Ebook: The Grammatical Strtuctures of English and Spanish: An Analysis of Structural Diferences Between the two Languages

In this book, we have tried to speak of the grammatical structures of two lan­guages in a way that could reasonably be expected to be understood by non-linguists who bring motivation, intelligence, and time—but no considerable amount of training in linguis­tics as such—to the task. The enormous complexity of linguistic behavior is surprising in view of the fact that so high a percentage of it is readily mastered by young children. Yet only a small fraction of the complexity has been adequately described by generations of scholars. Most persons, including many language specialists, take the structure of lan­
guage for granted, like the air we breathe. How anyone learns his native language is still largely mysterious. Why almost no one learns a second language with native-like control after maturity is hardly less mysterious. With so little known about the process of learn­ing, beyond the simplest sort of conditioned responses, how anyone can go on advocating the advantages of this method of learning or that one is in itself no small mystery.