This book asserts that language is a signaling system rather than a code, based in part on such research as the finding that 5-year-old English and Dutch children use pronouns correctly in their own utterances, but often fail to interpret these forms correctly when used by someone else.
1 Understanding and Misunderstanding .- 2 Asymmetries in Language Acquisition .- 3 The Listener’s Perspective .- 4 The Speaker’s Perspective .- 5 Symmetry and Asymmetry Across Languages .- 6 Competing Perspectives .- Appendix .- Index.