Acknowledgments
Preface
Chapter 1. The Window of the
Mind
(Click for excerpts)
Investigating language; A focus on people; Four kinds of evidence; Nine
questions; The transparency illusion.
Chapter 2. Evidence of the First Two Kinds
Speech and writing; Phonetics; Phonology; Two levels of patterning;
Words, words, words; Meaning.
Chapter 3. The Stratification of Language
The linguistic system as a complex of multiple systems; Realization;
Evidence from multilingualism; Realizational discrepancy within phonology and
grammar; Some quantitative estimates; World-wide correspondences.
Chapter 4. A Network of Relationships
On defining the morpheme; Objects and relationships; Objections; Local and
distributed representation; Further examples; Traveling activation.
Chapter 5. Components of Relational Networks
Basic node types; Networks and graphs; Nections; Terminology for
nections of different levels; Narrow network notation; Precedence ordering in
narrow relational notation; Nections of narrow notation.
Chapter 6. Syntax
Analytical syntax; Syntactic operations; Translating rules into nections;
Choice; Tactics at other levels; Differences in sequencing; Analyzing the
ordered 'and' node; Operation of the tactic network; It ain't necessarily so.
Chapter 7. Building Models
Three worlds; Four basic properties of mental models of the world;
Analysis and catalysis; Introjective models; Descriptive process; Metaphorical
models; Is the relational network a metaphor?; Bottom-up and top-down models.
Chapter 8. Interacting Subsystems
Phonological and lexicogrammatical systems; Meaning; Production vs.
recognition; The primacy of recognition over production; Bi-directional
processing within one subsystem; Multiple semological systems.
Chapter 9. Meaning
Semantic structure; Semantic structure vs. semological structure;
Procedures; Social groups; Object categories; The threshold node; Social roles;
Processes and their participants.
Chapter 10. Building Connections
Learning in relational networks; Lexicalization and idiomaticity;
Consequences for morphological analysis; Irregular inflections; Levels within
levels; The learning process.
Chapter 11. Traveling the Pathways
Descriptive overview of linguistic processes; Inner speech; Linguistic
processing and traveling activation; Idioms in action; Semantic relationships
in action; Context-driven lexeme selection; Visualization in interpretation;
Linguistically guided structure building; Interpreting relative clauses and
questions; Different people, different systems.
Chapter 12. The Ever-Changing Network
Creativity in the cognitive system; Lines, nodes, and activation;
Changes over time; Building network structure; The proximity principle;
Competition; Defining proximity; Nection recruitment for long-distance
association; Growing new connections; Fine tuning.
Chapter 13. Sources of Linguistic Patterning
Types of patterning; Patterning and cognition; Possible sources of
patterning; Fossils of earlier patterns; Redundancy; Conflicting patterns;
Parts of speech, parts of vision, parts of thought; Patterning imposed by the
observer; Thresholds, pattern recognition, and similarity;
Diversity and the survival of perceived patterns.
Chapter 14. Sequence Management
Phonotactics and timing devices; High-speed inner sequencing; Sequence
control without constituent structure; Managing new combinations; The mutable
lexeme; The mutable sememe; Learning to manage sequences.
Chapter 15. Linguistic Illusions
Semiotic fallacies; The monosemy assumption; Linearity in phonology;
The illusion of rules of grammar; Applying the unity fallacy to the linguistic
system; Language, thought, and intelligence.
Chapter 16. Introducing the Brain
The brain's biological context; The brain; The cerebral hemispheres;
The cerebral cortex; Hemispheres and lobes; Subdividing the lobes; Location
and function: general principles; Grey matter and white matter; Neurons and
cortical layers; Synapses; Electrical activity from dendrite to axon; Some
quantities.
Chapter 17. Neurons and Nections
Degrees of activation; Building connections; Long and short
connections; Nections and cortical columns; Excitatory and inhibitory
connections; Bidirectional connections; Preponderance of latent connections;
Nections that may not be implemented as cortical columns; Local and
distributed representation; Arguments against local representation; Arbitrary
and functional representation; Coarse and fine coding; relational network
representation of conceptual categories; Recognizing new things; Estimating
the abundance requirement.
Chapter 18. The Anatomy of Language
Hierarchy; Implications of the proximity hypothesis; Implementing the levels
of the model; The language cortex; Neurological evidence on localization;
Objections and answers; Communication between cognitive subsystems.
Epilog
Appendix
Some basic principles of neurocognitive linguistics; Arguments for the
relational network hypothesis; Some properties of relational networks;
Application of the model to conceptual categories.
Notes
References
Index
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