Non-Modular and Modular Views of Language
Whether language is modular is a debate for a lot of people. The two schools of thought say that (a) language is modular in that it is separate from other cognitive processes, and (b) language is non-modular in that it is a product of various cognitive processes (Robinson-Riegler & Robinson, Riegler, 2008). It cannot really be both, however, so determining which one it is seems to be very important. Unfortunately for the people who want the issue resolved, there is no definitive test or experiment that can be done to clear the matter up. It remains opinion. Personally, I think that the modular opinion is the most accurate, although I'm not sure that either option is 100% correct. The experiments that were done with music, though, showed that there were two different issues appearing when it came to whether people noticed a wrong word, a wrong note, or both (Robinson-Riegler & Robinson, Riegler, 2008). Because two different indicators appeared when there was both a wrong note and a wrong word, it would be difficult to say that there was nothing modular going on.
If language was not modular, it would be expected that there would have been a blending of the 'wrongness' of the music and the words, instead of having such a definite, noticeable difference between the two of them. That does not guarantee that language is modular, of course, but it sheds light on the issue and gives me the impression that there is more to it than many people realize. There are some concerns with both sides of the coin, though, so I have not completely decided that I am convinced that either side has everything figured out. The answer to the question probably lies somewhere in the middle, in that some components of learning language might be modular while other components might not be. Language is very complex in itself, and the human mind is even more complex, so it would be very unlikely that we would understand all of it no matter how many tests we do or how many opinions we form.
Bibliography
Robinson-Riegler, G., & Robinson-Riegler, B. (2008). Cognitive psychology: Applying the science of the mind. 2nd ed. New York: Allyn & Bacon.
