i n s Richard

'!he Development of Requelt RICHARD:

Ill

{ stands squ irming, looking down. Loo k s into cup­ boa rd s p i es a toy telephone ) telephone How about tho� two telephones? You get out the telephone and make a telephone call . ( starts to walk away; cupboard door swings shut again ) m u m m y { goes to mother, pulls her by the hand toward the c u p bo a rd ) mummy ge t out te l ep h on e ( tries to reopen cu pboa rd , then watches moth er ) ( props door open ) There we a r e! You get the telep hon e out th e n . ,

MOTH E R :

R I C H A RD :

MOTHER:

( reaches into cupboard } plcttes out ( e xcited ) MOTHER: m m ? RICHARD: p l a tes out RICHA R D :

MOTHE R : plates out!

RICH A R D :

( ex tracts plates from cu pboa rd , carries them back to sofa , looking u p to mother and smiling )

mind. d i ffi c u l t y assembling a fu l l request in advance. H e finally got h is mother to the cupboard , and did he just h a p pe n to see a toy telephone there that d istracted him from He

Obviously, we can' t know what w as initially on Richard's was

pl a i n ly having

his i'n i tial goal? He was probably in sea rc h of a set of plates to u se in a tea party for h is an imals. Yet when the telephone came into view-and h e was invited to make a "call"-he produced the fu ll s e n t e n c e mummy get out telephone. But o n c e the door was fu lly opened , he rev e r t ed to h is o rig in a l go a l and d e m a n d e d plates ottl, repeating to h is mother mmr He did not lack d is place m e n t in h is speech : he was indeed able to ask for out-o f-sight objects at this age. The basic difficulty was probably that he could not fu lly assemble i n advance both the required pl a n o f action and the

com municative

request.

By twenty-four months such "successive gu i d a n ce"

cally began by nammg the m tended

had

aid. He typi­ action (mumm

become his habitual mOde for req uestin g complex

and an come). Then a ocus was a e if needed and occasionall an instrument. Thts is illustrated by a two-mi n u te e p i sode. Richar a ent

Child's Talk

1 12

was again hold i ng a "tea pa rty" for h is toy animals Teddy a nd Rabbit. He was on t he sofa beside his mother and had several

times before requested and received cutlery from the k i tchen

for the "meal," incl uding several spoo n s, e.g . , red spoon.

spoon, granny

RICHARD: ( leaves sofa, goes across the room toward k itche n door, stands l oo k i n g into kitchen , th e n poi n ts to it ) -' 'that spoon ( shouting ) ( tu rns to mother, s t i l l point- ....... ing to kitchen ) that spoon MOTH ER: ( no response )

RI CH A RD : ( returns to sofa, grinn ing; adjusts

Teddy:

Teddy's

posi tion )

teddy ( steps up to m other at other end of

sofa; tries to pull m oth e r by the hand toward kitchen )

MOT H ER: What do you wan t me to do?

R I C H A R D : ( points to __,

.......

kitchen, looking from mo t h e r to kitche11 )

that spoo n MOTHER: Which spoon? RICHARD:

MOTH E R : RICHARD:

M OTHER:

RICHARD:

( still

pointing

( laughs ) ( tugs ha rd ( pleading )

M OTH E R :

on

MOTHE R :

�

/

mother's hand ) m u m m y , get u p

( moves

beh ind

mother,

( whining )

pushes

her

shoulder )

( laughs ) in front of mother, touches her arm . ) mummy

( comes

'--

get up ( insistent )

R ICHARD:

kitchen , tugging mother's hand ,

Would you help me ? ( laughing )

mummy

R I C HARD:

to

looking to mother ) those

( steps

outstretched to mother ) What is it you want?

( a pproaches

mother;

back toward kitche n , arm

touches

her arm ,

smiling )

mummy ge t u p ( cuddles up to mother's shoulder )

Th� Dev�lopm�nt

of Reqaust

I I)

M OTHER : W h a t RICHA R D :

M OTH E R : RICHARD:

do you want? ( pulls o n mothe r's sho u lde r ) m ummy get u p ( i nsist­ ent ) ( touches mother's collar ; sm iles; ste ps back ) mummy get off; need m u m m y ( insistent ) ( steps w mothe r aga i n ) Do you want some m o re spoons? m o re s poo ns ( touches mother's shou lder; Richard d istracted by m o th e r s d ress for t h i rty seconds; reac h es for mother's ha n d ; p u l l s it; lets go; looks :1t '

mother;

M OT H E R : R I CH A R D : M OT H E R : RICHARD:

pulls

her

h a nd

aga i n ,

loo k i n g · be tween

kitc h en and mothe r ) m ummy get off ( complaining ) ( t u gs ha rd on m o t h e r's hand ) ( gets u p , Richa rd p u l l ing ) ri g h t ! ( lets go mother's hand; runs ahead lO kitchen ) right ( follows Richa rd to kitche n ) ( retu rns with s poo ns ) the re ; that s poon

into full requesting w ith means specified in advance. Bot Fl Richard's action a n d his g rammar i m proved s u fficien tl y for him to

Successive g u idance slow l y merges

goal and "scn pts11

a s se m bl e com plex sen tences to m:ttch com plex re q u i rements.

Richa rd be ga n

"grammaticalized "

req uesti ng at the very end of

h is second year. Sea rching u nsuccess ful l y in

a

pile o f ga mes for

a j igsaw puzzle d epicting a d og " Douga l ," he c a ll ed across t he room (at twent y - four months): mummy , look. M o t h e r

made

no

m o ve He ran to her, putting his hand on hers, repeating mummy. .

She asked , What

do you

want

me

to do: He ran back

to the pile of Not a fault­

games , pointed t o t h e m , and said mummyfind Dougal.

less performance, but the re is no q u es t io n that he now u nder­

stood and could act on the requirements i m po se d by the mothet·'s What do you want me to do7 His reply was impeccable. S� pportive requests, then , work their way to a maturit � in w hich the chaid can &>tfi analyze the task in wh1ch he is engaged and, at the same ume, muster the necessar rammar to con­ struct a request m aa o us comp etaon . equests of t h i s order

S I X

--------�--

Learning How to Talk

Child's Talk

1 14

(almost always rou ch e d i n a declarative form) are quintessen­ tially case gram matical i n the sense that they req uire such speci­ fications of t he A ge n t the Action , and the Object, and , op tionally, the I nstrumen t, the Location, and the Recipie nt . If one restricted the analysis of the co rp u s of speech to su pportive requests only, one would surely conclude that th� arguments of action pro­ vided a kind o f protose mantic generative base for the child's lan­ guage . But we should have been w a r ne d a ga i n st any such facile condu sion by t h e p•·eceding cha pter, where joi nt attention fi g­ u red as a framework fa r more prom ine ntl y than did joi nt action . ,

Some Conclusions

Req uesti ng, li ke refe rence, goes through a neS?tiatory course toward sociali zation , whatever its form . Like reference, too, it is contextualized in conve ntional formats that con form as m uch to cultu ral as to li ngu istic reqm rements. In obJect request the pnnc1 pai task is to incorporate refer­ ence into re<JUest. When the child finally masters nominals, he need no l o n ge r depend u pon the i n terpretive prowe ss of his mother or the deictic powe r of his i n dexical signaling. The de m a n ds of dealing w i th displaced reference in requesting objec ts p rov i d e an i ncentive. Both children took natu rally to nominal referr i n g, not because their ostensive, deictic requests failed · (fcir they mostly did not) but out of some bu ilt-in preference for more econom ical proced u res. I ndeed , displaced requ e s ts would prob­ ably not h a , e g mwn so rapi d l y had it not been for the mastery of referring no m i nals. But whi le each child was mastering the s k i l ls of spec i fying the objects he wanted , he was also m astering the relicit condi­ tions that constrain the rna mg o requests. Needed pragmatic accom p hshments were usu a lly firmly m place in a d va n ce of e ac h child's referen tial pmgress . The "heat" was on t he fe l i city issue , not on the re ferential o n e . I nvitational requests were exceptions. They were issued o n l y for activities that were a l read y framed i n well-shaped , ga m e l i ke formats. A n d reference was n o big issue. ·

The lhuelopment

of Reqw1t

1 15

N oth i n g m uch need be specified when on e invites another to

play a we ll-known game. Nor was it a big job to assemble a plan

o f action while concurre � tly fi gu rin g out h ow to communicate

it.

There is an i ron y in all this. For while

invitations required Jess

com plex i ty of utterance than did other forms of request, we al ready know th �it th e y produ ced the most co m plex speech sam­

p les o f all tlu·ee request types-a matter

a lre ad y discussed �

Whether one explains t he superiority by refe ren ce to p1 ini mal

stress, i ncreased fa m i l i a rity , re le a sed

processi ng capacity or

whatever, it was pl
one had the cou rage a s we ll to try out

n e w forms.

What i s most evident a bo u t supportive requests is that they

req u i re pu tting to ge th e r a real-world plan and an a ppropriate

utterance . Many of the children's difficulties were imposed by

cu ltural co n ve n tion s of

requesting to

w h ic h children also have

to co n form . The com plexity of these conventions was nicely . illustrated by the req u i rement that the objective of a request n eeds to be di sclosed in advance-no easy t ask for an· eighteen­ month-old, even i n a familiar setting. Fi na l l y, I want to reiterate that learning how to req uest is not just le ar n i n g l a n gu a ge or eve n just speech acts. It is also learning the c u , t u re and how to get thi n gs done by la nguage i n tha t cul­ tu re . The c h i l d knows an e no r mo us amou nt about the cu ltural conditions of requesting a year before he knows how to deploy the gram matica l inversion rule for framing a question . I ndeed , he uses t he decla a·ative form exclusi vel y , d ecl a rin g his req uest�; rather tha n p u ttin g them in q u e ry form . Yet h is su btlety in m e e ti ng both real-world "physical" constraints a nd culturall y eM.>orate felicity condi tions grows ap ace .

W

E BEGAN W ITH A SURVEY. OF the "original mental capac i ­

ttes" th at m a ght hel the child in his career as an as i­ rant spea er of his native tongue. Four were offered a s pa rti c ular l y i m po rta n t : (a) means-end readiness; (b) a sensi tivity to transactional enterprises; (c) systematicit in or nizin ex e­ ese are not rience; an ( ) a trac tness m ru e ormation . "capacities" that somehow transform themselves into a formal system of language by dint of some mysterious process of semi­ otization or eve n by "s i m ple" socialization . They seem, rather, to be the minimal men tal equ ipment that a child wou l d n eed to w e

language-a matter better treated in a moment.

