Readings etc.

This course uses a variety of resources as a supplement to the class lectures. Two books have been ordered, and should be available in the campus bookstore; some additional readings will be made available at various points in the semester; extensive electronic resources will be available from the course web site, including lecture notes, study guides, and feedback on assignments.

Books

	Steven Pinker's book The Language Instinct (1994) is one of the most enjoyable and informative introductions to the science of language in the last few years. It spent many weeks on the bestseller lists. We will use this book primarily for non-technical background reading to accompany the other material that we will be reading.
	Fromkin & Rodman's An Introduction to Language (6th edition) (1997) serves as the basic textbook for this course. You will read many of the chapters in the book, plus a number of the exercises. It is also useful as a reference.

Additional Readings

Additional readings will be assigned at some points during the semester. These will either be handed out in class, or will be available on reserve in the library. Wherever possible, we will try to make these readings available on electronic reserve, so that you will be able to access them remotely.

• "The Great Eskimo Vocabulary Hoax", by Geoffrey Pullum. In Pullum (1991), pp. 159-171.

Electronic Resources

In addition to the course readings, we will make extensive use of on-line materials. For example, homework assignments and study notes will be available on these web pages. Also, email is the best way of contacting the instructor and TA. Therefore, you should ensure that you are familiar with using email (get an account on the university system if you don't have one yet) and with using a Web browser (e.g. Netscape). Using these electronic resources is good for students and instructors alike, because it is much easier to distribute information effectively to a large group of people, and it's also good for the environment, because it saves paper. We are able to do this because of the University of Delaware's excellent electronic learning resources.

Some of the on-line materials (e.g. speech sound demos) may require you to install a free plug-in for your web browser. The relevant pages will contain information on how to obtain these.