The Nativist Theory

Noam Chomsky
At the end of the lesson, the learners shall be able to:
a) Define the meaning of Nativist
b) Define what Nativist Theory is
c) Know the Function of Language Acquisition Device
d) Understand the Universal grammar (Language Acquisition Data)
e) Know the Grammar Principles
Avram Noam Chomsky was born
December 7, 1928. Chomsky was
an American linguist, philosopher,
cognitive scientist, historical
essayist, social critic, and political
activist. Sometimes called "the
father of modern linguistics",
Chomsky is also a major figure in
analytic philosophy and one of the
founders of the field of cognitive
science.
NATIVIST
- relating to or supporting the theory that concepts,
mental capacities, and mental structures are innate
rather than acquired by learning.

- a person who advocates the theory that

concepts, mental capacities, and mental
structures are innate rather than acquired by
learning.
NATIVIST THEORY

A set of theories that contend that human abilities and

developmental processes are innate hard-wired into
our brain at birth.
He said that every child is born with a biological
predisposition to learn language - any language

He believed that greater attention should be given to

children's innate ability to learn language

He came up with the idea of a language organ. Which is

known as the Language Acquisition Device (LAD)
Language Acquisition Device (LAD)

The LAD is a language organ that hard-wired into

child brain at birth that helps children rapidly learn
and understand language.
 HOW LANGUAGE FUNCTION

Children need to Once the LAD is activated, Matching the innate

access they discover to structure knowledge, and structures
to samples of a natural of the language to be of the particular language in
language to activate learned the environment
the
LAD
For example:

"Ron, a one year old baby wants to eat biscuits"

- he begins to form sounds in an attempt to

communicate with those around him.
So once the LAD activates,
Words and sentences follow quickly because he
already has an innate knowledge of the basic rules
of language.

"Mommy, Biscuits"

Innate Knowledge - at least some knowledge about

language exists in humans at birth
Sentence are formed in the following Sequence

PRIMARY GENERAL
GRAMMATICAL
LINGUISTIC LANGUAGE CHILD'S SPEECH
KNOWLEDGE
DATA PRINCIPLE
THE RULE
By saying the language is an
innate faculty, Chomsky
implies that children are
born with a set of rules
about language in their
head which he calls the
"Universal Grammar"
Universal Grammar (Language Acquisition Data)
A set of innate principles and adjustable parameters that are common to all
human languages.
Focuses on the structural relationships rather than the linear order of the
words

For example:
Your cat is friendly?

Is your cat friendly?

 Universal Grammar Principles

Language is organized that depends on the structural

relationships between elements in a sentence.

Language usually contain NP and VP + (other phrases)

 Parameters
Determine the ways in which language can vary
The head parameters specifies the position at the
head in relation to its compliments for different
languages.
Each phrases have a central element that is called the
head (NP - noun, VP - verb)