Although the study of the acquisition of a first language has been split by a controversy between the "innatists" and the "behaviorists," neither group has given enough consideration to the relationship between language development and the other developments of the child (social, cognitive, and perceptual). This collection of readings links the…

Some very practical questions about how children learn the first language compel us to study brain functions and how these functions evolve. They also bring the studies of linguistics and neurology together. The purpose of this paper is to relate some of the research that describes language acquisition with the research about the early development…