Task deadline: Monday 17th March at 2.05 PM (end of lunch)
Read the attached Adobe document (Acrobat reader is free to download online if you don’t already have it on your computer – or print this out at school). It is about child language acquisition, which is not something you have to know the details of in this course. However, it provides an interesting ‘way in’ to considering the monster’s development as narrated in chapters 11 to 16.
So what I’d like you to do is read the attached file and then respond to this post by posting a comment (post it here, not on your own blog), answering the following questions:
- In what ways does the monster’s development correspond to what we now know about child language acquisition? (remember these ideas were not around in Shelley’s time)
- In what ways is his development highly unrealistic in terms of what we know?
- What do you think Shelley is trying to say about the monster, Victor and society as a whole by highlighting the monster’s development in such detail?
Entries (RSS)
March 15th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
1) The monsters language acquisition is very similar to that of a child as when he describes his surrondings he uses simple statements. But as he develops he begins to talk about more than simple needs, he starts to talk about feelings etc.
2) However the monsters quick grasp of language is unrealistic as it would take a child 5 years to gain even a simple degree of language. Which is much more than the monster uses when he talks to Victor.
3) Perhaps Shelley is commenting on social mobility and the position of women in her society. For example as the monster is able to become human and speak eloquentley against all odds, which shows that even women can be amazing novelists.
March 16th, 2008 at 11:29 am
In chap 5 when victor creates the monster, and the monster comes to life. It could be argued that the sounds that the monster makes are inarticulate sounds “while a green wrinkled his face” this view can be supported by the stages of acquisition 0-2 months biological noises. The monster is like a new born baby and he is just learning to associate himself and identify his creator that’s why he grins at Victor because he can recognise him. In the later chapters the monster learns to speak fluently and skips the first 4 most important stages of acquisition, the cooing and laughing stage, the vocal play, babbling and the melodic utterances. In chap 10,11,12 explains to his creator how he learns to speak English so fluently, his suggests whilst he was hiding in the kennel, he spied on the family that lived in the small cottage. The monster learns how to speak fluently at very alarming rate, because although he skips 4 learning stages. the first things he learns is to associate names to objects such as little flying winged animals and then within a couple of paragraphs he is able to name different types of birds names e.g. thrush sparrow. The monster then just learns how speak very fluently without having any difficulties on how to use connectives e.g. “and” “but” “then” during his early stages.
2 and 3 ) The monster’s development of speech is very unrealistic, but normal human beings would have had to go through each acquisition stage. what makes it so unrealistic is that the monster learns how to speak without having any one to speak to, and he further more there is he has no one to imitate from so that he learns how to pronounce things correctly, but it could be argued that Mary Shelley is trying to emphasise on how superior and tremendous the monster is, because if he can learnt to speak so splendily withing a short amount of time, then there is so much more he has in store, also the reader should always remember that Mary Shelley in Frankenstein always emphasises on the monster unusual supernatural nature, such as the pace of it’s speed, it could also be taken into consideration that maybe Mary Shelley is mocking scientific knowledge that the Victor created a monster and thought he would have power and dominion over it , but the matter of the fact is that the monster despite its ugliness, unusual height and features can do things twice better than Victor can.
March 16th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Frankensteins monster definately shares the same learning pattern as young children and babies. Young children learn language and how to express it through their eviornament and what is goin on around them. The creature watched a family of peasants living normally and functioning together. Through this learning device he became a linguistic success and was able to have a conversation with Victor using a wide range of vocabulary and which he used contextually and confidently when attempting to calm Victor down.
It is very unlikely that Frankensteins monster would be able to learn such an eloequent use of language from peasants. It is not just unlikely because of the lower social status of the peasants but also because the monster seemed to have picked up biblical language which he uses in a contextual manner perfectly, it is highly unlikely he would be able to do this. This sort of development would take a breakthrough in many years and stages something which the monster just did not have when studying the peasants that later made him flee. Also from the monsters murderous rampages it is quite clear that he is unable to express his anguish problems, it doesnt seem viable that he has the capacity to express his words and what he wants porperly but is still unable to keep his anger issues at bay.
It is clear that the development of skills and education seems to be an issue with Mary Shelley. Frankensteins monster could represent a nation of underclass working people who were not gifted with enough riches to be educated or to educate others. The state of Britains social secuirty was rediculous. If Frankensteins monster really does represent a whole class of uneducated people then this would be a message to those in charge of the system that they can learn, because if an 8 foot monster made up 10 different people can learn, then why not the poor?
If this was the case then this would certainly reveal alot about society at the time. The rich, the beautiful and the connected are gifted in every sense because they are allowed to utilise the resources around them whereas others which do not possess these social graces are left to do what they need 2 do.
