LINGUIST List 17.637

Tue Feb 28 2006

Books: Cognitive Science/Ling Theories: Hinzen

Editor for this issue: Maria Moreno-Rollins <marialinguistlist.org>

---

Directory         1.    Jenny Breaker, Mind Design and Minimal Syntax: Hinzen

---

Message 1: Mind Design and Minimal Syntax: Hinzen
Date: 28-Feb-2006
From: Jenny Breaker <jenny.breakeroup.com>
Subject: Mind Design and Minimal Syntax: Hinzen


Title: Mind Design and Minimal Syntax Publication Year: 2006 Publisher: Oxford University Press http://www.oup.com/us

Book URL: http://www.oup.co.uk/isbn/0-19-928925-5

Author: Wolfram Hinzen, University of Amsterdam

Hardback: ISBN: 019927441X Pages: 320 Price: U.K. £ 60.00 Paperback: ISBN: 0199289255 Pages: 320 Price: U.K. £ 24.99

Abstract:

This book introduces generative grammar as an area of study and asks what it tells us about the human mind. Wolfram Hinzen lays the foundation for the unification of modern generative linguistics with the philosophies of mind and language. He introduces Chomsky's program of a 'minimalist' syntax as a novel explanatory vision of the human mind. He explains how the Minimalist Program originated in work in cognitive science, biology, linguistics, and philosophy, and examines its implications for work in these fields. He considers the way the human mind is designed when seen as an arrangement of structural patterns in nature, and argues that its design is the product not so much of adaptive evolutionary history as of principles and processes that are ahistorical and internalist in character. Linguistic meaning, he suggests, arises in the mind as a consequence of structures emerging on formal rather than functional grounds. From this he substantiates an unexpected and deeply unfashionable notion of human nature.

Clearly written in nontechnical language and assuming a limited knowledge of the fields it examines and links, Minimal Mind Design will appeal to a wide range of scholars in linguistics, philosophy, and cognitive science. It also provides an exceptionally clear insight into the nature and aims of Chomsky's Minimalist Program.



Linguistic Field(s): Cognitive Science Linguistic Theories

Written In: English (eng)

See this book announcement on our website: http://linguistlist.org/get-book.html?BookID=18474

	-------------------------- Major Supporters --------------------------
	Cambridge University Press	http://us.cambridge.org
	Cascadilla Press	http://www.cascadilla.com/
	Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd	http://www.continuumbooks.com
	Edinburgh University Press	http://www.eup.ed.ac.uk/
	European Language Resources Association	http://www.elda.org/sommaire.php
	Georgetown University Press	http://www.press.georgetown.edu
	John Benjamins	http://www.benjamins.com/
	Lawrence Erlbaum Associates	http://www.erlbaum.com/
	Lincom GmbH	http://www.lincom.at
	MIT Press	http://mitpress.mit.edu/
	Mouton de Gruyter	http://www.mouton-publishers.com
	Multilingual Matters	http://www.multilingual-matters.com/
	Oxford University Press	http://www.oup.com/us
	Palgrave Macmillan	http://www.palgrave.com
	Rodopi	http://www.rodopi.nl/
	Springer	http://www.springeronline.com
	---------------------- Other Supporting Publishers ----------------------
	Anthropological Linguistics	http://www.indiana.edu/~anthling/
	Graduate Linguistic Students' Assoc. Umass	http://glsa.hypermart.net/
	International Pragmatics Assoc.	http://ipra-www.uia.ac.be/ipra/
	Kingston Press Ltd	http://www.kingstonpress.com/
	Linguistic Assoc. of Finland	http://www.ling.helsinki.fi/sky/
	MIT Working Papers in Linguistics	http://web.mit.edu/mitwpl/
	Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics / Landelijke	http://www.lotpublications.nl/
	Pacific Linguistics	http://pacling.anu.edu.au/
	SIL International	http://www.ethnologue.com/bookstore.asp
	St. Jerome Publishing Ltd.	http://www.stjerome.co.uk
	Utrecht institute of Linguistics	http://www-uilots.let.uu.nl/