Theories of Language Development

There are some famous theories that discusses the development of language in little children. Some different perspectives of the same development of languages seems to contradict each other and this is truly interesting as the one unified thing such as languages is seemed to be developed by people in different ways. For instance B.F. Skinner believes that language is developed through positive reinforcement of language, that is when a baby babbles 'mama', the mother smiles therefore re-enforcing the child's learning. But on the other hand Noam Chomsky disagreed suggesting that children are born with an innate language acquisition device congenital understanding of deep structure of language which is its grammar. The idea of positive affirmation and re-enforcement the development of language defiantly stands true as children understand simple things such as smile and therefore get a lot of the simple language. Whereas children are unlikely to be born with such innate language acquisition device, as such thing would perhaps be to complex for the baby. Children however start to pick up most of the grammar that they learn and the words that they lear by listening. That is the key to a child's development in language. An example of this would be my cousin who as he grew never spoke a word but at the age of two or three, he was sitting with my dad and said "Look at how beautiful the roses are", now that suggests that he was always listens and putting two and two together in his mind and understanding the little wonders around him. He never spoke until that stage and most of us thought he couldn't speak but when he did speak, he spoke a whole sentence which threw us all off. Well both Skinner's theory of positive reinforcement seems to stand false as he never spoke till then but on the other hand Chomsky theory of inherit understanding of the grammar could possibly seem true at that point. But the idea of children understanding and learning through listening is also important and significant. This explains why children generally
learn to speak the mother tongue fairly well but might have problems reading and writing. This is because parents might speak the mother tongue at home which makes the kids understand and comprehend by listening and seeing. Kids are able to assume, guess and put things together to understand the language and if it is correct then parents positively re-enforce the idea. So therefore perhaps both of the theories come together to understand the development of language in children but essentially the idea of listen and understanding is also a major aspect of the development of language in children.

The idea of thought before speech or speech before thought has essentially become a great topic for debate, however it only seems logical to think before you speak. Language in thought is essential to speak. There would be no understanding if there was no language in thought. Everyone thinks in a certain language be it english, arabic, french or Canadian english. If you take away that language the thought seems impossible for language is a medium through which thought can take place. If there is no language there can possibly be no thought. The idea of thinking without language seems impossible but however that sparks the debate on how deaf people think or how babies think. The human brain tends to process information through the use of the five senses and therefore a babies thinks in the aspect that they are born with which is the eyes. There is a sense of visual understanding and visual thought in young babies and in the deaf even in grown humans when describing something abstract such as peace or love the picture of a dove or a heart pops to mind. Also for someone who is blind and deaf like Hellen Keller, when she was presented food in the movie "The Miracle Worker", there was a sense of recognition with that food. She might not have necessarily know what the name of the food was, but she recognised the food by smell. Hence there was a recognition, therefore for people who know language thinking using language as a medium seems essential but even people without the knowledge of language have some sense of recognition through medium of the five senses.

Going back to the theory of children's having the ability to listen and understand by putting things together explains why during the holophrastic stage, the child speaks sentences using single words. This is probably because of the child's association of that word with an action. The child has understood that the word means a certain action and therefore speaks sentences in single words. Also when the child says such single words such as 'more' and the parent gives more of something, through the idea of positive re-enforcement, the child then tends to say 'more' to get more of something. The child has associated the word with the action and this association in the mind of the child has brought about a sense of understanding for the word and it's action and causes the child to say the single word to get the output. If the child is given more of something by saying 'more', why would the child need to say 'can i please have more?', if the result is the same. Obviously it is nicer to ask the the latter way but the child isn't processing a lot of the language at such a stage and is taking baby steps into the realms of language.

A look at beauty through perception

Beauty (by Grace Nichols, 1986)

Beauty

is a fat black woman

walking the fields

pressing a breezed hibiscus

to her cheek

while the sun lights up

her feet

Beauty

is a fat black woman

riding the waves

drifting in happy oblivion

while the sea turns back

to hug her shape

Our society has drilled into the people that beauty is the skin on the surface that adds appearance to the structure of a person. We have perceived beauty to be that perfect slim, smooth skin girl with the perfect cut hair that complements her appearance; or a guy wearing a tight shirt that further complements his body build with the dazzling smile across his face and the beautiful eyes staring at you. We have put the word "beauty" with "perfection" and expected to see them in pairs. The pressure that society has set for young girls and boys to be "beautiful" are relatively high and are so unrealistic in order to sell you products that apparently makes you more beautiful. The problems is that we have blindly taken society's definition of beautiful and have started battering our faces with creams, swallowing pills and applying creams, herbs and medicines to be perfect; however what we don't realise is the fact that beauty is found in the person and not the skin that engulfs the person. The poem by Grace Nichols further conveys this idea; Grace compares the definition of beauty to the exact opposite facade of beauty that society has thrown at us. However what grace does is that she throws a contrast in the visual description of beauty but then describes that activity the person to do a true act of beauty. Grace describes beauty to be a thing that a person has a hold of and is not something that a person has to necessarily acquire. Beauty is not perfection but the understanding of joy and happiness against all odds; beauty is in the action not the reflection; beauty is in the core and not on the surface.

