Recent studies of vocal development in infants have shed new light on old questions of how the speech capacity is founded and how it may have evolved in the human species. Vocalizations in the very first months of life appear to provide previously unrecognized clues to the earliest steps in the process by which language came to exist and the processes by which communicative disorders arise.
Perhaps the most interesting sounds made by infants are the uniquely human 'protophones' (loosely, 'babbling'), the precursors to speech. Kimbrough Oller argues that these are most profitably interpreted in the context of a new "infrastructural" model of speech. The model details the manner in which well-formed speech units are constructed, and it reveals how infant vocalizations mature through the first months of life by increasingly adhering to the rules of well-formed speech.
He lays out many advantages of an infrastructural approach. Infrastructural interpretation illuminates the significance of vocal stages, and highlights clinically significant deviations, such as the previously unnoticed delays in vocal development that occur in deaf infants. An infrastructural approach also specifies potential paths of evolution for vocal communicative systems. Infrastructural properties and principles of potential communicative systems prove to be organized according to a natural logic--some properties and principles naturally presuppose others. Consequently some paths of evolution are likely while others can be ruled out. An infrastructural analysis also provides a stable basis for comparisons across species, comparisons that show how human vocal capabilities outstrip those of their primate relatives even during the first months of human infancy.
"The Emergence of the Speech Capacity" will challenge psychologists, linguists, speech pathologists, and primatologists alike to rethink the ways they categorize and describe communication. Oller's infraphonological model permits provocative reconceptualizations of the ways infant vocalizations progress systematically toward speech, insightful comparisons between speech and the vocal systems of other species, and fruitful speculations about the origins of language.

Recent studies of vocal development in infants have shed new light on old questions of how the speech capacity is founded and how it may have evolved in the human species. Vocalizations in the very first months of life appear to provide previously unrecognized clues to the earliest steps in the process by which language came to exist and the processes by which communicative disorders arise.
Perhaps the most interesting sounds made by infants are the uniquely human 'protophones' (loosely, 'babbling'), the precursors to speech. Kimbrough Oller argues that these are most profitably interpreted in the context of a new "infrastructural" model of speech. The model details the manner in which well-formed speech units are constructed, and it reveals how infant vocalizations mature through the first months of life by increasingly adhering to the rules of well-formed speech.
He lays out many advantages of an infrastructural approach. Infrastructural interpretation illuminates the significance of vocal stages, and highlights clinically significant deviations, such as the previously unnoticed delays in vocal development that occur in deaf infants. An infrastructural approach also specifies potential paths of evolution for vocal communicative systems. Infrastructural properties and principles of potential communicative systems prove to be organized according to a natural logic--some properties and principles naturally presuppose others. Consequently some paths of evolution are likely while others can be ruled out. An infrastructural analysis also provides a stable basis for comparisons across species, comparisons that show how human vocal capabilities outstrip those of their primate relatives even during the first months of human infancy.
"The Emergence of the Speech Capacity" will challenge psychologists, linguists, speech pathologists, and primatologists alike to rethink the ways they categorize and describe communication. Oller's infraphonological model permits provocative reconceptualizations of the ways infant vocalizations progress systematically toward speech, insightful comparisons between speech and the vocal systems of other species, and fruitful speculations about the origins of language.

Because dual language learners are the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. student population-and the majority speak Spanish as a first language-the new generation of SLPs must have comprehensive knowledge of how to work effectively with bilingual speakers. That's what they'll get in the second edition of this book, an ideal graduate-level text and an essential resource for every practicing SLP. Fully updated with five new chapters on hot topics (see below), an expanded age range that includes infants and toddlers, and cutting-edge research findings, this book arms SLPs with the most current information on language development and disorders of Spanish-English bilingual children. More than 25 leading researchers give SLPs in-depth, high-level coverage of a broad range of critical topics, including -social-cultural factors affecting language acquisition -diagnosis of language disorders -effective professional development -infant/toddler language development -first language loss -bilingual lexical development -semantic development -verbal morphology and vocabulary -morphosyntactic development -code-switching -grammatical impairments -narrative development and disorders -phonological development and disorders -fluency -SLPs will have the sophisticated knowledge they need to accurately distinguish language disorders from typical bilingual development, and they'll get a complete language intervention framework they can use as a guide for their own practice. Whether used as a graduate text or a trusted reference, this book will help SLPs fully understand the complexity of language development in bilingual children, diagnose disorders accurately, and conduct effective assessment and intervention for the growing number of Spanish-English bilingual speakers.