180290 VO Introduction to linguistics from a cognitive perspective (2010W)

We will introduce some of the basic concepts of modern linguistics like word structure, morphology, the mental lexicon, syntax, semantics, pragmatics and phonology of spoken and signed languages. After a general overview of each of those subfields, we will discuss one or two problems of each subfield in more detail and then take a look at the impact of those problems for issues in language acquisition, language pathology and neurolinguistic studies. At the same time, we will compare these problems with cognitive phenomena outside language like vision, thereby addressing the important question which phenomena are language-specific and which are general from a cognitive view.