No doubt the aspirant speaker of a language req uires far more mental mach m ery than thiS at the outset to "ge t m ton th e formal , abstract rules that govern h is local language. Whatever other mach inery the child must have to ge t into grammar we shall s i mpl y take for granted . It may include innate knowledge of a u n i ve rsa l gram ma r, as Chomsky s u gge s ted , or it may be in th e form of in itial sensitivities to distinctions i n both language and i n the real world , as B ickerto n has proposed . Such questions a re not the cen tral ones of this book . Whatever origi nal 14nguage endowment may consist of and however much or little of it there may be need not concern us. For whether h uman beings are lightly or heavily armored with in nate capacities for lexico-grammatical language, they still h ave to learn h ow to we language . Thal cannot be learned in vitro. The only wa y l an gua ge use can be learned is by wing it comm unica­ tively. Th e "rules" of language use a re only lightly specified by the rules of g ram m a r . Well-formedness does n ot make utter­ ances either effective or a pro riate or felicitous. Not that such rules are not of eep interest: they may tell muc about the shape of mind. It is only that infants lea r n ing l a n gu age are not aca-

1.10

Child's Talk

demic gramma rians i n ferri ng rules abst ractly a n d indepen­

dentl y of use. Whatever else Ian u a e is, it is a s stematic wa of com m u ­ nica t i n t o others, of affectin thetr an o u r own behavior, o f sharing attention, an d o consutuung rea l i ties t o which we th e n ad h.e,re just as we adhere to the "lacts" of natu re . Let us n ot lie dazzled by the grammarian's q uestions. Pragmatic o nes are j ust as dazzling and ju st as mysterious. How i n de ed do we eve r learn to get th i n g s done with words? The cen tral t hesi s of the recedi n cha ters-theoretical and em irica a 1 e- as en t at t ere ts a an ua e c utsmon Su pport ystem t t rames t he interaction of human bein s in sue a way as to a1 t e as p1rant speaker in mastering the uses of language. It is this system that p rov1des the functional prim­ ing that makes lan gu age acquisition not only possi ble, but makes it p roce ed in the order and pace in which it ordi narily occu rs. U ndoubted ly, there is something in the human genome that predisposes h u m a n beings to i n te ract with dch other commu­ nicat ive l y in just this way-although again, it is not our object to se pa ra te the innate from the acquired , th e natural from the cul­ tural. Ra ther, the inquiry has bee n directed to several cru ci al linguistic functions a nd to the i nteractional settings io :which children learn to master them.

101Ua y m1crocosmac anteract10n pa tte rn

an

between an adult and infant that contains demarcated role's that eventually become

uaming How

to

Tallc

Ill

reversible. They hecomt:,

as

n ot ed in earlier chapt e rs, such

familiar rou tines in the child's interaction with the social world that they are deserving of james Joyce's t e r m , epiphan ies of the ord i na ry . " They have a scri pt l i ke c1 u a l i ty thm in \'ol\'es not only action but a place for com m u n ication that const itutes, d i rect s , a n d com pletes th at ac t i o n C i v e n t h a t p l a y is r he cuh m·e of child­ hood, it is not surprisi ng that fonnats o ften have a play fu l , ga m e l i k e nature . I n time and with i n<: 1·easi ng systematicity , f(u­ malS a re assembled into higher-m·der subro u t i nes and in this sense can be concei ved o f as the mod u les from wh ich more com ­ plex soci
.

ca lled speech ac ts in the Austinian sense . In

Cha pte r 3

we co n side red the game l i ke nat u re of some

early formats-literally ga me s like object exchange , peekaboo ,

framing role­ which words prod u ce

hide-and-seek. Such games provide a type case for the

o f e a rl y communication . Fo r not only do t hey fi l l the b i l l as s t r u ctured transactional microcosms in

,

d i rect , and co m pl e te the action , but t h e y have ce rtain cmcial

la nguagelike

prope1·ties of

t h e i r own . They a re , within the i •·

bou nds, l a n guagelike "ways of l i fe." What makes them l i ke la n­

presence of a deep st mct u re (e.g but also the presence of <� s u r­ res t ric t ed but high ly variable set of means f()r

g u age is, o f course, the

. .

appeara nce and disappear.mce) ,

face structure, a reali
·

·''

·

p

.

, . .

Child's Talk

never before occu rred . I n tilne, the child was able to turn virtually any situation into a kind of hide-and­ seek. Th1s ''iletacha hihty" of form from context confirms one in

tings in which they had

claim ing the abStractness of children's early behavior. By the same

toke n , the' child's e a rly capacity

in

games

for

role sharing �nd

role re,•ersal ma kes one doubt seriously the claim that all early

social behavior is egocentric. I ndeed , i t is h i g h l y doubtful that c h i ld ren could learn la nguage as we h a ve observed it were t h ey cith�r irre\'ersi bly concrete or im placably egocentric. Nor cou ld they C\'er play games as they do. In Cha pter 4 we plu nged i nto a classic problem of lan­ guage�{ermce. In ga mes like peekaboo and hide-and-seek t h e referent of any expressions used is inherent i n the "moves of the game" and need not he specified . Expressions used in games a re pri nci pal l y performative. They p roduce, orde r, a n d complete the action just as su rely as a d u bbing ceremon y creates a knight. But in com municative en<.-ou nters i nvolving reference, however ritucdi zed , one element of the "ceremony" is not fixed . The u n known is the refe rent to which a joint focus of attention is to be achieved by the two pa rticipa nts . . I made the bold claims that the "intent to refer" is u n learned ,and that so too is the recognition of that intent in othe..:S. These cla ims seem to pose no great problem in the establishmen� of join t re ference. So m e basis for referential in tersubjectivity must exist be fore lan gu age proper appears. Logically, there wou l d be no conceiva ble way for two human beings to achieve shared ref­ erence were & he re no i n i tial disposition t
�

uarning How to Talk But e m p i rica l e vi d e nce as well as logical necessity supports claim s. How could t he infant "know" to follow the line o f regard of another t o search for a joint visual focus save by know­ i n g it in advance? A nd how could he spontaneously develop indexical "poi nting" without there being some expectancy of its

these

likely e ffect?

I f t h ere is a natu ral basis for establishing jo i n t attention and a natural way of si 11naling that one wishes to draw another's a ttention to what one is experiencing, that still leaves u nex­ plained the conventionalization of such activity. For, in fact, lin­ guistic re ference is not natural, and its conventionalization poses a psychological problem . There is a long road between followi ng another's gaze ou t to a n object and being able to comprehend a refe rrin g expression like "the cream c h ee se on the top s h e l f of the fridge." I made common cause in Chapter 4 with H ilary Putnam 's "historical cau sal" theory of reference and gave a good list of reasons why a student of the development of refe rence w o u l d fi nd his reasoning both useful and compelling. We need not -review his a rguments about "partial overlap," asy mmetry , and the rest. But I would want to add one point to that earlier discussion , one that brings us back to the d ifference between language use in reference and the more performative use of language in games . I n his o riginal presentation Pu tnam m a kes much of the "dub­ bing ceremony" b y which some th ing or sta te receives t h e name "ash tree" o r "electrici ty" or '1ustice ." Th� bu rde n of the evi­ dence presented in Chapter 4 was that such "dubbing ceremo­ nies" are made and not born. They are crea ted as formats, highly constrai ned formats that are gradually transformed as the child masters t h e procedu ral elements b y which t h e na mes of o�ects are indicated. This is first done with nominals placed appro-· priately i n a d i alogue format where attention is joi ntly concen­ trated on a target. The dubbing format is made as gamelike by the mother as necessary to accommOdate the child's lack of ex rtise. The egrees o ree om m t e ormat are minimized better to leave

Chi ld's Tal k capaci t y a vailable

for dealing with

the u ncertain element of the

referent and its indicating nom i na l . I n time, as we saw , th e for­ mat develops to the point where the-two a re

able

even to mark

the difference between presupposed referents (i.e . , alread y

incorporated in the game) a nd new ones ( n ot yet in). And o n ce the p roced u res for re fe r ri ng are firmly enough in place m the format, the mo ther hegins a next step: developing a system of commentmg on the referent not stmply as an end in itself or to note its existence-Thn'e it is! or the Wench La vmta! or tfie Ital­ ian Eccole!-but as a topic to which a comment can bC "attached. I n fact, the to p ic
Learning How to

Tolle

tests over the disambiguation o f a re fe re n t Is the figu re on an English pen ny the Quee n , the chi ld's grand mother, o•· simply a l a d y ? The mo t h e r exhibits a cu l t u ra l sensi tivit y in t h is negotia­ tion that matches her li ngl!istic fine t u n.ing in an:epting or rej ect­ ing par�icular indexical vocalizations. The child is being "t rained" not only to /mow the la nguage but to use it as a member of a cultural co m m u n i ty The ontogenesis of proced u res of request, treated in Chap­ ter 5, re pre sent s yet another s te p forward. For not only m ust the .

.

chi l d master conventionally acceptable ways of s i gn a l i ng his intention (he came equipped with one such , of comse, in being . innately endowed with demand crying at the start) , but he m ust i ncorporate re ference into his request. The child does not st ay long with the condition in which he s i gna l s only that he wan ts, but soon "wishes" to i nd icate what he wan ts. In effect , he m u st t ravel the path fro m raw demand signaling to t he fulfillment of felicity condi tions on request . A nd at the same time , he m u st combi ne these achievements with refe rential o n e s of increased complexity-displaced refer:ring to absent objects, proced u res for re fer ri n g to

pu nctual a nd iterative actions, and the like . As his refine it by the ad di t io n of a regulatory function (in Midmel Halliday's sense) through which he can control Mw his request is to be fulfilled . Develop men t in all three of the forms of request st ud ied (invitations, requests for objects, and requests for assistance in action) was crucially dependent on conven t ional framing i n familiar formats. I t w as not thanhe formats provided any "hi nts" about the linguistic proced ures requi t·ed by the child , but rat her that they provided s pecifications and acce ptance limits" on what was requ i red . They no m ore prod uced the grammatical fm·ms of requesting than the net and the cou rt lines produce th e st rokes by which a person p l ays tennis. But just as. you ha\'e to h i t the ban · in tennis high enou gh to clear the net and not so far a s to go over the baseline, so i n requesting you must specify the end state desired before requesting the means for its achievement, or you must ,fulfill the essential cond ition that you can not you rrequesting becomes still more complex, he needs to

"

Chi ld's Talk

u6

sel f do what you req uested or the sincerity condition that you

real l y w<mt what you are ask i n g for.

