本书是适合所有层次学生的理想教材，包含语言教学的诸多领域，诸如语言学、英语、教育、外国语言、心理学、人类学、社会学以及英语作为第二语言的教学。第八版继承作者始终如一的写作与出版理念，努力做到最前沿、最完整、内容最丰富，除保留面向学生的亲和风格之外，新增了近年来神经语言学的新发展和语言自主性的相关研究，更新了心理语言学的最新发现和计算语言学的有关议题等，反映了语言学领域内最新的研究成果。

prdface

about the authors

part 1 the nature of human language

chapter 1 what is language

chapter 2 brain and language

part 2 grammatical aspects of language

chapter 3 morphology:the words of language

chapter 4 syntax:the sentence patterns of language

chapter 5 the meaning of language

chapter 6 phonetics:the sounds of language

chapter 7 phonology:the sound patterns of language

part 3 the psychology of language

chapter 8 language acquistion

chapter 9 language processing:humans and computers

part 4 language and society

chapter 10 language in society

chapter 11 language change:the syllables of time

chapter 12 writing:the ABCs of language