7/30/2019 Definition and Examples of Universal Grammar

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Universal Grammar (UG)

Glossary of Grammatical and Rhetorical Terms

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by Richard Nordquist
Updated July 12, 2018

Universal grammar is the theoretical or hypothetical system of categories, operations, and

principles shared by all human languages and considered to be innate. Since the 1980s, the
term has often been capitalized. The term is also known as Universal Grammar Theory.

Linguist Noam Chomsky explained, "'[U]niversal grammar' is taken to be the set of

properties, conditions, or whatever that constitute the 'initial state' of the language learner,
hence the basis on which knowledge of a language develops." ("Rules and Representations."
Columbia University Press, 1980)

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The concept is connected to the ability of children to be able to learn their native language.
"Generative grammarians believe that the human species evolved a genetically universal
grammar common to all peoples and that the variability in modern languages is basically on
the surface only," wrote Michael Tomasello. ("Constructing a Language: A Usage-Based
Theory of Language Acquisition." Harvard University Press, 2003)

And Stephen Pinker elaborates thusly:

"In cracking the code of language...children's minds must be constrained to pick out just the
right kinds of generalizations from the speech around them....It is this line of reasoning that led
Noam Chomsky to propose that language acquisition in children is the key to understanding the
nature of language, and that children must be equipped with an innate Universal Grammar: a
set of plans for the grammatical machinery that powers all human languages. This idea sounds
more controversial than it is (or at least more controversial than it should be) because the logic
of induction mandates that children make some assumptions about how language works in
order for them to succeed at learning a language at all. The only real controversy is what these
assumptions consist of: a blueprint for a specific kind of rule system, a set of abstract principles,
or a mechanism for finding simple patterns (which might also be used in learning things other
than language)." ("The Stuff of Thought." Viking, 2007)

"Universal grammar is not to be confused with universal language," noted Elena Lombardi,
"or with the deep structure of language, or even with grammar itself" ("The Syntax of
Desire," 2007). As Chomsky has observed, "[U]niversal grammar is not a grammar, but
rather a theory of grammars, a kind of metatheory or schematism for grammar" ("Language
and Responsibility," 1979).

History and Background

The concept of a universal grammar (UG) has been traced to the observation of Roger Bacon,
a 13th-century Franciscan friar, and philosopher, that all languages are built upon a common
grammar. The expression was popularized in the 1950s and 1960s by Chomsky and other
linguists.

Components that are considered to be universal include the notion that words can be
classified into different groups, such as being nouns or verbs and that sentences follow a
particular structure. Sentence structures may be different between languages, but each
language has some kind of framework so that speakers can understand each other vs.
speaking gibberish. Grammar rules, borrowed words, or idioms of a particular language by
definition are not universal grammar.

Challenges and Criticisms

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Of course, any theory in an academic setting will have challenges, comments, and criticisms
by others in the field; such as it is with peer review and the academic world, where people
build on the body of knowledge through writing academic papers and publishing their
opinions.

Swarthmore College linguist K. David Harrison noted in The Economist, "I and many fellow
linguists would estimate that we only have a detailed scientific description of something like
10% to 15% of the world's languages, and for 85% we have no real documentation at all. Thus
it seems premature to begin constructing grand theories of universal grammar. If we want to
understand universals, we must first know the particulars." ("Seven Questions for K. David
Harrison." Nov. 23, 2010)

And Jeff Mielke finds some aspects of universal grammar theory to be illogical: "
[T]he phonetic motivation for Universal Grammar is extremely weak. Perhaps the most
compelling case that can be made is that phonetics, like semantics, is part of the grammar
and that there is an implicit assumption that if the syntax is rooted in Universal Grammar,
the rest should be too. Most of the evidence for UG is not related to phonology, and
phonology has more of a guilt-by-association status with respect to innateness." ("The
Emergence of Distinctive Features." Oxford University Press, 2008)

Iain McGilchrist disagrees with Pinkner and took the side of children learning a language
just through imitation, which is a behaviorist approach, as opposed to the Chomsky theory of
the poverty of the stimulus:
"[I]t is uncontroversial that the existence of a universal grammar such as Chomsky conceived it
is highly debatable. It remains remarkably speculative 50 years after he posited it, and is
disputed by many important names in the field of linguistics. And some of the facts are hard to
square with it. Languages across the world, it turns out, use a very wide variety of syntax to
structure sentences. But more importantly, the theory of universal grammar is not convincingly
compatible with the process revealed by developmental psychology, whereby children actually
acquire language in the real world. Children certainly evince a remarkable ability to grasp
spontaneously the conceptual and psycholinguistic shapes of speech, but they do so in a far
more holistic, than analytic, way. They are astonishingly good imitators—note, not copying
machines, but imitators." ("The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of
the Western World." Yale University Press, 2009)

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