We have a new paper out in which we argue that the robustness and flexibility of human language is underpinned by a machinery of interactive repair. Repair is normally thought of as a kind of remedial procedure: a system for handling clarification questions, just one of those things we need to stay out of communicative trouble. Simply put (and oversimplifying only a bit), we argue we wouldn’t have complex language if it weren’t for this system of interactive repair.
