LANGUAGE PRODUCTION, A COMPLEX, BUT FEASIBLE TASK WITH THE RIGHT STRATEGY

Michael ZOCK CNRS & LIF, Université de la Méditerranée (Aix-Marseille II) E-mail: michael.zock@lif.univ-mrs.fr
Abstract. The goal of this paper is threefold: (a) provide a possible explanation for language production in real time (computation of syntactic structure); (b) present a method to help the language producer become fluent in another language than his/her mother tongue; (c) help speakers or writers to find the word they are looking for, by developing navigational support inspired by findings based on the study of the mental lexicon. Key words: language production, pattern matching, pattern drills, language learning, fluency, lexical access, mental lexicon.

1. LANGUAGE PRODUCTION, ATTEMPTS TO EXPLAIN AND SUPPORT IT AT LEAST PARTIALLY 1.1. Introduction Speaking a language is a very difficult task. The message (what to say), its corresponding linguistic expression (how to say it) and sound form (say it, i.e. articulation) have to be determined on the fly, quasy simultaneously.1 There is also a space problem. Messages can become complex, yet our short-term memory is limited (Miller, 1956). In other words, we cannot afford to plan everything in all its details before starting articulation. Our cognitive resources would simply be exhausted, causing us to forget what we meant to say, before having translated it into language. Obviously, language production is a complex process. Nevertheless, despite this fact and despite individual differences most of us succeed most of the time. The question is how do we manage? I will try to answer this question partially in the next section, confining my hypothesises to the computation of syntactic structures. In the following two sections I will present my ideas of how to support (a) fluency acquisition when learning a foreign language and (b) lexical access (memory search), i.e. how to help authors to find the word they are looking for. The work