a model of [[human language]] and [[language acquisition]] that focuses on human [[social]] skills and adaptations. claims that [[morphology]] and [[syntax]] stem from [[pragmatic]] and [[cognitive|cognitive]] factors # [[motivation]] ![[1973BrownDevelopmentFirstLanguage#^abstraction]] [[generative grammar]] focuses on just the [[form]]al language part and mostly ignores the actual [[semiotic]] / [[semantic]] / [[pragmatic]] [[utterance|functions of language]] as *referring* to phenomena in the world [[usage based linguistic]]s cares more about this. seems likely that we used [[symbol]]s long before we developed [[form|grammar]]. usage emphasizes that grammaticalization is a [[culture]]l (memetic, [[discourse|discursive]]) process and not a biological ([[natural selection|evolution]]ary) one. [[historical linguistics|language change]]s via gradual abbreviation and loss of [[replica|redundant]] forms; [[1979GivonUnderstandingGrammar|today's morphology is yesterday's syntax]] [[Occams razor]]: no need to hypothesize fudge factors like [[universal grammar]] ![[human cognitive skill]] ![[2025-07-16 Kempner lunch and learn linguistics talk#sources]]