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  3. The Creators of Grammar No student of a foreign language needs to be told that grammar is complex. By changing word sequence

The Creators of Grammar No student of a foreign language needs to be told that grammar is complex. By changing word sequence

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问题                                         The Creators of Grammar
    No student of a foreign language needs to be told that grammar is complex. By changing word sequences and by adding a range of auxiliary verbs and suffixes, we are able to communicate tiny variations in meaning. We can turn a statement into a question, state whether an action has taken place or is soon to take place, and perform many other word tricks to convey subtle differences in meaning. Nor is this complexity inherent to the English language. All languages, even those of so-called "primitive" tribes have clever grammatical components. The Cherokee pronoun system, for example, can distinguish between "you and I", "several other people and I" and "you, another person and I". In English, all these meanings are summed up in the one, crude pronoun "we". Grammar is universal and plays a part in every language, no matter how widespread it is. So the question which has baffled many linguists is—who created grammar?
    At first, it would appear that this question is impossible to answer. To find out how grammar is created, someone needs to be present at the time of a language’s creation, documenting its emergence. Many historical linguists are able to trace modern complex languages back to earlier languages. But in order to answer the question of how complex languages are actually formed, the researcher needs to observe how languages are started from scratch. Amazingly, however, this is possible.
    Some of the most recent languages evolved due to the Atlantic slave trade. At that time, slaves from a number of different ethnicities were forced to work together under colonizer’s rule. Since they had no opportunity to learn each other’s languages, they developed a make-shift language called a pidgin. Pidgins are strings of words copied from the language of the landowner. They have little in the way of grammar, and in many cases it is difficult for a listener to deduce when an event happened, and who did what to whom. (1) Speakers need to use circumlocution in order to make their meaning understood. (2) Interestingly, however, all it takes for a pidgin to become a complex language is for a group of children to be exposed to it at the time when they learn their mother tongue. (3) Slave children did not simply copy the strings of words uttered by their elders, but they adapted their words to create a new, expressive language. (4) Complex grammar systems which emerge from pidgins are termed Creoles, and they are invented by children.
    Further evidence of this can be seen in studying sign languages for the deaf. Sign languages are not simply a series of gestures; they utilize the same grammatical machinery that is found in spoken languages. Moreover, there are many different languages used worldwide. The creation of one such language was documented quite recently in Nicaragua. Previously, all deaf people were isolated from each other, but in 1979, a new government introduced schools for the deaf. Although children were taught speech and lip reading in the classroom, in the playgrounds they began to invent their own sign system, using the gestures that they used at home. It was basically a pidgin. Each child used the signs differently, and there was no consistent grammar. However, children who joined the school later, when this inventive sign system was already around, developed a quite different sign language. Although it was based on the signs of the older children, the younger children’s language was more fluid and compact, and it utilized a large range of grammatical devices to clarify meaning. What is more, all the children used the signs in the same way. A new Creole was born.
    Some linguists believe that many of the world’s most established languages were Creoles at first. The English past tense "-ed" ending may have evolved from the verb "do". "It ended" may once have been "It end-did". Therefore, it would appear that even the most widespread languages were partly created by children. Children appear to have innate grammatical machinery in their brains, which springs to life when they are first trying to make sense of the world around them. Their minds can serve to create logical, complex structures, even when there is no grammar present for them to copy.
All the following sentences about Nicaraguan sign language are true EXCEPT________.
选项 A、The language has been created since 1979.
B、The language is based on speech and lip reading.
C、The language incorporates signs which children used at home.
D、The language was perfected by younger children.
答案B
解析 事实细节题。根据Nicaraguan定位到第四段第四句。该段第五、六句指出，1979年，政府为聋哑人创办了一所新学校，孩子们在教室里学习说话和唇语，但在操场上，他们利用在家里使用的手势开始发明他们自己的手语系统，A项和C项表述符合文意。同时可知，这种手语并不基于口语和唇语阅读。本题为选非题，故B项为答案。倒数第三句指出，虽然这种手语最初来源于大孩子，但是小孩子的手语更流畅和紧凑，其使用了大量的语法手段来阐明语义内涵，即这种手语是由小孩子们完善的，D项表述符合文意。
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