So requesti n g too p rovides a means not only of getting things done with words, h u t of operating in the culture. Thas entads not only coordum t m g one's la n g ua ge w a th the requa rements of
l inguistic com m u n ication d i sc us s ed in Cha pter 2, a few poin ts

wou l d benefit from be i n g gone over agai n . Recall that four sou rces o f possi ble conti n u ity were si ngled out: (a) category cor­ respondence bet ween

real wo.-id

concepts

and

gram matical

f(>rms; (b) co n ti n u i t between t he fu nctions se rved by p rel in­ gu ist ic and late•· li ngu istic com m u m cat1on ; c) t 1e constnu t1ve role of Jan ua e m fornun real world knowledge ; and (d) si m­ i larit y in the cog n i t i v e processes by wh ich ru les o any sort, m­ guistic or otherwise, are formed at vanous a es. What can "6e sa1 o eac 1 o t 1ese i n the •ght of the evidence a sse m bled in the prece d i n g chapters? Concernin g sensi tization to gramma tical forms that corre­ spond to ca te go ri es of rea l world knowledge , the precedi n g dis­ cu ssion has li ttle to say . This is basically an issue in the relation between semantics and syntax and points to the possible "form­

to the la tter. such issues.

i ng" role of the former w i th respect marginally bee n concerned with

We have only

As to conti n u i t y of com m u n ica tive functions from prelin­ lingu istic exchanges, there can be li ttle question of i ts im portance. Cont i n u i ty of fu nction provides an im portant sca ffold for the development of both re fe rential and request ive proced u res. I n ce rtmn respects, mdeed, the contmu 1ty of fu nc­ tion pro\'ide s a basis for "progress by substitu tion . " Take the guistic to ea rl y

1 27

I...arn i"' How to · Tallc

development of re fe re n ce The mother for months on end .

maintains an extraordinarily constant pattern of interacting with

the child over the

naming ,o f things. The stead y format, in effect,

h o l d s the fu nction constant. As the ch i l d progresses in the mas­

tery of new forms, he su bstitutes them

in

the old format to per­

requests), failure in the u se of the new form provokes regression to the older o ne Even t h o u gh the new form may have th e effect of transforming and expanding the old functio n , the continuity remains. I ndeed , I rather assume that it is this contin uity of fu n c t io n that ma kes it possible for an ad u lt to "understand'' the more primitive forms form the old fu nction. A nd i ndeed (as with

.

b

which an infant real i zes var ious communfcati ve fu nctions. I n

rovt e s a SIS or a u t fine luning and or the operatton of the La nguage Acquisition Sup-

this sense, functtona contmmt

.

port System.

. As for the constituti ve role of la n gu a ge its role in "creating" ,

the world into which the child enters, surely the game formats we examined are constitutive in the deepest sense. Games are li terally p roducts o f what and how one says things in what con­ texts. I charactenzed them earher as becoming, wi th develop­ ment, more systematic and abstract and also as being like "m9veable feasts" that can be imposed by speech acts on new situations by invoking the appropriate illocutionary force. Referri ng, requesting, th reatening, promising, etc . , are early on

the scene as states of the world created in major pa rt by appro­ priate l an gu age use. The source of continuity from constitutive­

ness was, of cou rse , in the formal structures of language games ,

which (as I tried to show in Chapter 3) have so many elements in

common, from their earliest introduction right on through childhood. I t is e uall evident, however; that there are ma"or discontinuities in develo ment that are crea ted the constitutive powers o an uage. We o not treat the child quite as a child any lon ger w en we think him capable of u nderstanding such

�

. constitutively

based

obligations as promising, explaini ng, being

loyal, etc. But even so, the a rg u m e n t still holds that from the

very start--and particularly in gam es-we give the child a run-

u8

Child's Talk

ning start by introdu cin him to the constitutive fu nction of lan­ guage t roug the use o per ormauves. . Of conceptual processes common to m i n d generally and lan­ guage particu larly that give con t i n u i t y to development, there are few things we can conclude. Our emphasis, rather, has been upon social processes tha t are shared by prelingu istic and linguistic communication . Certainly these processes (turn taking, role interchange , etc.) do remai n invariant across the cha n ge into la n­ guage a nd provide a centrally important sou rce of continuity. I ndeed, I have even urged that the principal "motive" in la n­ guage acq u isi ti o n is the better regulation of t hese u nde1·lying ' social-cu ltural processes. The account of early language acquisition presented in these p ages d epen ds heavily on the use of co nte x t by bodi mo t h e r and child in form ing and i n t e rp ret i n g messa ges. Successful early communicatio n requires a shared and familiar context to a id the partners in m aki n g their comm u nica t ive intentions dear to each other. I ndeed , the co nce p t of the format was put forth earl y in this volume in the hope of explicating how context works in these early commu nicative encounters.

Oddly enough , the notion of con t e x t is rarely explicated in

discussions of lan gu a ge It is a little l i ke the notion .

of ':im plicit

knowledge"--assumed to be p rese n t as a "surrou nd'� for ex plici t

k n o w ledge but not amen!lble to close a na l y sis . ..Text" is what is in words; context is the rest of what a ffec ts the interpretation of ,

the

words-the "rest" including words and

nonwords.

So we will find statements of the followin

pre en

orde r: (a) To com­

a sentence as to extract a proposi tion from it in i ts con­

(6) A sentence as a devace for e m beddm g a propos1t1on Few attempts have been made to analyze the rela­ tio ns that exist between a sentence, its context, and the proposi­ tion that is extracted from their relationship. It is easy enough to specify the sentence and the proposition, but what shall be taken as context? Some writers, like Pieter Seuren, u rge that we should re la x our approach to this issue and observe with a d m i text; or

in a context.

­

ration the opportunistic ways in which' people use con te x t to

Learning How to Tallc interpret text.

1 29

We would be bound to

la il i f we t ried to i � pose a

strict determinism on the process. All these discussions ope rate u nder the assumption that the context, like the text , is llu,·e, the•·e to be interpreted . l want to take a radically d i ffe rent approach

co n tex t "is." Context fo•· t h e you n g child can­ a given, as sim ply "being t he a·e." Ope t·ati\'e con­ text, for the child or ad u l t , is selected and const ructed . The "mles" or criteria for its selection and construction will, of cou ne , vary with the circumstances. Like rules for for m i n g <md t rans­ forming t he sentences of �• tex t or discourse , the mles f(n con­ st ructing con text ch a n ge with develo p men t . O ne o f the constraints of const ructed cmu exts is t h a t t hey m ust be cogn i ti vely m a n a ge a bl e That is to say , they m ust not be so com p rehensive as to groan u nde•· ordina•· y c o n d i t ion s of lan­ guage processing. In speaking o r in com prehending speech , we cannot take "e veryth i ng" into accou n t ! I f j ane offers john a cup of coffee after dinner a n d h e replies, Thanks, b u t I've got to hit the sack early to ni gh t he is contextualizing his refusal by refe rence to a ( p resumably) sha red contextualizing presu pposi­ tion about unmetabolized coffee k ee p i ng people awake. The. presu m ption is not a bizarre one, and if Jane bears John no grud ge , she will accept his refusal as gr<�cious. The loading is not e xcess iv e B u t J ohn could easi l y be more contex t u a l ly demand i ng by gi v i n g a mo re bizarre response rhat would force Jane to work intole rabl y hard i n understand i n g the basis of his refusal-like "No th a n ks, I 'd rather not be a pa i r of ra gged claws . " The f i rst implicit rule about con st r uc t i n g context is that it be "ordinar or "convenuona " easons or refusing a fter-dinner coffe e 'should be related to such common nfatters as caffeine and sleep, not to al lusio n s to t he sleepless depression suffered by T. S . Eliot's Pru frock. Ordi nariness implies a sha red culture. Anothe r rule of context construction is that we aid the i nter­ locutor in fi urin out what we have in mind . There a re many "tricks" or accomplishing this. The literature on speech aclS can be conceived o f as a close analysis of these "tricks" i n t he sense that j ohn A�stin analyzed the. s u btle means whereby we tell o u r to context-what a

not be taken as

.

..

,"

.

"

.

Chi ld's Talk

IJO

listeners whether an uttera nce is to be ta k en as a cbmmi s si ve a ,

behabitive, or whateve r. B u t. aga i n , m a s t e ry of t h e se "tricks" develops wi th experience in usin g the l a n gu a ge and with nego­ tiating how to inte rpret mea n i n g The child's grasp of how to make clear the con text of his u t te ra nce will certainly be u ncer tain . B eari n g these two gen e ra l poi nts in m i nd , l e t us redeem the status of form ats as speci alized v e rs i o n s of contexts. To begin with , formats a re p re se le c ted and preformed by the mother for the child. They may be varied slightly to k ee p them "interest­ in g ," bu t they a re kept easil y recog nizable and highly con­ stntined. They are made as gamelike as necessary to re11trict them to a set of perm issi ble ''moves" that define the context. One sees such nominali1.ing games as "Where's your nose, eyes, ears, etc.?'" o r "What's this?'' W h a t should be p roce s sed from the co n te x t has bee n prearranged by practice and ri tualization. Only with m as . tery of these prearranged contexts does the child or his mother begi n to "tran sfer" the game to a wi de r se t of alternatives. Con­ textualization starts with manageable and restricted formats an d is then e x te n de d-a n d then subjected to further modi fication�. l i ke bringing them under the sway of the kinds of feli�ity con­ . d i tions that govern speech acts. With res pect to the h i nts by which pa rtners in speec h give each othe r clues about i n t end e d context, early formats scarctly oeed them. They a re prefal;nicated . The labeling format of Ch a pter 4 is restricted to books a n d pictllre.r a n d naming. Early ,(lbject requ ests a r·e for things that a re ah·eady part of habitual interactions-food , toys, pictu res . Both even tuall y are extended . 'to a far b roa d e r r·an ge and then they come to require disambi­ � �ati ng " h i n ts" abou t con text. �: T h is brings us to con ven tional ization. The conventions of �nd icating a n d requesting, as we h ave seen repeated l y , are not � much d i rectly lin gu istic as broadly cu ltu ral . When to request, to prepare th e grou nd, how to ad d re s s a requestee in order orm a felici tous link-these a re what the child lea rns th rough racting. As he masters these "procedures," his signaling of .

­

­

.

·

.

.

131

uarning How to Tallc context becomes more "ordinar as a

conse uence, he

"

and more conventional . And,

can be not context- free in h is speec ,

context-mobile. That 1s to say\

ut

e can (as a rea y remar e ) lmpose

a context upon a new si tuation , indicate how the new situation is

to be interp reted by his i n terlocu tor.

How does the process of conventionalization get started? I

want to propose that before language proper comes on the scene, the chi ld has "natu ral" ways of embedding his ge s t u res and

vocalizations i n to contexts of action and interaction . I agree with

A rde Den kel 's thesis that much of early comm u nicative devel­

opment consi sts of converting natural modes of contextualizing

into con ven tional patterns. The natural modes provide the start­

up p rocess upon which conventionalization can· operate. Let me

give some exam ples.

Take joi n t attention regulation fi rst. When the you ng preli n ­

guistic child si ngles o u t or touches a "new" object, he often

accompanies the act wi th a

p rotodemonstrative like dn.. Patricia sequel to this. One of her sub­

G ree nfi e ld reports an interesting

jects used as his next p rocedu re for marking objects of attention

the doubled conson ant-vowel syll able. I nstead of dn., it would be bi-bi or na-na or some such . After this stage, the same child ma rked attended objects with the ex p res si on ada, with the into­ nation contou r of h is mother's expression "What's that?" A "natural" vocal m a rking shifted first to a "specialized" syllable

d u plication and then to

a

more linguistically mimetic form that

was well en route to being conventional.

the child

F ro m then on , of course,

wen t step-by-step i n to conventional utterance .

