Essay on Motherese in Language Aquisition

As a child grows into a young person/young adult they will again use more complex words and start to negotiate a discussion using longer more advanced words and sentence structure, allowing an older child the time to talk and to tell you how they are feeling is essential as this develops their social skills.

In Mother Tongue, an essay written by Amy Tan, the fictional author explains how we all speak different languages and how we are all categorized and treated differently by the way we speak. She gives us examples and stories that have happened to her and how they made her become “fascinated by language in daily life.”

Demetria Martínez’s Mother Tongue is divided into five sections and an epilogue. The first three parts of the text present Mary/ María’s, the narrator, recollection of the time when she was nineteen and met José Luis, a refuge from El Salvador, for the first time. The forth and fifth parts, chronologically, go back to her tragic experience when she was seven years old and then her trip to El Salvador with her son, the fruit of her romance with José Luis, twenty years after she met José Luis. And finally the epilogue consists a letter from José Luis to Mary/ María after her trip to El Salvador. The essay traces the development of Mother Tongue’s principal protagonists, María/ Mary. With a close reading of the text, I argue how the forth

Amy Tan’s ,“Mother Tongue” and Maxine Kingston’s essay, “No Name Woman” represent a balance in cultures when obtaining an identity in American culture.  As first generation Chinese-Americans both Tan and Kingston faced many obstacles. Obstacles in language and appearance while balancing two cultures. Overcoming these obstacles that were faced and preserving heritage both women gained an identity as a successful American.

All language theorists acknowledge nature and nurture both play significant roles in children’s language development. However, the theoretical debate to whether nature or nurture is the dominant tool during a child’s language

Nature and nurture both play a significant role in language development. Language development refers to how children understand, organise, speak and use words in order to communicate at an effective, age-appropriate level (Karen Kearns, 2013, P.105). For centuries, theorists have been debating the roles of nature versus nurture. Although, each child’s language will develop at their own pace and there will be many individual differences based on culture, ethnicity, health and ability. As well as physical, social, emotional and cognitive development in which will contribute to a child’s language development.

So naturally when I thought of this, I thought that her piece was about her language that she spoke at home or grew up with. The way I read her argument with this concept in mind, made me agree with what she was saying in her paper. However, some people may not have thought what I thought when reading her title. Others may have thought more literally and so thought the story was about something that maybe happened to her mother’s tongue. Another interpretation of the title could have depended on how the person interpreted the word “Mother”. Some might have thought more outside the box like I did and think that “Mother” was referring to a country; someone could then think this piece was talking about what the whole language speaks like English, German, Chinese, etc. Amy could have written the title to be more specific like “Languages growing up” or “The Broken English of My Mother’s” in order for the audience to have more of an idea of what the story was

* We do not always know the stages of development of the child’s mother tongue.

In her article, she mentions that Sociologists and linguists will probably tell that a person’s developing language skills are more influenced by peers (Amy Tan). However, Amy Tan thinks family condition is very foremost for a person’s spoken English. Most of the time, people always can not find the distinction when they get used to a thing. If people do one thing for a long time, they always think it perfectly normal. In addition, the language spoken by the family plays a large role in shaping a language of the child. Her mother’s English still limits people’s perception of her. Furthermore, her mother’s English almost had an effect on limiting her possibility as well.

Language is a social cognitive function that developed out of our need to share ourselves with others. From their earliest days, infants feel this same need to express themselves. The mother, who is one of the first and most prominent people the infant interacts with, helps to create a bond with the child. Now the child is growing with someone whom they feel safe with and trust to share his or her inner self with. This is particularly true when the child is securely attached to his or her mother. Despite the lack of studies that directly connect attachment theory and language development, there are substantial similarities between the two ideas.Both secure attachment and infant language development flourish in mother-infant relationships that

you have the child’s full attention and that they are listening to you. It also shows that what you are about to say is important.

In Amy Tan’s essay “Mother Tongue”, Tan discusses how the way her bilingual mother speaks negatively affects how people perceive her intellect. Despite the fact that Tan’s mother is actually very intelligent and understands more than many people expect her to, she often is ignored and belittled because of how she speaks. Tan feels that those who ignore and belittle her mom are oblivious to the beauty, complexity, and richness of her mother’s speech. In Tan’s essay “Mother Tongue”, Tan shows that the belief that standard English is inherently better than other forms of English is flawed by questioning the prominence of proper English and sharing how rich and beautiful her mother’s English can be.

Most young children develop language rapidly, moving from crying and cooing in infancy to using hundreds of words and understanding their meanings by the time they are ready to enter kindergarten. Language development is a major accomplishment and is one of the most rewarding experiences for anyone to share with a child. Children learn to speak and understand words by being around adults and peers who communicate with them and encourage their efforts to talk.

This term paper aims at reviewing various stages of language development in human being early life in regards to language development. The paper also analyzes various theoretical issues and hypothesis that contributes to change of speech and how human beings corporate the changes in their daily development as far as language is concerned. Adult language and child language are quite different especially because adults have more exposure to the society norms than the children. It will also take in to consideration various processes of learning, how children acquire linguistic inputs such as forms meanings and word use during their talking processes. This term paper will focus on the child development in terms of language and gender. It is a paper on how children under the age of 10, learn language adaptation to their first language during their early developmental stages. It will identify theories for learning of a language, childhood development as well as look into the societal norms of gender socialization.

There are many bilingual and multicultural people in the world today. For many, the choices of which language they use, and how they use it, correspond to what social or cultural community they belong to. Amy Tan, a Chinese American novelist, portrays this well in her short essay "Mother Tongue." Tan grew up in two vastly different worlds, using different "Englishes." The first world, which consists of her close family, she speaks what we may call "broken" or "limited" English. The second world, which is her business and professional world, Tan speaks and writes perfect standard and academic English. Having to "shuttle" between these two communities with very different languages has had many different positive and negative effects on