Joe Becker's 1975 article 'The Phrasal Lexicon' argued that the mental lexicon is far richer than a set of words; it contains phrases, idioms, and other linguistic chunks that are stored and retrieved as holistic units, not constructed compositionally.

factualpending

Speaker

Douglas Hofstadter

Evidence Quote

I was deeply influenced by an article...by Joe Becker...called the phrasal lexicon...what we have in our head is far, far richer than a set of words...very very inspiring article. [50:43]

Source

Analogy as the Core of CognitionStanford
Created: 8/12/2026, 6:12:22 PM

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