In recent years linguists have increasingly turned to the cognitive sciences to broaden their
investigation into the roots and development of language. With the advent of
cognitive-linguistic usage-based and complex-adaptive models of language linguists today are
utilizing approaches and insights from cognitive psychology neuropsychology social psychology
and other related fields. A key result of this interdisciplinary approach is the concept of
entrenchment the ongoing reorganization and adaptation of communicative knowledge. Entrenchment
posits that our linguistic knowledge is continuously refreshed and reorganized under the
influence of social interactions. It is part of a larger ongoing process of lifelong cognitive
reorganization whose course and quality is conditioned by exposure to and use of language and
by the application of cognitive abilities and processes to language. This volume enlists more
than two dozen experts in the fields of linguistics psycholinguistics neurology and
cognitive psychology in providing a realistic picture of the psychological and linguistic
foundations of language. Contributors examine the psychological foundations of linguistic
entrenchment processes and the role of entrenchment in first-language acquisition second
language learning and language attrition. Critical views of entrenchment and some of its
premises and implications are discussed from the perspective of dynamic complexity theory and
radical embodied cognitive science.
