Includes bibliographical references (pages 316-351) and index.

Machine generated contents note: Part I. Introduction: 1. Genesis; 2. Instinctive phonology; 3. The anatomy of the phonological mind; Part II. Algebraic Phonology: 4. How are phonological categories represented: the role of equivalence classes; 5. How phonological patterns are assembled: the role of algebraic variables in phonology; Part III. Universal Design - Phonological Universals and their Role in Individual Grammars: 6. Phonological universals: typological evidence and grammatical explanations; 7. Phonological universals are mirrored in behavior: evidence from artificial language learning; 8. Phonological universals are core knowledge: evidence from sonority restrictions; Part IV. Ontogeny, Phylogeny, Phonological Hardware and Technology: 9. Out of the mouths of babes; 10. The phonological mind evolves; 11. The phonological brain; 12. Phonological technologies: reading and writing; 13. Conclusions, caveats, questions.

"Humans instinctively form words by weaving patterns of meaningless speech elements. Moreover, we do so in specific, regular ways. We contrast dogs and gods, favour blogs to lbogs. We begin forming sound-patterns at birth and, like songbirds, we do so spontaneously, even in the absence of an adult model. We even impose these phonological patterns on invented cultural technologies such as reading and writing. But why are humans compelled to generate phonological patterns? And why do different phonological systems - signed and spoken - share aspects of their design? Drawing on findings from a broad range of disciplines including linguistics, experimental psychology, neuroscience and comparative animal studies, Iris Berent explores these questions and proposes a new hypothesis about the architecture of the phonological mind"-- Provided by publisher.