Similarly, th e study by Scaife and Bruner

reported in Chap­

te r 3 indicates that initially the child naturally interprets a "long

gaze" in a particular di rection as indicating the presence of a

visual target to be found along the path of that gaze. But Ryan's

study shows that by the end of the first year the child now also i nterprets conventional rising intonation in the mother's speech

as a signal to look for a new visual target. How did the child get from the natu ral to the conventional in this i nstance? U nfortu-

. nately, we do not have

the answer in the form of a research

study. B u t it certainly is not the least inconceivable that it could have jumped the gap by contiguity learning. To argue that the first step toward conventionalization is learned does not im ply

1 32

Child's Talk

that one has e mbraced once again a thoroughgoing empiricist

account of language acquisition. All that it implies is that the

child is ready and able to pick up associated cues that take him into the domain o f conventional communicating. To

proceed

in

that conventional domain requires the kinds of initial capacities

discussed in Chapter 2 as well as some sort of

sition Device.

Language Ac'1ui�

Or take an example from demanding and requc;sr ing. The

object that is being pressed on h i m . Other, less natural vocalizations take the place of crying. When conventional nega tion begins, the first u se of child natu r.llly cries when refusi ng food or an

"no" is found in the .same position as those earlier denial vocali�

zations. I ts contextualization is much the same as i ts nons tan� dard predecessors. But now it is amenable to linguistic elaboration

(as Roy Pea has shown) by genuine linguistic insights on the part

of the child .

Natural contexts are conventionalized into conventional forms

and regularized as formats. A format is a routinized and repeated interaction in which an adult and chikl diJ things to and with

each other. Since such formats emerge before bioo-grammati· cal speech, they a re crucial vehicles in the munication to language .

passage from

com­

�

A format is a contingent interaction between a t least two act­ nses · of each

ing parties, contingent in the sense that the res

epen ent on a pnor rese2 n mem r can s own to the other. Each member of the minimal pair has a goal ana a set

of m ean s

for its attainment. Each has the capacity to affect the

ot her's progress toward the respective goals. The goals of the

two participants need not be the same; all that is required is that

the condi tions of communal response contingency be fulfilled.

g

Fonnats "grow" and can become as varied a nd comple x as

necessary. Their growth is effected in several ways. They may in

time incorporate new means or strate ies for the attai nment of

Learning How to Tali

1 33

goals, inclu ding symbolic or li ngu istic one s. They may move

toward coordi nation of the goa ls of the two panners not only in the sense of "agreement," but also with re s pec t to a division of labor and a d iv is i on of i nitiative . And t h e y may become conven­ tionalized or ca n o n i ca l in a fash ion that permits others w i t h i n a symbolic community (e. g ., a "speech comm unity") to enter the format in a provisional way to learn its s pecial rules . Formats are also modular in the se nse of being accessible as subroutines for incorporation in larger scale, lon g-term rou­ tines. A greeting format, for example , can

be incorporated

in a

la rger scale rou tine involvin g other forms of joint action . I n this

sense, any

given

format m a y have a hierarchial st ructu a·e ; parts

being inter p retable in terms of their. placement in a larger struc­ t u re . The creation of higher-order formats by i ncorporation of

subroutine formats is one of the princi pal sources ofpresu ppo·

sition . What is i nco rpora ted becomes im plicit or presu pposed . Form;t.ts, save when

highly conventionalized , cannot be spec­

ified independently of the perceptions of the pa rticipants. I n this sense, they generally Fiave the p rope rty of contexts m being the resultant of defimuon 6y the earucapants. I he 3efimuon ot formats comm u na lly is .one of the majo r ways in w hi c h a com­ munity o r cultu re c«;>ntrols the interaction of i ts members. Once a format is conven tionalized and "sociali zed'' il comes to be seen as having "exteriority and co n s t ra i n t i n Emile Du rkheim's .sense and becomes objective in Karl Popper's. Eventuall y , formats provide the basis for speech acts and their const raining felicity conditions:· we learn how to i n voke them by speech. One special prope ny of formats involving ; m infant and <m ad ult (to pick u p H ila ry Putnam's point about refea·ence again) is that they are as y mmetrical w i t h a·espect to the knowledge of t he panners-one "knows what's u p ," the ot her ·does not know or knows less. Insofar as the ad u l t is willin g to ''hand over" his k n ow l ed ge he can serve in the format as model, scaffold , and monitor until the child achieves requisite mastery . To sum it up, I see the format as a means for achieving sev­ eral very crucial pragmatic functions in language acquisition. To "

,

· · Child's Talk

1 34

be n with , formats embed the child's com m u nicative intentions Lnto a cu t u ral m atri x ; t he y a re mstru ments for transmittin g the ·

cult m-e as wel l as its language. Because formats have a sequential structu re and a hi story (as noted earlier) , they permit the chi ld to develop p ri m i tive co nce p ts of aspectual time. At their sim­ plest, they provide the child with a kind of manageable , middle­ ran ge future, defi ned by the co u rse of t he ac t i o n rather than by ;1hst ract t i m e m· ten se . Beca use they have an incorporative growth, they become important vehicles for the dev�lopmen t o f p•·esu pposi tion and lor signal i n g presu pposi tions. Because they a re f i n i te, ordef'ly, a n d interdctive t hey also provide· a context ' fen· i nterpreti ng what is being said here and now . One last >int. I h a ve tried to set forth a view of language acctu isition that ma kes it continuous wit an epen ent on t e child"5 acqu isi tion of his cultu re . Culture is co n sti tuted of sym­ bolic proced ures, concepts, and d istinct ions that can only be made in langu age . I t is constituted for the child in the very act of m as­ tering lan guage . Language , in consequence , can not be ·u nde r­ stood sa\'e in i ts cul t u ral setting. I ho pe the account I have set forth has m ade i t c le a r w h y the two cannot be treated se parately.

N O T E S

,. 7 ,. ,

,, ,

,. 10

Prefoa

Allll in, J . H..,,. d• lltillr •iiA ""'""· OxfMd: Oxford Univ. �-. ag6• . Brown, R. A fi"' lanporp. Cambridre. Mass.: Hanard Uni¥. Preu, •97S· Bloo m , l.. Otw ...W III e lillw. The .Hasue: Mouton, I 97S· Green fi eld, P. 1: Smith . ). H . '171. *'""''' fl{ ..,_;,...... ill ..m, ....,..., ..,.,_,. . New York: AcademiC �-. 1g7fi. Dore. J. A praJmatk detcription of earlr lanpase demopment.J...,.,W fl{ �-

pUc R....mA. •97f·J· �

.

Ryan, _1. EariJ' laiiJUIJie de¥e nt. In M. P. M. Richards (ed.), '171. ..,...,... fl{ • dtilii ;,.r. . l«itJJ -'1. Cambridre: Cambridre Uni¥. I'Tess, •974· Bruner, J. S. The ont11Jmail o hpeech '11/CtL}a'ffflfl of CJtU ,..,,, • 975• a , 1- 1 9. Bruner, J. S. From communication to languare. Copifitll, 1975o J (5), •55-87. Bruner, J. S. A preface to the clnelopment of ·�· In G. Oleron (ed.), L�P�: H,_,, 4 P..JF,.u. Presso Unt¥enitcs de Frana:e, Ratner, N. 1: Bruner, j. S. Games, social n:chanre and the ac:quilition of la��Juage.

•977·

}tiUrNJI 'f!Ciriltl LMI"!f'_, t 978, ,, J191-fo l . Ninio, A. 1: Bruner, J. S. The achiew:ment and ant«.edcniS of labelling. }ttM'fftlll of Cltilll �..tm,..,.. 1 978, , , 1-15. Bruner, ]. S . , caudil, E., 1: Ninio, A. Languare and experience. In R. S. Peten (ed.), }tim 0,., � London: Routledre 1: Kqan Paul, •977· B rune.r, J. �·· Rainer, N., 1: Ror. C. The tiqinning of requat. In K. Nelson (ed.), CAilllrat , �. Yol. IV. New York: Gardner Pras, •til•· Bruner,J. S. Formata of languap ac:qui1ition. A..,;,..., joarNJI '!/S,..tiu, 1g8•, r (5), 1 -16.

,. II

Gftru, C. Till ;.. �,.., .( adlura: Stfldal GM�JS. �ew Yo�: Basic Boob , • 975 · Sperllcr . D. Rtftitiift6 ..,.. w. ... Cambridre: Cambridre Un••· �-. •975·

,. 11

The epigraph

o N IE

l l•trtHlwtiort

is !n Massimo Piattdli-Palmarini: ed., '--�UP ...J ,_.!"�_. '171. fhfall ..,_)_ ,._, ..., N- �- Cambric!�, M.S.: Hananl Unw. �. •,SO. � p. -'•· Based on uan�eripcs or a debate held m at Abbayc de Rorcs to the ltudJ' of lanalmont. For IJeneral t.ckground on the different .a bookl wil be of panicular help: SUIIIC KIJuii llion , the A ullin, j. H... �e .t. fAiotts WII • Oxfonl: Oxford Unlv. �. ag6•. Batn, E. ,_,..,. in c..,.· Tit ...,.Uiliaol fl{ /MJpolia. New York: Academic Prcn, a g7fi. Bdcn, H. S...._ in lit. cepiriw liuir tf -.,..... ....,_,. New York: Academic

followi ..,l

Oct�7S·

�· 1 975 · BeYer, T. G. The copitiYC basil for linguiltic: ·�res. lnJ. R. H•J'I (ed.), CepiiMia rm4 rlw ..,.,._l l{'-..... New York: Wiley, 1970. Biclerton. D. R.., .,,_,...,�. Ann Arllor, Mich .: Karoma I'Ublishen, 1 g8 1 . . Cbomskr, N. A lfl«b of tlw til-, tf .,..,.. Cambridp, M•A.: MIT �u, 1975· Oark, H. H . • Clark, t:. V. ,..,., .. ....,.:... All � ��� �New York: Han:ourt BracejO¥Biiimch , Jt¥17· c..,mcr, R. The de¥Ciopmcnt of languap and mpition: The cownition hypothesis, ·

Notes In B. Fou (al.), N• �ua ill cllilll �- Harmondswonh, Ena.: Pen­ suin, l 974 · Cromer, R. Rec:uncep�ualizinJ la r�� uaea acquioi&ion and c:ognitive devdopmem. In R. L Schiefdbua:b .. D. Bric:ltr, EariJ lill"f"'JI•: A� .� ;..-.... . Balti­ more, Md .: University Park Presa, 1 g8 1 . De LaM una, G. S,..: 111/wutien Mil lllwl.,.,.,.,. New Haven: Yale Univ. Preu, 1ga7. De Villiera, J. lc De Villiers, P. Lllrrptlp Mf!WiliM. Cambridse. Mass . : Harvard Uniw. . . Presa, 1978. Greenfield, P. Suucaural parallels between lansuage and action in developmenr. In A . l..ocl. (ed.), Aditol, f•*'•• lllld �. U.ndon: Academic Press , 1 978. Karmiloff-Smith, A. A fvodWull ,_,. ,. dtilll ltll..,_,.: A ....., of ,.,.,..._ _, rtf-. CambridJe: Cambridse Univ. Presa.. 1979· McNeill, D. TAu..,.UIIIGII rflill"f'I.IJP New York: Harper 1c Row, 1970. McNeill, D. Tw ciiiiUflltMII '-il rf""'P"''· H illsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum Publishers, 1979. Pinker, S. Formal modell c.p-..., 1979· 1• u7-a5. Searle, J. $,_, adl: A• _, ill 1M • · tf�·· Cambridse: C.. mbridge Univ.

ortanl";f�,':.;l;iiiJ. for

Preu, 1g6g. Sinclair-d�Zwan, H .. � 1Ja!Uililion and copilive �n1. In T. E. M001-e (cd.),c.piliw .,.,....., lllld iA.MfUUilioa ofliiiJtP�•�C · New York: Academic Presa,

1 975· Slobin, D . �nitive pr-erequisira 1he developmem of pammar. ln C. A. Fers1110 n • D. Slobin (cds.), $.-. efCIIM Uulgtulf• �l. New York: Holl , Rinehan . · .. Winalon, 1 gj 5. Trevanhen, C. The foundations of interaul!jectivity: Developmem of interpenonal coope rative undenlandins in infan11. In D. Olson (ed.), Till Miclalf""'NI.alitl 'u •I � orul tlltlfltl. ll New York: Nonon, 1g8o. T w o

,. 24

,, ,,

,. n

,. ,.

