The Silent Child

Laurent Danon-Boileau combines the role of Professor of General Linguistics at the University of Paris with professional language therapy. He is a psychoanalyst and associate member of the International Psychoanalytical Association. He works with children between four and seven years old who for a variety of reasons cannot or will not speak He aims to induce the birth of language in these children, at the same time using his observations to explore the nature of child language and communication. His background and education make him particularly attentive to two different dimensions of language that are often considered to be mutually exclusive: language as a psychic and poetic creation, and language as a word processing activity. He is also the developer of a new computer game, Play On, which is designed to assist dyslexic children.

Review from previous edition Laurent Danon-Boileau's investigation of young children with difficulties in learning to speak combines the highest quality of case writing with speculations that are remarkable in their penetration ... His observations are stunning, and his commentary on them is equally sharp ... You sense a real genius at work ... Never have I seen such a subtle and resounding plea for cultivating the child's own meaning-making capacity wihout imposing meaning on him or her Jerome Bruner

• 1. What Game Are We Playing? ; 2. Fabien: Thinking Without Words ; 3. Kim: Seeking One's Own Language ; 4. Rachid: Word and Gesture ; 5. Benjamin: Reality and Fiction ; 6. Pierre: Thinking With Broken Language ; 7. What is 'Quality' in Language? ; Conclusion ; Some Ideas from the Back of My Mind ; Bibliography ; Index