NATIVE SPEAKERS ARE CREATIVE AND CONSERVATIVE: WHAT EXPLAIN ME THIS REVEALS ABOUT THE NATURE OF LINGUISTIC KNOWLEDGE

Since its publication in 2019, Adele E. Goldberg's Explain Me This has attracted the attention of not only linguists and psychologists of diverse theoretical persuasions but also a broad readership interested in what it means to be a native speaker of a language such as English—for good reason. We start off by providing a detailed summary of the book to give an idea of what makes it as convincing and thought-provoking as it is. We then attempt to place some of its core ideas and implications in a broader context by setting them against their counterparts in other prominent theories.