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The Origins of Language
Primate CommunicationVocal + NonvocalExpresses immediate mental/emotional stateSpecies-wideInnateExamples:– Yikes–a snake!– Give me some of that– I am dangerous!– I see food!
Human Spoken LanguageDistinguishing Traits
Detachable from immediate state of speakerDisplacement of time and spaceInfinite productivityHigh information densityCulturalArbitrary
The Evolution of Human Language and Cognition: Two Models
Early/gradual– Circumstantial arguments – Brain casts
Recent/sudden– Upper Paleolithic revolution– Vocal tract
Must it be one of these?
Multilayered Human Communication
We cannot find partially linguistic species today . . .
. . . but we can “peel away” the layers of our own system.
We contain multitudes!
Two Experimental Scenarios:A. PRELANGUAGE
You cannot use words.
B. PROTOLANGUAGE You have all your present abilities, except that your vocabulary is roughly that of an 18 month old human child (a few dozen nouns & names, a dozen or so verbs, no tense, no articles or prepositions, no pronouns but “me”)
Communicate to Thag:1. You want Thag to share food
with you 2. You want Thag to leave, or else
you may attack him3. How your companion Thug got
covered with mammoth poop4. Why Thag shouldn’t eat that
plant5. You want Thag to go find rocks
and make tools to cut up the wildebeeste you have just found
6. Lord Vader finds Thag’s lack of faith “disturbing”
PRELANGUAGE
CALLSGESTURES
The Human Call System
Similar to other primates and mammalsLargely cross-cultural– Eek! Grrrr...!
Interlaces with language– Tone of voice– Volume– Pitch– May supplement, even contradict, spoken message
Increased importance when speech is limited
The Human Gestural SystemGesture vastly enriches calls or simple speechLinked to speech centersRecent studies of blind gesturersShared with related speciesLargely innate & species-wide– Cultural vs. universal gestures– Anger– Begging – Flirtation?
Language Evolution Revisited:
How could language have evolved?
Language Development:An Alternative Model
Primates:Calls &gestures
Australopithecus:Enhanced calls
& gestures
Homo erectus: Protolanguage
& gestures
Homo sapiens:Syntactic language
3 mya 2 mya 1 mya Present
Primates:Calls &gestures
Australopithecus:Enhanced calls
& gestures
3 mya 2 mya
Argument for AustralopithecuslanguageSlightly larger brainReorganized? (casts)Circumstances: ecology, society
Against:Apelike vocal tract No tools
Enhanced call system?(Not cultural)(No displacement, etc.)
Phase 2:Protolanguage
Homo erectus: Protolanguage
& gestures
2 mya 1 mya
(Dereck Bickerton, Language and Species)
“Robust” and universal– 18-month children– Language-trained apes– Language-deprived (“Genie”)– Pidgin speakers
Short, unstructurecd utterances (“word salad”)– “Applesauce buy store”– “Banana give banana me give”
Cultural: learned wordsLexical (vs. grammatical) words– Concrete nouns, verbs, adjectives
(bear, hand, rock, Thag, hit, give, big)– No tense, conjuntions, prepositions,
pronouns etc.– No syntactical elements
What is syntax?Logical organization of elements in an utteranceDevices: Word order, connectors, inflectionsNesting levels of relationship– “Lord Vader finds Thag’s lack of faith “disturbing.”– “I have been deeply troubled by your lack of regard for my
Christian moral principles.”
How much of this could be said in protolanguage?Clusters of meaning, normally nested without ambiguityBreakdown of syntax draws our attention to how it works. Can you fix these?– “The King of England’s hat”– “Today we will be discussing sex with a leading child
psychologist.”
Protolanguage enhanced by gesture and nonverbal sounds
Homo erectus
2 mya 1 mya
Protolanguage utterances=“word salad”How to get “syntax” into protolanguage?– 1. Context– 2. Gesture
Gesture:– Stokoe, The Gestural Origins of Language– Gestures have incipient syntax– Stories (mimesis)
H. erectus: protolanguage + gesture and nonverbal sounds
Compatible with erectus brain & vocal tractExplains continuing evolution
of brain and vocal tract
Homo sapiens:Syntactic language
Present800 kya
The Modern TransformationSyntactic items– Do not refer to things or actions– Create logical relationships among
lexical items– Example: “I am deeply troubled by
your lack of regard for my Christian moral principles.”
Modern cognition– Complex mental maps created by
semantic categories and syntactic connections
Modern articulation– “Dance” of mouth, tongue, larynx,
breath
A “Package” (?)
Which came first?Syntax, mental mapping, or articulation?Language is a holistic system of representation which entails all threeCan’t have mental representation of something until it can be put into syntaxSpeech/hearing is the doorway between the individual mind and the cultural “storehouse”Mind and Culture
The Human Vocal TractDoorway of the mind
Specialized for speaking
Modern human Neandertal
Vowel formation and SupralaryngealVocal Tract (SLVT)
Vital phonemes /i/ and /a/Modern proportions are crucialCould Neanderthal talk? Skhul?
Dance of the Consonants
Tongue and teeth for stopsCoordination of breath and tongue in voicingUnvoiced and voiced (/p/ versus /b/ or /t/ versus /d/)20 millisecond difference
Requires specialized neuroanatomical equipment
PhonemesHumans capable of about 50 vocal soundsTypical language maps out 25-30 “phonemes”Phonemic distinctions must be learned during childhood– English speakers cannot differentiate aspirated and
unaspirated /p/ of pots and spots– Chinese speakers cannot distinguish /r/ and /l/
Phonemes grade into one another for speed– Say “Tea for two” while touching your lips
Speech conquers a biological barrier
Mammal hearing cannot track a tapping sound at more than 7 taps per secondHowever, we can distinguish about 20 meaningful units of spoken information per second:“Australopithecus” has 14 phonemes, plus pitch contours and
accentuations
Neurological and anatomical adaptation for speechUnique to fully modern sapiens (?)
Spoken language as a “natural” legacyOccurs at a predictable ageDoes not depend on deliberate teaching– Requires only exposure
We unfailingly follow grammatical rules that we cannot describeAll human languages are equally complexIsolated languages have recurrent grammatical featuresNew “Pidgin” and “Creole” languages evolve similarly everywhere
Reviewing Language DevelopmentHow language advantaged erectus and modern sapiens
Primates:Calls &gestures
Australopithecus:Enhanced calls
& gestures
Homo erectus: Protolanguage
& gestures
Homo sapiens:Syntactic language
3 mya 2 mya 1 mya Present
Hominid IntelligenceSocial IntelligenceThe role of sensory processingFour kinds of learning– Experiential [Animals?]– Observational [Mammals?]– Constructional: [Homo?]– Cultural: [Homo?]
Cognitive mapping with syntactic spoken language– An unexplored territory of mind– Effects are cumulative
The Creative Explosion
“Symbolic Tools”Personal AdornmentMusicGrave offeringsRitual and religion
Upper Paleolithic societyLinguistic complexity probably equal to today’sReligion, music and artRegional trade and intergroup relationsGlobal cultures diverse but comparably complexA world constructed by language and mind– “We live suspended in webs of meanings that we ourselves
have constructed”– Yet, fully adaptive to material conditions
The best glimpse of this world comes from modern hunter-gatherers
Next . . .
Hunter-Gatherers:The Original Affluent Society?