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The Language Game
How Improvisation Created Language and Changed the World
Author: Morten H. Christiansen, Nick Chater
Narrator: Peter Noble
Unabridged: 9 hr 50 min
Format: Digital Audiobook Download
Publisher: Basic Books
Published: 02/22/2022
Categories: Nonfiction, Language Arts, Linguistics, Psychology, Cognitive Psychology & Cognition, Science, Cognitive Science, Philosophy, Language Philosophy
Includes:
Bonus Material
Synopsis
Forget the language instinct—this is the story of how we make up language as we go
Language is perhaps humanity’s most astonishing capacity—and one that remains poorly understood. In The Language Game, cognitive scientists Morten H. Christiansen and Nick Chater show us where generations of scientists seeking the rules of language got it wrong. Language isn’t about hardwired grammars but about near-total freedom, something like a game of charades, with the only requirement being a desire to understand and be understood. From this new vantage point, Christiansen and Chater find compelling solutions to major mysteries like the origins of languages and how language learning is possible, and to long-running debates such as whether having two words for “blue” changes what we see. In the end, they show that the only real constraint on communication is our imagination.
Language is perhaps humanity’s most astonishing capacity—and one that remains poorly understood. In The Language Game, cognitive scientists Morten H. Christiansen and Nick Chater show us where generations of scientists seeking the rules of language got it wrong. Language isn’t about hardwired grammars but about near-total freedom, something like a game of charades, with the only requirement being a desire to understand and be understood. From this new vantage point, Christiansen and Chater find compelling solutions to major mysteries like the origins of languages and how language learning is possible, and to long-running debates such as whether having two words for “blue” changes what we see. In the end, they show that the only real constraint on communication is our imagination.