I Fro• C•••••ic•li•l fo T•IAi"'

Chomsky, N. Rtfl.-, ... ta.,...,. New York: Random Houae, 197!1· C �omslr.y, N. Review oC Vm..l &lltnMr by B. �- Skinner. lAnfllll! l • 1959, Jj, •6-511. Bickcnon, D. R"'* r(liiiA,...,. Ann Arbor, Mteh.: Karoma Publ•hen, 1g81 . · For a fuller disc:IIISion of lhesc poims, see: ' B runer, J . S. Nature and uae1 of immaturity. In K. J . Connolly .. J. S. Bruner (eds.), Tlw f'MA .,_,fllrtU. London lc New York: Academic Pra•. 1974· Kalnins, I . .. Aruner, j . S. The a10nlinalion of vilual observaaion and instrumenlal behavior in earfy inlancy. Pm.,_., 1 97!1• 2, !107-•4· _ Papouaek, H. Elaboraaiona of conditioned head-cumiiiJl. Paper presented at the sym­ posium on l.eamms of Human Infants, lAndon, 1 g6g·. . · , Stem, D. Tlufim �· /rtfortl -.4 ..,.. Cambridsc. Mau.: Hamtnl Univ. Praa. ' 1 977· B razdiDR, T. B., KoJl-slr.i, B., lc Main. M. The reciprocity: The eariy mother-infanl imeration. In M. Lcwia • L Rolenblum (cda.), n. o.ffld f{IM in/11111 ... ill mr•P.· New York: Wiley, 1 974· Bruner, J. S. Nature and UICI of immaturity . In K. J. Connolly lc J. S. Bruner (eds.), Tlw .,.... e/ �- London lc New York: Academic Prcu, 1974 · Bower, T. G. R.. p,� -'1 r( 1/w clli/J. Cambridge, Mau.: Harvard Univ. Preu, . 1 97!1· Mel110fT, A. lc Moore, M. K. lmilatioa of facial and manual ac:saures by human neonala. ScVr!u, •977· '"· 7�-78. Trunid, E. (eel.). � �I' ill irtfeM"J: A/f«t, c...-. M4 ... ...u..a... . Balti­ mo�-e, Md.: Univenily Park Preu, 1g8•. For a cli.c:usaion of abe •ruau�-e of early aaion, aee: Bruner, J. S. • Bruner, B. M. On voluntary acaion and ias hierarchical llrucaure. l.,. •llli••ll,.. of P.,.,.,. ag68, J (4), •S9-&J· Bruner, J. !. The oraaDiutirin of early slr.illed acuun . ClliM �. 1 973. u. 1 u. f'iaser, J . SiniGllrllii.. u.nct-: loudcd&e • Kepn Paul, 197 1 . f'ialet, J. '1M _,._ r( r.a&, ;, 1M dtilll. London: Roudcdge • Kegan Paul. •95'7 · Werner, H. c-,.raliw � ll/ __,., �- New York: Science Edilions, 1g61. New York: lnteriaaaiotUI Univeniliea Preu, 1'"-8. For a d._... of lhe -..binaaioul atrUClur-e of early play, see:

orisins of

,

1 )7

Note1 KollloWiki, B.

,, ,,

,. JI

&: Bruna·, J. S. L.earni111 10 use a lever. ClliU Otwlflll-•. 1 97 1 , ·ll l:s). 790"119 · Bruner, J. S. The OIJanization of e;ariJ ... illcd action. Clliltl ��. 1 97 ' · H• • ­ u. Weir, R. � m Ill# nill. The H aaue: Muu1un, tg6t. Bowerman, M. The aajuisilion of wo1-d tnaning: An inveiligation into sume £ urrcm confticu. In N. Walenon &: C. Snow (eels.), Tlu �� t{ r--niulrioft. New York: Wiley, 1 978. The deboot e 011 "rich interpretation" of early speech is reviewed in: Greenfield, P. &: Smah, J. H . T1u llrVduf'l f{ c-••italimJ m '""' ��· bwltlf'IIVHJ. New Yoa·k: Academic; Prcu, 1976. A n a.amplc of the "surprise reaction" produced by objeciS that are chanteed u pon reappear•nce is found in: . Gardner, ]. The development uf ot;ea identiay in dae lin& silt mon1h1 of human inl',aiiC)'. Ph.D. "rhnis, Department of Social Rdauuns, Han<ard U n iversity, 1 97 1 . The aurprile produced by "unnat ut'll l" caus;r.tion is reponed in: l..ealic, A. The repracntation uf pen:cived causal conneaiun in inlimcy. D. Phil. Th� ••· Department of El< perimenliol l'sychology, Univcn;ily ol' Oxl'ru·d, 1979· The tniDlln toclal nr "amudllf' b;a.sis lOa· dae ·recogniliun uf ubjena is rcpurlecl by: Bryanl, P., Junes, 1'., Claxton, V . , &: Perkins. G. Recognition uf sltapes acn••• niCldalui"" by infants. NGN.r1, '$7'• 240 (S579), sos-so.t · Meltzoff, A. lmiaation, tnter-modal QIOrdination and n:prcsemation in early infamy. In G. Bu11en010nh (ed.), l""""' drul ,._,DO· l..onclon: Harweiler Preu, ag8t. Piaget, J. .SinldUrvllu•. l.Dndun: RoutlcdJe &: Kegan P.•ul, •97 • · These distinctions (e.g., between specific and nonspecillc, c:IC.) a re discusaed by: B iderton , D. R• t( ,_,...,., , Ann Arilor, Mic:h.: Karoma Publishers, lg81 . The: La�t�uage Aajuisition Devic:e ia discuuc:d in: Chotosky, N. Review of y,6Ql B•lun!Wr by B . �- Skinner. LtmfVdfl'· • 959· JJ, 16-5 1! . Chomay, N . Asjl«
(eda.),�·

Preu, 1 Critic:ism

·

a.

Surpa·

rhis idc:a ia oontained in an interesting anic:le by:

W. J. M. Whar bec:amc: of U\01 In Ul vida& .. Cet•tribulj.,u lit Gil urulol'lldnding of liapislia . FeSISChrifr fur l'ic:rcr Verburg on the: occasion of his 7oth binhday .

Levell.

,. JJ

·

Liuc:, nac: Netherlands: Peter de Ridder Press, ' 975· St. A uguttine. CIIIIjcui-. Bldl.imorc:, Md.: Penguin Books, 1 g6 1 . The transformation of A uguaa inian le.amina imo the modern dress of imitation and reinfon:cment is more fully disc:uued in: Bruner, J. S. The Nle of d illl ugue in lallllllliKC: K�tUiaition. In A. Sinclai•·. K. J. J;arveiLI , &: W. J . M . Lcvdt (cda.), Till tlli/4• -�· of lallfiAtJfl· Be.-lin: Springe:!'· Verl;ag. , ,, a. The 1'(0) wnstruaion w;a first imroduccd by: Braine, M. D. S. The on101c:ny o f EnaJill• phrase struaurc:: The: lint phax. Ltmpt�gt, l g6!J , J9· • - • 5 · 111 synractical ltaiUI h as been cast into dou lx by : Bloom, L. Ltm.p"'• � F- Gflll junaitm in ,_,.gm, gra•1111n . Cambridge,

Ma11. : M IT

1970·

Press, Bowc:nna n , M . I.Minling •

Mit· A cr.�-lillp ulic � t{ ,.., "'*"fir �� wid& � '""""' t. Filvtid. Cambridge: Cambridge: Univ. Press, 1 97S· B rown, R. Ajint ltm,.,.,. Cambridce. Mass . : Harvllrd Univ. Press, ' 975· Sec: Skinner, B. F. VgiJJ..,.,, New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1 957 . Chom... y, N. Review of Vg/ Btluwillr by B. F. Skinner. l.arJfi'IJI'• 1 959, J J , 16-58. Chom... y, N .S]IIIII dio: Jbtldur•. The H 1111c:: Mouton, 1 957· Miller's rcmari is diKuued in: UICI of la.. uaae . Caftlldiaa J-..1 t{ P9f""""R " �.;, of P fl• t978 , J a , •o.e-aB. •

,. J4

Br�J:..!· ="' &he •

Sc:e: Fillmore,

C. The cae far case. In E. Bach &: R. T. Hllrms (eds.), Uroiwrllal.l m lillpislie --,. New York: Hoh, Rinehan &: Winllon , ag68. Fill more, C. The case ror case reopened. In P. Cole &: J . M . Seadock (eda.), S)llllllt Gad s-'ip, V.I. J: S/*dl .... . New York: Academic: Press , 1g68.

1 )8 ,. n

,. ,6

,_ ,, ,_ ,, ;. 411 ,. 41

Note• B rown, R. lt fi nl ltm�. Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard Univ. Prai. 1 975· Sft: . Grec:nfield, P . .. Smid,, )· H. Tltulnu:turuf c_,_nietrliM in ..,., ,_,_,. .,...,.,_,_ N�w York: Ac:anc�pt. -rd and Kni�Me: Interrelation• in acquisition and dcoorlop­ �nt. l'�ptJ Rftliftl, • 974• II (4), •67-85. Nehon, 1. . .. Gru�ei, J . Gellft'lll ized �nt r�pRSen�atimu: Ba1ic building blocb of cngnitiw development. In A. Brown .. M. Lamb (eds.), A� iol �

�. ¥01. 1 .

