ABSTRACT
Up to this point, we have dealt almost exclusively with the neural substrates of language at the level of single words. By restricting the scope of our inquiry in this manner, we have gained considerable insight into the complex networks of brain regions that allow us to represent and process the phonological, orthographic, semantic, and morphological structures of individual words. One could argue, however, that we have not yet gotten much purchase on the biological bases of naturalistic language use because, to put it bluntly, people don’t go around all day communicating with each other in single-word utterances. On the contrary, they routinely combine words in systematic ways to formulate novel propositions of every imaginable kind, from idle gossip, driving directions, and pasta recipes to medical diagnoses, legal judgments, and religious exhortations.