Looking at these videos you can see there is something fundamentally wrong with the what society has told us what beauty is. The visual aspects of both videos shows the stereotypes of beauty, they show what society wants us to think what beauty. The first video portrays the idea that the beauty that society shows us to be beautiful is photoshopped and edited which makes it fake. Therefore we as humans are killing ourselves over by taking pills, applying creams and herbs in attempts to achieve a body that was initially photoshopped. Which brings about the idea that beauty set by society to be perfection can never be achieved regardless of products they sell you, so then what beauty truly is, is the person as the person being. The second video complements a similar idea that shows the nonsense that society breeds about beauty to kids, teenagers and adults.

By visually demonstrating truths, facts or any problem for the matter one is likely to convey more persuasive aspects. Visuals imagery helps us imagine the consequences and the different problems of our world. Visual imagery helps show a clear cut problem which persuades us more towards the solutions and visual imagery is one of the most attention grabbing and persuasive structure. Showing the behind the scenes of the many advertisements and showing our mindless struggle for beauty we are able to comprehend a clear problem. Showing this thorough visual media we are able to understand the different truths and formulate our opinions and understand that beauty is not what society tells you but is what we as the people make it to be. 

Humans are limited but at the sometime expandable, we can use our eyes to see but our eyes which have certain limitations are great for perceiving and understanding complicated patterns and sequences. Our eyes and minds are vulnerable to great deal of visual persuasion and therefore there is the questions that how do we know if what we see is actually the truth out there? maybe it is or maybe it isn't. A great of convincing is done through the images and a little play in the images can greatly affect out understanding of any matter. The idea of trusting our senses becomes an arising questions the longer we think about it, but there is no choice but to trust our senses and make the best of it. 

Sense Limitations and Drawbacks

The world is a perception of our senses and a translation of the brain to make the reality in which we

live. The brain in our heads makes the bridge between us and the world around us. The creation of that bridge or perhaps the translations of the perceptions of our senses are greatly influenced by external factors. Like discussed before the choice we make in the situations we are in a influenced by the options presented to us, or what we hear, see are all influenced by what we know already or what we understand so far. To come to terms of why are sense are changing variables or unreliable at times, requires us to understand that everything we see is just a interaction of light and our eyes. Everything else is just a interpretations by the brain of this interaction.  Therefore during this interpretation of our perceptions the brain tends to rely on our past experiences, patterns and sequences to put together the world we live in. Therefore as a fact what you see is not what you believe but what you believe is what you see. some of the few problems that sense perception boils down to can perhaps be identified and realised, however knowing these problems does not make our senses any better and these are fundamental defects in our senses.

• Past experience - Past experience is rather relevant as the brain uses past experiences to prepare itself for future ones. It tells signals the body to predict danger or to convince us that orange juice is orange juice. A lot of life is based on past experiences and experiences to others. Therefore the brain tells us what to expect this based on past experience rather than what actually happens.

• Through social and cultural conditioning - We have multiple social and cultural aspects all around us and such thoughts and judgements often lead us to expect something that could possibly be wrong. The culture and social aspects much like past experiences have conditioned us to expect something when that is probably not the case.

• Through spatial familiarity - Our brain processes information to identify patterns and shapes which we already posses and ridged understanding over. This methodology of understanding and perceiving causes a loop in our sense that cause them to be unreliable and cause us to perceive differently. 

• Through our biological limitations - The human senses are limited to a certain degree of information at a time, and this is a factor that affects how much we know and the affects are perception of the world around us.

• Through existing learning structures - The way we perceive the world around us can be greatly influenced by an important conceptual alternative ways of knowing.

• Through seeing the in existing - The human eyes are capable of seeing optical illusions that cause the eyes to see what is not there and this further makes the senses unreliable. How are the human eyes able to see what is not there. 

• Through our dependence on language - The use of language around us vastly affects the way we perceive objects. The use of more positive words towards an objects tends to make it more attractive and more appealing to the people and therefore language plays a vital role in the way we perceive the world around us. 

• Through filtering - The human mind receives a lot more information than what is processed and the irrelevant information is filtered out causing the person to ideally focus on a particular bit of information. This affects our perception of the surroundings as the perception is generally limited to certain bits of information to maintain focus and enhance the work efficiency.

• Through self perception - How the human body thinks of itself will greatly affect the information taken by the person and this is relevant as this is different for person to person 

“All seeing is seeing-as… There is no ‘innocent eye’. In order for you to receive something you must add to your sense data; you must furnish an element of projection.” R. Abel. 
Tautology is the practise of re-emphasising the same point with the use of different or more complex words. Establishing an understanding of the limitations of our senses and understanding how we perceive the world around us differently; attempting to explain this quote will require one to implement tautology. The idea that people perceive information differently is widely acknowledged. There are some fact that we humans have kept general to all, such as gravity is 10 newtons, if you jump of a cliff you fall or there is oxygen in air (a more tok example can be that if you are nice to your tok teacher, you are sure to get chocolates). However more life based examples are always influenced by the people around us, the choice we are presented with and many more. There is no information that is not influenced and this is because of our brains mission to find patterns and rhythms in our lives. Therefore when we perceive something we use prior experience or knowledge to further improve the perception of the present. We use the past to make decisions and better perceive the future although they might not always be correct or useful at the particular place and time. Sometimes a quote just says it all and there is no better way of saying it.

Although the human senses do have certain limitations and are blinded by them, these limitations can indeed cause us to perceive the world differently; however our senses always brings about a sense of appreciation for the world we live in and that is elementary and essential.