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In:Theory and Practice in Functional-Cognitive Space
Edited by María de los Ángeles Gómez González, Francisco José Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez and Francisco Gonzálvez-García
[Studies in Functional and Structural Linguistics 68] 2014
► pp. 253–270

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Cognitive functionalism in language education

Published online: 22 July 2014
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https://doi.org/10.1075/sfsl.68.11hud
Functional pressures on language are always cognitive, and cognitive pressuresare always functional, so cognitivism and functionalism combine to explain thestructure of lexicogrammar – the continuum of lexicon and grammar – andalso the statistics of language usage. As an example, the paper shows how WordGrammar explains the difficulty of centre-embedding in terms of dependencysyntax combined with a general cognitive principle of binding, and also thebenefits of non-canonical word orders (such as extraposition) in the lexicogrammar.These reordering options are part of the formal academic languagethat children learn through education, and education should be guided bylinguistic research. This is a research area that calls for far more effort and collaborationwith other disciplines.
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