Personal Faculty Profile
Joseph Galasso

I came to the study of Language and Linguistic more by a twist of fates than by design--actually a very common method taken by most linguists. I took my B.A. in 20^th Century Literature at California State University (where I also studied music composition and 20^th Century Spanish classical guitar). In 1989, my attempts to discern 'the ways of modern language' in the Arts brought me to consider the more formal works of Semiotics and Semantics. In 1994 I was accepted to study with two great scholars in the field of Language Acquisition--Andrew Radford and Harald Clahsen (both at the University of Essex, U.K). My doctoral thesis was on Syntactic Development and the Early Stages of Child Language Acquisition. I have since gone on to write one short paper with Radford (1998) and have published various papers dealing with first language acquisition. A revised version of my 1999 doctoral thesis has recently been published by IULC Publications (Indiana University, 2004). Within the last few years, I have taken an interest in the waging debate over language development & syntactic processing and whether or not the brain processes syntactic information in a dual capacity-i.e., a 'Dual Mechanism Model' (DMM) as attested by the separation of (i) learning <>lexical stems as based on associative/frequency based learning as opposed to the engagement of (ii) true rule manipulation. Harald Clahsen, working with Steven Pinker (Harvard), has set out to establish such a dual mechanism model of processing that reflects qualitative differences found amongst (inter alia) derivational vs. inflectional morphology and irregular verb rote learning. My own interest here lies in the idea of promoting a developmental--syntactic response to the otherwise morphologically based dual mechanism model--a Research Statement & Project which attempts to correlate the classic syntactic twin-benchmarks of language acquisition (Lexical vs. Functional), as proposed by Radford in his seminal 1990 thesis, to that of an overall protracted, maturational stage of abstract syntactic-rule development. This same line of inquiry which pegs cortical development to specific aspects of language development has been advanced and reduplicated in a number of neuroimaging studies (loni.ucla). These and others' findings provide evidence for a neural dissociation between Declarative (memory) and Procedural (rule) systems.

Web Links:

(Harald Clahsen) (Andrew Radford) (Steven Pinker) (Paul Thompson)

http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~harald http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~radford http://wjh.harvard.edu http://www.loni.ucla.edu

General Teaching Philosophy

Child Language Acquisition.

I have a strong willingness to present a wide range of positions held in the current literature. Although my personal research supports maturational-based hypotheses, I have sufficient understanding of other competing models and could equally present them without bias. I have a good working appreciation towards (association-based) connectionism vs. (rule-based) nativism. My current work involves investigating the roles that relevant brain development and neuroanatomy play in Early Child English Grammar under an assumed modular theory of language. My general approach is Generative and follows a Principles & Parameters Framework as advanced in 'The Minimalist Program' (Chomsky: 1995).

Second Language Acquisition & Applied Linguistics: CLAD-Credential.

I have a strong willingness to develop/present methodologies which combine (i) overt language learning strategies with more (ii) naturalistic approaches--specifically in the areas of Second Language Acquisition where (at the appropriate level) I have found that an 'overt grammar-learning' approach, reinforced with natural and contextual aspects of language learning, often produces the greatest results. I am familiar with second language Methods & Theory, having worked for a year under a leading second language developmental linguist (Harald Clahsen). In sum, his (and others') research points to the fact that (adult) Second Language (L2) learners cannot approach and acquire a second language in the same 'innate' means by which their L1 language was acquired (pace Krashen). In this respect, I adhere to Chomsky's well known theory of UG/PPT as based on the notion that a critical period of language acquisition exists (cf. Lenneberg 1967). Within such an approach, L2 must be 'learned' via specific and strategic efforts that are transparent enough to bring about a systematic mapping of L2 linguistic material onto an L1 innate template (presumably based on UG). In this sense, a given L2 is 'learned' in a distinctively different manner as compared to the natural acquisition processes of a parameterized L1.

Introduction to English Grammar.

I take a 'Features Theory Approach' (as presented in Chomsky 1995) to teaching traditional English grammar. I feel the best way for students to gain a handle on some of the more abstract properties of grammar is to instigate a hands-on approach whereby students deconstruct various aspects of languageÑfrom the Clause down to the very small properties of features associated with Nouns, Verb, etc. Generative tree diagramming allows students to incorporate features while having them build Phrases, Clauses, and Sentences, one constituent at a time.

Language Therapy.

A comprehensive and overall understanding of normal patterns of child language development is essential before a proper assessment of Specific Language Impairment (SLI) in children can ever be made. My own research suggests that formal properties of language acquisition having to do with more abstract semantic-relations and/or inflectional-morphology are often delayed in normal children (up until 5-6 years of age in some cases). Such findings demonstrate that children's errors for this age group do not necessarily imply language abnormality. The question may be to see if language under-development (e.g. alternations between objective and genitive possessors) among children in a slightly older age group belongs in the same category as cited above, or whether SLI should be diagnosed. In either case, specially suited language therapy should be given, though with a more detailed investigation/therapy for diagnosed SLI (See Radford & Galasso 1998 regarding normal L1 language acquisition).