Parallel constraint-based generative theories of language

A re-evaluation of the goals and techniques of generative grammar since the mid-1960s suggests that its mentalistic/biological program for describing language is still sound and has been borne out by subsequent developments. Likewise, the idea of a generative system of combinatorial rules has led to a tremendous expansion of our understanding of linguistic phenomena. However, certain fundamental features of the versions of generative grammar based on Chomsky’s work prevent the theory from making deep liaisons with related fields such as language processing and neuroscience. Perhaps the most prominent of these is the assumption that all creative aspects of language stem from syntactic structure. In this article, I propose a model of generative grammar that generalizes features of several, alternative, non-Chomskyan generative frameworks. In this model, language is seen as composed of three independent generative components (phonological, syntactic, and semantic/conceptual structure), whose respective structures are placed in correspondence by ‘interface components’. Besides being able to incorporate a host of purely linguistic facts, this view leads to a more direct relationship between the theory of grammar and the theory of lexical and grammatical processing.