ISCUssions or the role of ·-rtd knowledge• in language aatuisition, tee : For early cF OI!IOn, D. R. l..an"uage and lhotJ«ht: Alped� of a c:oxnitive theory of eemanda. ,.,. TIHJntirnl Rn�""· 1 117''• '17 (1), 11;7-73; a n d : Mac:Namara, J. The coinitive basiS ofla ngtiaw e IKIJUioilion in infanu. l'� R,W,, • 97 • · 79· • - • S · d � Samsu�. F . Cou r., in ,,._, linpirlia. N � w Vorl: l't1ilo110phial Library, 1955. WiltiJI!nllrin, l� l'ftil•_ofllrica_l in-�P-· OK ford: fllad.��ll. 1 95ll · , Alllltn, j. """' to tlo tltmlfS ,,;,/t -.lt. OKfnrd: O• rord Unw. Pre�. •!lfi•· Bmwn, R. l ntmcluc:t iun. I" Snow ., •·�rxu110n (eels.), TIJ/Imr t o dliUrm: 1-I""P i"/'UU ....t «f"Uilitlro. Cambridg�: Cambrid� Univ. Pr�••· 1 977 · xarle, J. S/)t«
�, YOI. s .

For a discussion of th� child's "�entry" into the Gman cycle, �= Denkel, A. CA>mmunication ami meaning. D. Phil. Theis, Department of Philosophy; Univenity of O. ford , a g77·

T H R E E

I P11J1, Gc-•• arul lA"P"f•

The study of t� nature and URs of immaturity is diliCuslll!d in: B runer, J. S . Nllture a nd u11:1 of immarurity. I n K. J . CA>nnnlly .. J. S. Bruner (edt.), Tlw pfllllt t{ cortptma. l.ondon .. New York: Academic Prns. 1 97:f · A fuller di��e111sion Of suc h IJillmn o f childiiOOCi and their lingut.lic: implications cari !*! · found in: Bruner, J. S. It Sherwood , V. Early rule struct un: The c:a� or "peek aboo . " In R'. Harre (ed.), l..f, _,.,,., Asfl«
Wiley, 1976; and: . .. Bn�n�r, J .

S. (;a me�, oocial eacl•a"'le and ehe acquisition of laniJWIII:· }tJMmiJI -f Cltiltl u.n,..,., 1978, j, !g 1 -of01 . Buh�t, K. $�: 1M DoiSIM/unl'fiiMAiitln Ur S�. Jena: F"IIICher, 1954· Stern , D:, Hofer, L., Haf1, W., lt �. j. lnterpmonal mmmunitation: The Mlune­ mem or affect Mates by means of lnltrmndal Rurnc:y. Paper preHntecl at the Inter­ national CA>nferenc:r on Infancy Studies, Allll i n, Tn111 , March , 1 g8 1 ; and Ill the N- York Child l..anguage Group CA>nf�r�nce, N�w York, May, 1 g81. Kaye, K . It Charney, R. How mnthen maintain •dialogue" with rwo-year-olcls. In D . OIMHJ (ed .) , 1M ...W./•11tltJti.u f/� _, tAoup1. N ew Vorl: Norton, 1 gllo . Brazelton, T. B., Kozlowski, 8., .. Main, M. 'the origins of reciprocity: Earl,. mother­ infant incerac.t ion. In M. l..ewis .. L. RoRnblum (ed,.), Tlw *ffct tf IN illf- .., ilr cort,n-. New Vorl : Wiley, •974· Rai MF , N

Fo u R

I TM Growtlt

of R•f•,.. ""

Putnam, H. Mintl, lll n...., .., rllllllif!. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Pras, 1975· Ogden, C. K . .. Ric:hards, l . A. Tlte -illt
1 )9

Not�• 5«:

Pechmann. T. lntentt ion and the dnelopmem of definite dacrip­ tlona. Unpublished manuiCript, M P I P, N!jmqen, The Nedmiands, •oil a . W. &: Pechmann, T. Form and function in lite development of reference. Paper presented to S,mposium 1 8 (Lanpaae Deftlopme nt and Prewerbal Com· municatlon). XXII International Con&rcst of l'lychoion, Leipzia, •tflo· Pechmann, T. a. Deuuch , W. From amure 10 -n1 and iftt ure. Papen and Repor11 on Child LaniJU:tle Dewelopmenl. Li111J11istia Depiltlment, Sunford Univenity, • lg8o. Pechmann, T. a. Deutsch, W. Thc development of verbal and nonverbal deYices for reference.JtiMrttlll f{� CitilJ I'�, 1 gll• , J4• li!IG-of l . Chance, M . Auendon llruc:turc a s the bub of primate rank orden. Mtott, i g67 . 2 ,

Deuuch, W. &:

Deuuch,

503- 18.

I

It is to C. S. Peirce lhat we owe lhe distinction of indexes, ioonl, and symbols; see : Peirce, C. S. C.Um.J /�¥#"• Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Prcu, (vols. 1 and 5I,

,_ .,.

,. 7J ,. 7J

1 9!1•-!14 · L)'OM, j. Deixis as the .... uru of reference. In E. L. Kcman (ed .), F-' -..aa _,., �ma,.,.,. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Pres.•, 1 975· .

of

Rolnon, K. S. The role of �to-eye contaa in matemal-inf•nt atta�hment.J.,rul •/ CAild l'� � l'lydlial,, 1 g&, , 8, 1 !1-15. Stem, D. • Hofer:-L, Haft, W., a. Dore,j. l nterpenonal communication: The auu-. ment of affect states by means of intcrmodal fluency. Paper presented at lite Inter­ national Conference .on Infancy Studie1, Austin, Teus. Man:h, a g8•; and New York Child Lansuaae Group Conference, N ew York, May, t gll. Lyo111 , J. Deixir. u the oource of reference. In E. L. Keenan, (ed.), ,,_, ,_,.., fl{ ltllllmll ,_,_., Cambridp: Cambrid1e Univ. Press, 1975· Ryan, M. L. CIIIIIGur it UltlkttL Paper presented at the P•ydaology Lanauage Confer­ ence, Stirlinc. Scotland, 19'16. Seaife, M. a. Bruner, J. S . The apacity for joint visual auention i n the infant. Nfllwow, 1 975· 2}1 (5
Butte ,_rah, G. a. Jarrett, N. The seo!!�ftry of preverbal communication. PaJII9' pre­ sented 10 The Annual Conference, Dcftlopmentai i'I)'CiaoloKy Section, British l'ly­ choJosical Soc:iety, ·uncuaae. Communication and tJndcriia nd inc: EdinbufJh,

September, 1 g8o.

Putnam, H. Miml, ln11pt11,r •"" rMii'1. Cambricl��:: Cambridge Univ. Press, ' !1'75· Hosan, W. Theoretical epentrilm and ihe prOblem of compliance. A...n-t l'.,o..J­ ,. 71 ,. 77

,. 71 ,_ , ,_ , ,_ ,., ,, ,

Ofill, May, 1 975, 5!15-
indebted to Maada Kalmar of the Univenity of Budapest ror promins this striki"' inltlnce ofp0int in1 10 a •hypothetical" loa!tion in •s-ee · Ninio, A . &: Bruner, j. S. The achievement and ancecedents of labellins. J.,,.., t( I am

Cllilll u,,.,_.,., 1 9 78, ,, 1 - 1 5. R. a. Shat2, M. Appropriate apc!ec:h adjulllmenl2 : The operation of CDnver­ sational mnstrainu on talk to c--ycar-olds. In M. Lewir. a. L. Rosenblum (eds.), lflfmlditM , ___.,. .U tltr �l t(�. New York: Wiley, 1977 . Quine, W. V. Tllr "'* ll{r#f,_. La Sralle, IU.: Open �uti,_ �f?!l· _ xhlninger, J. M. n. ��episiriett fl/ -tJJ .U ctlttafl*. Unpubfilbed manuscript,jeru· ulem, The Hebrew University, 1978. Grice, H . P. Lotric and con� nation. ln P. Cole a. j. Morgan (ecb.), s,.. ,_ ...., _,;c,, ¥01. !I· London: AcademiC Pras, t975· Chllfe, W. M-itf ...., ,., ,_ ., ,.,_,.. Chap: Chicaao UniY, Press , 1 p7o. For particularly penetnlina dilc- Of how the ch11d milht p about mutern�� ahe Intent of ion utterance, see: Harrison, B. M-iltf M4 .,_,.,., A11 _, ill IIJr � tf ....,..,. . . New York: Harper a. l'ow, 1 971 . McShane, j. L-naittf ,. 111M. Cambridse: Cambridge Univ. Preu, 1 !jllo . Denltel, A. Communication and mnnq. D. Phil. Thais, Department or Phac-phy. Unlvenil.y of Oxford, •977· Shau, M. The relaaionlbip between copitiwe proces- and the development ol COlt

Gellman,

'· " ,. •7

nitive 1Uia. In B. Keur (eel.), Nebrulr.a Symposium oo Motivation, •977. Lincoln, Ncb.: Univ. of Nebrub l'reM, tf78 . Putnam. H. Miill, IM�w.�r .U .,_,. Cambridae: Cambridge Univ. Preas, •975· .· See Miller's dilcuuiorl in: Miller, G . s,...,_ _, ...,... riclll . New York: Saburp Prat. • 977· Carer, s .. � child • Word le;ai'ner · �n M. H�le. J. Branan I< G. A. Miller (eels.), l.iapiiiiC � �� ,.,U,. Cambridae, MaiL: M IT Prell, 1978. . BaRlett, E. j. The aaa uilidon Of dw IIIG nift& of mlor term�: A ltud)' of lnic:al devd· o pmenl . In R. P. Smith (ceiL) , RIUIIl .....,_., a 14. � of MR· 1111/l ...,.-dliU . �. New York: Pieounl. a978. ,...,: u.,..,,

�=..:

,_ ,

��·

f1v

1 / TA. lhr��l¥-•

ef Rctwll

Hinti.... a. J. . Quationnbout q-iona. In M. K. MunitJ I< P. K. Unaer (cds.);S,_,.Iia """ New York: New York Univ. Preu, •974· Katz, J.· The ic or q-iont. In M. K. Jof unu I< P. K. Unaer (edl.), s-ac, _, Pili.,.,.,_ ew York: New York Univ. Preu, 1 974·

Searlc, j. S,.. ,di: AR _, m tlu� tt{,_paf'. Climbrfdae: Cambrid1c

Univ.

Pre��, ag6o. Garvep, C. ieij-. .and rcspoNa in children's apecdi.JiiUmsl t( Cltil4 U.,W.,.. '975· a,

4 1 -63 .

Ricb, D. Jof. Th e bqinnins• or WJCal mmmunic:ation in infan&s and autistic child.-en. Unpublitbcd Doaoraac of Medicine Thais, Univenil)' of Lqndon, •97• · Prau, C. Tlu � t( nJMI· Unpublished doaoral diuert.alion , Univenily of ,_ , Oxfonl, ad. ,, , Suprman, S.-Some orpnizaaion upecu of preverbal mmmunication. In I. Narkova (ed.), n, __ _,_, tt{laf1141'· New York: Wiley, 1978. p. IH Lpons, J. s-tia. C.ambridse: Cambridae U niv . Prest. •977· (See apecially chap�Cr • 5·) Stepben, L. H._, of E•p.ll ...,., a llw � URIU'J. London: John Murray, 1 go1; reprinted t917 . ,. IH Crawfonl, lol. Cooperative behavior in JOUDIJ chimpanzees. P� Bull.dila, •935 · J 3.• .7 1 4: ,. uJ The fo!Jowin& work came 10 the author'• anenlion after the current volume wu complete: Huelkorn, S. The development of the requa11 of pou ns children from 11011 ve rbal ltrarqia 10 lhc J»Wr of Jan1u.aae . D. Education Thail, Graduate School ol Edu� • ca&ion, Hananl Uniwnity, agla . s 1 x

,. uJ p. IJJ

,. ,.

