Cognitive Science 0226 - The Psychology of Language

Language is paramount among the capacities that characterize humans. We hold language as a marker of our humanity, and by understanding language we assume that we will understand something important about ourselves. In this course we will ask, and try to answer questions such as the following: What's so special about language? How do we produce sentences? How do we understand them? What might cause us to fail at either task? What is meaning, and how does language express it? Is our capacity for language a biological endowment unique to the human species?

Mind, Brain, and Information Writing and Research In this course, students are expected to spend at least six to eight hours a week of preparation and work outside of class time. This time includes reading, writing, research.