"In recent years, following Noam Chomsky's lead, linguistic research has virtually equated syntax with language. Syntactic ability is taken to be a unique characteristic of the human mind, deriving from genetically transmitted "language instinct.""

"In this provocative book, Lieberman shifts the focus, arguing that language is not an instinct coded in a discrete cortical "language organ", but a learned skill, based on a Functional Language System distributed over many parts of the human brain. To make his case, Lieberman synthesizes converging behavioral and neurobiological data, including clinical evidence from speech-impaired patients (some with Parkinson's disease, whose deficits are subcortical, and some with Broca's aphasia); neuroimaging; and evolutionary biology.

Using this enormous body of data, he argues that human language is regulated by a network that involves regions of the neocortex often associated with nonlinguistic cognition, and even subcortical structures - our ancient reptilian brain - in addition to Broca's and Wernicke's areas in the neocortex."--Jacket.