,. 12'

I �.e.,..;.., H•w

�P.,.�

lo

Tall!

Pu�m, H. Miad, ,_,.,, Cambridae: Cambridac U•iv. Halliday, M. � A. ,. _. London: Edward ArnoJcl, t975· Seuren, P. Penonal communication.

I

indebted 10 Dan Sperber, whole talk at PrincetDn Univcnily a gSa helped form the ditc:uuion of context and ill co1111ruaion .

am

Press, •975· in the 1pri111

of

Dcnkd, A. Communic:alion aad mcanins. D. Phil. Thctia, Dept. or Philolophy, Uni­ nnitr ol Oxford, •977· Greenfidd, P. I< Smich.). H. n. --, of a�•-imliloo itt •IIJ ,_,.., �. New York: Acadenuc rr-. 1 976. Scaife, W . I< Bruner. j. S. The capacity for joinl visual •lention in the infant. N41V�, 1 97 5 , a,J (M8g), a65-66 . Ryan. M. L. CMIIolr ill _,__ Paper presented a the Psycholoay Lana:uap Confer­ ence, Slirlif11, Scotland, a976. ,. uz Pea, R. The of ncsation in eaoi)' child lanauasc. D. Phil. Thaia, Dep.anment ol Paydao , Oaford Univenitr, • 9'111 · p. IJJ Durkheim, E. 7'tlr �1- tf tM .-.ipur lif•. New Yort.: Free Pteu, a!J65. Papper, K. Oljldiw �c Aft 111ft BJ II')' �· Oxford: Clarendon Preu. 1971. · The discuuion of •formau• presented he re wa1 firll elaborated i n : Bruner,J. S. Fonn.att of lan�U�e liCllluiaition". t..m-}.,'lftlll tf s...i*cJ, ag&a, •(5), ,. IJI

de=nt

a -a&.

I N D E X abetractncu, 19-so, 1 19, 1 1 1 , 1 11 action �ehemas, 75 anaphora , 68 apa, ue Great Apa A u1u11ine, Saint, 5 1 -51, a4, l !l7" Austin, john, 7• a. 56, a u , 1 19-50,

• 55"· tsiiR Bacli, E., a s.,.. Bartlett, E. J., 87 , 1 4C111 Bales, I., a 55" behaviorism, s• Beilen, H ., a !15" Bever, T. G., I !IJI' B ick-erton, D., as. 40, t 1 9, • !15"• a s&.. 1 !1711, a s• biopro1rammin1. 40 Bloom, L., 8, t !l!o"· 1 !17" MBody Pan.s" game, 7? "book readin1: 7!1· 77-84. 86-38, 1 04 Bower, T. G .lt., 17, a sfia Bowerman, M., 19, . ,.,.. Braine, M. D. 5., 1!17" Braaelaon, T. B., t6, 6o, a s&t, a s• Bre11111 n , 1 .• 1 4011 Bricker, 0., 1 5_6oo Brown, A., a s& Brown, R . , 7-8, S5· 56, S?• s a, 1!15"• 1 !17"·

•s•

Bruner, B. M . , a s& Bruner, J . 5 . , • 55"· a sfia.

as.,.., •!I• •

I !191'• 14011 • Bryant, P., 1 5.,.. Bubier, K., 4 ? • • s• Buuerworth, G., 75-74• • !111'· a ssn · CampbceUi .R., '4!1'" Mcanonica locua, gl, a oo- a o 1 Carey, 5., 87 , 14011 cue pammar, 34-35 caae Audics, 47�!1• 7 1 -71, 75� · H-a8, 95- 1 05, • 07- a s , a s a CaUcliU, E.. 1 !15" Chafe, W., , • S9'1 Chance, M.. , 15911

Chari_ICY,

�ID,

.... a slloi

child lanpap: compoetence vs. !;'Crformanc:c, 55 •ricli in�erpretauon" of, 8 , 19 voc:alizadDn ¥1., 7 I, 1 14 children:

absrraaneu endowment

. . . . ...

in,

19-30, 1 1 9,

body-minded vs. feature- minded , a a cauutaon pe rceived by , •9-SO combia�:.otion rcadineu in, •9 gual-dia�t:!ed �ctivily or, lf-19 head l llrRinl( IR, 15-16 initial COIIliuve endowment of, 14-5 • · 1 19 inlcr:.oction with mothers of,su motherchild interaaion as Naive Realiau, 74• 1 11 perce pt ua l world of, 19-.so prolonged imnwurily of, 16-17, 45 110eial response in, ac;:.. l8 1pecch cncoun1crs arr.. n1ed for, a o- a a ,

as

sg. 6g

apccch errora or. 19 sponta neous speech in, •9 suckio1 response in, 1 5 syruax used by,, 7 •ay��cmadcity • in, aa, u 9, visual perccpcio n of, 15

chim panaecs: lan1ua1c not acquired by , l i ne of reprd amo1_11 , 6g

ua

•s

request behavior of, 104 Chom..k y , N011 m , 17, a g, •s. ss-S4· 155'1· . ,•• • ,.,. Clark , E. V., ' S5'1 Clark, H. H . , I SS" Claxton, V., 1 !11" Cole, P., • s�. • sSn. a sgro combinaaonal readineu, ag, 45 . 46

•

•9·

Q1111 m unication:

47• • • • prelin1uiJiic , • !I · s a . s8. 59. 6a, 1 16 snailcs and1 a6, 51 . - allo facial CXP!CS51011 ; langua1e

play and, _

ConnoUy. K. J . , a s6n, .• s&n c;onteXI, COnteXt SCnSiliVIl)',

• •B-s•

1 19 defined , • • a in reference, &a, 69'"70

9• 14, 1 9 , 36,

constructed,

in � behavior, g a , routinization in, text "'·· 1 18-19

70, 1 18

Crawford, M., 1 04 , 1 4011

100, 1 1 4

Index Cromer, R., 1 35"-s&a cry i ns: as �wst, g•. ns socialiution of, g.. 1 s• cuhur�: biolosy and, •s-•6 lansu•se and, 1 1 , •4 · •8-•g. sB. •os-4 . 1 1 5, 1 10, '54 mothen as "agents" of, 94· 1 15 ordinari�u in, • • • . • •g. • so-s • deictics, 68, s,. 74• too, 1 1 4 undifferentiated, n _,, "'·"' context. cont.,xt toe n�itivity Ot' I."JI""a· G . • 1 !IM Denlr.�l. A .. • s • . i sllll . • ll9"· • 4.., l>eUt!ICh, W., 68, 1 !19" developmental linguistia, ·"' lang•"'ge acqui�ition

De V iRiero, ) . , t :t�6n De Villirrs, 1> •• lllfioo Dore, J., 8, • 35"· t !jlloo dubbins ceremony, • • s-•4 Durlr.�tm, Emile, I SS· 1 4011 egocentricity

as mammals, •s

"orisinal endowment" of, •s-•4 illocuttonary fora!, 8, • a t , • •7 indexica�. 77o 9S• 1 1 4 , t a;

•(4• • ••

"e pi phanies o the ordinary," 1 1 1 �re·to-f!)'l! contact, 70

facial n pre11ion, importance of, •7

..

Ferpson, c sB. 1 s&n. • slloo Fillmore, C .• Jof• 1 57" " fine tuning, in l a ns ua ge acq uisition, sB. 40, 1 14-•s

formats: "book reading," 75• 77-84 , 86-88, 1 04

defined , I IG-1 1 , 1 1 8 , 1 31

d ubb!ng, • •s-•4 greet • ns . • ss growth of, 1 3• -34

.

idealized, 46 inviutional. aos-6 m odula rity of, l lJS in mothcr:.child Interaction, g, 40 in play, 41, 46, 7 1 , • • 7-•8 ref�rena:. n4-17 requ�st. g6- • os in �peecli encounu:rs, 1 0 , t 8- t g , •9· 394 1 , • so Foss, B . . •s6n

Frege. Friedrich, s•

functional wre model (FCM), ss-s6 functiorudism, s6-s9 Fudlillll .tiKJI, 47 pmrs: defined, • • 7 HUIJ• pby; lf'ttfit fllfii G "pp i ndica,ma.M t oB Gafdner . _l . ; • s 7" Ganey. c:, . ' 4"" Gftnz, C., 1 1 , •S5" Gelman, Roc he l �. 78, ' !19" gi'IOI:·and-talr.e pmes, &o-6 1 srntax ··sn m marian hn11uistics," 8

lrammat, ,,

Great Apes: line of regard amon1, 6g play in development of, 45 IOCtal respon se in, 16

Gree n field, P., 8, S5· I J I , ' 35"• • s&a. I S7"· • slloo . 1 4011 Grice, H. P., 4 1 , I SIIn, i,sp Grurndei,J., • sllft Haft, W., 1 38ft · Halle, M., t 4e101 Halliday, M . , • •&· 1 4011 "ha ndover princ:aple," 6o, 107-8 Harms, R . T . , • s7" Harrt!, R., 8, 1 s lloo Har rison, B .. 1 39" Hasrltorn, S., 1 4011 Uays, l R., ' 35" 59 "hello. ' in play vs. in real sito..,tinns, · B intik b , J. , 1 4.., Hnft'!r, 1.., 1 38oo HotJan, W ., 74• t 39" human beinss: Great Apes and mnnkeys vs., 16-1 7 , 4!1• tit

infants, J" children insntiatives, 1 05 in tention :

c:onventionali'rd or "nonnatural; 4 • ,

• • s. 1 15, • so-s• importance of, s6-s8 . 1 1 8 reft'!rential, 67. 85, 1 1 1

interroptive form, 9 1 i n te rpre tation or. 3 7 reference vs. request in, 76-77 intenubjec:titoity, •7 · 1 1 1 intonational cues, 75

1alr.obson, �

Roman, g, t a- 1 3 I !J!I" anelb, R. j . , 1 !17" " nt aaion1 75· gs. •o4-e. • • 4 - t 5, I SS nt auenuon, 61J-n . BB. • .. -•!I· I S I nathan (case stud}'). 1,7 -55· 5�· 1, • 7 • · 75• 77· 95-96• 98• 100, 1 0 1 -1 , 105, 1 07-8 Iones, P., • 37" 'kalmar, M . , 76, ' !19" Ka lnins, I . , tlj&a Ka rmiloff-Smith, A . . 1 3&. Kat7., j . , g t , 1 4001 arrett, N . ,

•

Kaye, K., 1 58ot Keasy, B., 1 4011 Kernan, E. 1.., I 39"

