Reviews "The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language" (S. Pinker). Defines generative grammar, examines the evidence for Pinker's Generative Grammar as Instinct hypothesis, and discusses Pinker's use of language acquisition as support for the hypothesis. Suggests alternative theories of language that begin from different…

Noam Chomsky's theory of grammar, or more specifically his theory of syntax, proposes to describe all possible English sentences through an explanation of how the native speaker generates sentences. It is the study of one's competence that offers insights into how language is acquired and how the rules and generalizations of that language are…