March 16th, 2008 at 8:35 pm
i think that the idea that the monster is/was developing corresponds with this information. However Shelley portrays the monster as quickly capable and its understanding of the world to be extremely quick and condensed. The monster appears to go from having the smallest vocabulary to the widest within a matter of lines, we see this in chapter 10 with the birds. With this factual information at hand we realise that the monsters development is ridiculously fast, and extremely unbelievable. The monster (using the example from chapter 10) should carry on being confused by the ‘little winged creatures’ for at least a chapter before calling them birds, let alone their species.
I think that Shelley is trying to portray him as an intellectual thing, as from the narration we get from Victor, it seems that the monster is not this, and is perceived as a vicious monster. I think she is trying to show that through this quick and innocent knowledge that is factual but childlike, we receive a better understanding of the monster, and are then able to judge it with our own assumptions and not Victors bias narration. The same message appears throughout, that beauty is not skin deep, and this point is backed up by the extremely simple but sweet narration from the monster himself, where we really get to know and realise that he is perhaps not this cold-blooded murdering fiend he is made out to be, but a misunderstood creature!
March 17th, 2008 at 6:03 am
1) The monsters language is very similar to that of a child of 0-2 monthhs. In chapter 5 it says that the monster ‘muttered some articulate sounds’ this can be reffered to as the biological noises that is mention in the language acquisition for a child of 0-2 months old. The monster is just like a new born baby, he learns to speak the language by the people that are around him (the family of whom he watches for sometime). The monster skips four stages of the learning process for children, he is able to identify ‘winged creatures’ and within a couple of lines he is bale to identify it as a bird and then the particular type of bird.
2) It is unrealistic that the monster was able to speak the language so fluently, because as we read on the PDF file, its takes children at least 5 years to develop the language and even then they have error in their speech and this is with constant human contact from birth. The monster learns too quickly for it to be realistic and without the errors that a child would. He is able to use connectives and understand the language and speak it better than most people can.
3) i was completely sure on this question but i think that sheely is commenting on the fact that those that are lower down in the society seem to not have the rights to be able to learn the language and so therefore have to teach themselves. Like the poor will home school thier children because they dont have the money to send them to school.
March 17th, 2008 at 10:00 am
Given the lack of information about how children acquire knowledge the monster’s grasp of the human languages is to a certain extent realistic. the “grunts” he makes as referenced in chapter 5 that gradually flows into language when around people mimics how young children learn to talk. the speed at which he learns however is incredibly unrealistic – that level of eloquence is not only unlikely to be learned from poverty stricken and thus uneducated people but also the time it took for him to learn all that much is equally unrealistic. I think Shelley is using this to comment on prejudices. One would not expect a woman in Shelley’s time to be a great novelist, they would find it unrealistic if unthinkable. In the same way the monster’s amzing grasp of knowledge in such as short time and the ability to reason and ration impeccably could be a reflection of the ignorance of prejudices. By highlighting his development and in particular the things he developed: the ability to love and give perhaps she is contrasting his unfortunate predicament of being created by man, being rejected by his creator and having no money at all against victor who was not created by man and has a loving family and sufficient money for his needs. it appears that through this contrast she is drawing parallels between victor’s arrogant selfish nature and the monster’s loving giving nature and through this insinuates that people cannot be generalised according to how they were born.
March 18th, 2008 at 6:50 pm
1) The langauge that the monster uses is similar to a child, his ’simple vocabulary’ and short senteces’ are similar in the developmet stages of a child at the begining of the stages of aquisition. He then develops more and speaks fluently, perhaps representing the ‘imitation’ stage, where he learns speech from watching other people speek.
2)This is un-realistic due to the fact that the monster hasn’t actually interatcted with anybody, only watched from afar. This means it would probaly be very unlike he would have picked up language so quickly without diversing in conversation. He also skips stages that a child would have to go through in the learning process, and we as readers question weather this is belivable.
3) I think Shelly is trying to show us the irony of the monsters misfortunes through his development as well us the unjustment of society. The monster wishes so hard to become beautiful and ‘normal’, as he is seen as a rejection from society buy yet he doesn’t reflect his ugliness and wishes to ability to be loved and love himself. The is ironically in opposistion to Victor, who is considered normal and yet portrays monster like qualities that you would have associated with the monster. Victor repeatly refers to him own troubles and ‘torture’ and yet does not consider any body elses misfortunes.
March 27th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
When first created the monsters’ development like a child’s is slow and to an extent believable, however as the plot progresses the monster’s rapid linguistic growth becomes in its own right astounding. Having merely observed from a distance a family and never actually conversing with them, the maturity and eloquence of the monsters’ speeches become more sublime then the surroundings! I think that possibly Mary Shelly is suggesting that if a child (or in this case monster) is neglected then personal development is near to impossible, however even observing from a distance the good of a loving family growth (not limited to simply language) is achievable.