Kenney, A nthony, 8

Kozlowski, B . , l !llin, l !l'P'• · , ,&n. K u h n , Thomas, 3 1 • . Lamb. M . . a slln • ·· lanRUa11e: . diild, 8, .,. ,. . . . ... as c:onsdtuent o play, 45· 47• 6 1 . 1 • • • I • • •• �uhurr and, ' ' · 14 , it8-a9, s8, t OS-4 · . . , . 1 10, •54 ••smg on or, 1 0 " · 11.1 ning," 71

,

use

and�function of, 8

lan11uage acquisition:

_

1 43

lndes mm�l.l or, l l - 1 8 em pnida aaociauonism theory or,

s•-

, •• S4• IJII luncuonar core model or, s s-s6 I functionalist theory Of, ,e;..,, �n�te caP,�City for. •s-•4· SS• ' ' 9• t ao ... - \11, "' ....... ,, •4 natiYia theory of, ss-s4 refereoa: in, ut reference �uell in, 1n requea thiories of, 8, .5 a -sg, •of Lansuase Acquttition omce ( LA D), t g, , , , ,, , 58. 59, 85, • s • LR npaJ!t! At'C�UIIition Support Sy!lle m (LASS), t g, S9-4•• 6o, I to, 1 17 lcarn!"' eaperimcnts, !15 : •7 lrarn1ng thi:ory, beha\ll onsuc; Lealie, A., I S 'I" l.eYelt, W. J. M., •S'I" Lewis, M., I 56oe, I s8oo , I !19'1 line of reprd. 6g. 7)"'74• , .. , l S I . linplatic communiues: correctift poaibilitics in, 87, 1 15 nquiremcnll or, s8 IJICCCh encounters arnnpd by, r o- n ,

s•

I.msu 6!1uucs: .

developmental, '" lanpase �uisition domain or, , functional w. structunal, s6 ·snmmarian," 8 LoCk, A., • sfin locutionary ronn , 8 Luria, Alexander, 55 88 , tOO, • SF• 1 4011 Lyons, J., Mac:Namara, . , 1 58oo McNeill, D., • s&oe McShane,J., ' 59" Main, M., rs6ft. 158oo Markon, 1., 1 4C111 means-end reailiness, •f-•5· 40, 45• 1 07 , . . ,. . . . MeltzOff, A., 17, ISfin. 157" Miller , G., !14• 1 !17"• I fOil monkeys: line or rep rd among, 6g IOdal response in, t6 Moo re, M . ll., • s&oe Moore. T. E., • s&oe Morpn, J., • $Ilia• • S!I" . modier-dlild mtcractiOn, 1 8- 1 g, 17-18, s B-f •, " ' In "boo k reicling ," 77_.4, 86-88 cxperimenu with, 17, 57• 75"'74 "fine tuning" in. ,S. fO, • •4-a5 formats \n, g, 40 interpretation Of request• in, 9 ' -94• 97-

70·]•-?S·

,S. • O? · • •8

joint attention in, a,..., , , 88, prolo"'lfll , 4 5 '" Ills• .,..,

lfiOthcn: n "apnt of die cultuft," 94• UIICraiiCel of, 7S.... 1 , 85, 99 u ...t unttry a�nt, 100, 1 01

"mother tdMima," 95

. .. -.,. l S I ,. 1 15

Muniaz.. N . K., 14CIII Nagel, E., 157" Naive Realiiril , 7f• I t t namin1, nominali, 76-77, g8, 100, I I f , . . . ,-. .. . . , Ne�NN� , K., ss_,6, 4 1 , I S5ft, 1 5h Ninio, A., 10, 77• a sp. ' SF � hifht111iu111 , 7 •-'7• o!!jcct �mancnce, 46. 48 +t play, a8, 7 1 otiJ«l �uea, 95· gs-1 04 object sdiema, 95 Oiden, C. K., a s&oo Oleron, G., 1 5511 Olton, o .. · �&n. • s•

"E'!Io-t•

ordi �rincsi, 1 1 1 , OltCRIIYe reach, ,95•

, fl',

Papou��ek, Hanus, •5-16,

• sfin

Oxford Univenlly, specc eYOIYed at, 8

act

100

lhcory

f'IIJCnt-chilcl interaction, - modocr-child Interaction

Pea, R., I 51, 1 4011 Pec:hmann, T. , 68 , •sr

pccb boo , 45�5 analysis of. 57 deep ltfUCIUre o(, 46, 5 1 , 54• 56, 59• I I I �direct," 49 •hamJover prindtJic" in, 6o as P-roiOCDnYenatJOn, 47• 1 1 1 surface structure of, f6, 49-50, 54· 5557· $9o ,I l l surprne •n• ll ' lurn mkins 1n, 47• 6o Pcirat, C. S., 1 59" · Perkins, G., • S7" Pcccn, R. S., '15" Piasei. Jcan, • , ,o, • sfin. •s'l" Piasclli-=l'almarinl, Nallin10 , 1 !I P Pinker, 5., •• · Pi¥Ot·�n ClaN speech, s• play, e:.es. 70· 95, • OS· n • "'Bocft hrts" pme •s. 77 combinaaoriarread inc• an, ag rormal.l in, 4•· 46, 7 1 , 1 17-18 ·r·•c-and...,. ke" pme• . .. 6o-6 • o Great AP.ft, 45 Gric:can cyC:Ict in, 4 1 "gueuins pn_�e•" u, s8. 76-77

"liandcwer prind�"ln, to !tid.ill( al, 54; _ ,,. pecbboo '"""liOn

to, •Of

lanpp U COIHUtUt:Dl •••

object, as, ., ,

of, f&, f h ,

"pretend" tkuationl in, 4•· 59 as protoc:onvcnation, 47, • • • surprlac in, 5 1 ·.,.��enatdciiy" in, a8 toys in, f 9o $4• 95 tum takl"' m, 47• 6o, 70"'7 1 , 78

pointins:

rac:h "fl., 95 in rereret�oe, 75"'77

OltCIIIIYe

in request. 9s. l8 Popper, K., 1 55, 1 4011

Ill,

indn

1 44 power assistance, 1 07 prag ma t Ks , 7 · 9· a8, s6-sg. g a , · aos Pra�. �·· ga ,_ 1 4a1 . preasaon ass111ance, 107 prediction, smile as sponc 10 suc:ee u in, 16, 51 ··rrefKe 10 the Development or Speech, A" (Bruner), 9 prelinsuistic communication, 15, s a . sa.

re

.

5!1· 68· • •8

Principle of Re1110 nable Ignorance, 88 Putnam , Hilary, &,-ea. 74• 86, 88, ns. · �s . a ss... • sgn. 1 4 a1 Q...-a · Enrclish, 71 Quine, w: v . . a • • 1 5 9" "raspberry" utterance, 54 Ratner, Nancy, • o, · �· as8ot reference, 67:.S , a o a , 1 16 a naphora an, 68 asymmetry in, &, -18, 86, 1 55 causal chams in, 67 , 1 1 5 con te x t sensitivity m, 68, &g-70 deixis in , 68, 6g, 74 , format or. 1 14-17 . JOII I structure in, 68 Importance of, 1 7 - a a intent in, 67, 85, t a t poi mi ns i n , 75-77 shared, a u

t.

"reference trianp: &a rcguell>J I - 1 1 5, 1 1 5-16 for actton va. for information, 57, 77 in chimpanzee beha vior , • Of context sensitivity in, g a , 100, 1 1 4 �jng as, gt, 1 1 5 displiced , · - a o a , 1 1 1 , 1 1 4, • •!i format of, 1 05 function o , aa, g a guided, a og- a s illocutionary aspeaa of, 91 invitation to joint action as, gs, tOf-6, 1 1 4- • 5 objec!. � · 95- • ot poantins an, g;'. � for supponive a�n. 95-94 · aoo, 107. 15

r.i

re

. . types or. 95:-94 rcquestive re fe n tial , 95 Riclaard (case studyl, 47-48, 55-6 1 , 7 1 , 7 57 7 . 8 t -8f , 86-88 , gs,- ao5, ao8- a s Richards, I . A., asS. Richards, M . P. M., 1 5511 Ricb, D. M ., 9 1 , •4• Ro-;nblum, L, as8ot. a s8ot, • 59" Roy, Carolyn, ao, • S!i'l Ryan, .Joanna, a, .a S!i'l Ryan, \laire �an, 7S• • S!I"· 1 4a1 saussure, Ferdinand de, s6. a sa.. Scaife, Michael, 7 • s • . • 59"· ·1 4• Schiefelbusch,-R. , a s61 · Schlesinser, l . M . , 8 1 , •59" Seadock,. t . M , . •s7" Sea rle , john, 57, g a , -a,lioa, 1 5S., 1 4CM "semanticity liypochCIII .. as, 114 · semaRIKs, 1 7 - iB, a t&

t

senerative, 54-55 JU IIlso lquistKs; reference Seuren, P., 1 18, 14001 Shatz, Marilyn, 78, as. 159N-4a1 Sherwood , Virginia, g. a s8ot Sinclair, A., a 57" Sindair-de-Zwart, H . , a s6n Skinner , B. F., a s&n. • s 7• Slobln, D., :to• a s&n smiles, smillns: of predictive pleasure, 16, 59 as to 1110 1her, 17 Smith, . H., 1 55'1• 1 57"• a slla, 1 4 011 Smith , • • lfGI Snow, c . . sa. , ,,., • s•• "speec h act leuo ns," a o a speech act theory. 8, s6-sg . . . . . . , "tricks" in, • •g-so Sperber, D., 1 1 , ISf'• 1 4011 "stanins la ng uage , 7 1 Stephen, L . , aos-4. 1 4 a1 . Ste rn, 0 . , 16, 60, 70-7 1 , 1 56n, 1 58ot Sarawson, Pe1er, a structuralism, s6 successive guidance, 1 1 1- - 1 !1 auding response, 15 Sugarman, S., 95• 1 4 011 Suppes, P., 1 !17" syntax, 1 1 6 acquisition of, .1 7 case structure an, !14 -!15 ·chihiren's use of, 7 evalu a tion of, a in invitation to joint action, 1 05 m yste ry of, a a universal, 55-54 "words" VI., 51 syatemaaiciay, aa, 1 1 9, 1 1 1 tauin.s . reference a n d , 70 Ta i'H. 1 , A., aszn Tinbeqcn, Nako. 8 transactao nality, Ju inte rac. .nwther-child -

resr.-E

tion

translocationat lluiltaacc , 1 07 Trevarthen, C., 1 56n ,. •aricks" in speech acu, a tg-so Troaick, E., 17, 1 56n . tum aaki�t� pmes and skills, 47 , &o, 70-'7 • · . ,. U nger, P. K., 14m1 universal sramlllll r ,

..

5!1-54· 1 1 9 utterances: . a nal y si s of, s6 in "book reading," 78-8 1 , a, i n CORieXt, 70 mo&her's, 7a-a 1 , as. 99 sin11le-wuri:l , a a, !15 two-word, S O • 1 05 . visual percepuon, sucking response and, 1 5 Waterson, N., 1 !17"

. Weir, R., ag, 1 57" Werner, H., a8, a s&. Wiu�nKein, Lladwig,

. ,..

zw,mmerdam Medal,

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