Prof. dr. sc.

Danica kara
University of Split
dskara@ffst.hr
PSYCHOLINGUISTICS AND COGNITIVE
ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE
WEEK 4: LANGUAGE EVOLUTION AND
DEVELOPMENT
ANIMAL LANGUAGE

What is language?

Languageisapurelyhumanandnoninstinctive
methodofcommunicatingideas,emotionsand
desiresbymeansofvoluntrilyproduced
symbols.
EdwardSapir(1921)

A language is a system for encoding

and decoding
information.
the term refers to the forms of
communication considered peculiar
to humankind.
In linguistics the term is extended to
refer to the human cognitive facility
of creating and using language.

Origin and evolution of

language

To ask where language comes from is to

raise the question of the origin of the
cognitively modern human mind.
The evolution of modern human
language required both the development
of the anatomical apparatus for speech
and also neurological changes in the
brain to support language itself, but
other species have some of these
capabilities
without
full language ability.

The frontal lobes are where ideas

are created; plans constructed;
thoughts joined with their
associations to form new memories;
and fleeting perceptions held in
mind until they are dispatched to
long-term memory or to oblivion.
This brain region is the home of
consciousness. Self-awareness
arises here, and emotions are
transformed in this place from
physical survival systems to
subjective feelings.
The area of the frontal lobe most
closely associated with the
generation of consciousness is in
the prefrontal cortex. These four
areas, which endow human with
fucntions are not available in other
animal:

1) Belief in divine creation. Many

societies throughout history believed
that language is the gift of the gods to
humans. The most familiar is found in
Genesis 2:20, which tells us that Adam
gave names to all living creatures.
This belief predicates that humans
were created from the start with an
innate capacity to use language.

Invention hypotheses. There are

several hypotheses as to how language
might have been consciously invented
by humans based on a more primitive
system of hominid communication.
Each hypothesis is predicated on the
idea that the invention of language
and its gradual refinement served as a
continuous impetus to additional
human mental development.

1) Warning hypothesis. Language

may have evolved from warning
signals such as those used by
animals. Perhaps language started
with a warning to others, such as
Look out, Run, or Help to alert
members of the tribe when some
lumbering beast was approaching.

Gestural theory
The gestural theory states that
human language developed from
gestures that were used for simple
communication.

Each of the imitation hypotheses

might explain how certain isolated
words of language developed. Very
few words in human language are
verbal icons. Most are symbols,
displaying an arbitrary relationship
of sound and meaning. (Example:
the word tree in several languages:
Spanish rbol; French arbre;

There are three distinct views of

how language evolved:
SOCIAL > Language arose through
increased socialisation in early
settled communities and the need
for a communication system to
support hunting and farming.

PHYSIOLOGICAL: the human

articulators appear to be specially
adapted to language.

NEUROLOGICAL: A lay view holds

that human beings are able to master
the complexities of language because
they have developed a higher
intelligence or a larger brain.

Nativists vs. empiricists

Nativist theories Chomky is the

preeminent name hereplace the
distinctiveness of language in specific
genetic endowment for a specifically
genetically instructed language module.
Under that view, there is minimal learning
involved in acquiring a language.
Empiricists like Hobbes and Locke argued
that knowledge emerge ultimately from
abstracted sense impressions.

The precise form of language must

be acquired through exposure to a
speech community. Words are
definitely not inbron, but the
capacity to acquire language and
use it creatively seems to be inborn.
N. Chomsky calls this ability the LAD
(Language Acquisition Device).

Co-evolutionary theory

There are also coevolutionary proposals: Language

is not an instinct and there is no genetically
installed linguistic black box in our brains.
Language arose slowly through cognitive and
cultural inventiveness.
Language began as a cognitive adaptation and
genetic assimilation. Cognitive effort and genetic
assimilation interacted as language and brain coevolved.
We have a vast, open-ended number of frames and
provisional conceptual assemblies that we
manipulate.

During the last few years the

argument that both archaic H.
sapiens and Neanderthals had the
brain capacity, neural structure and
vocal apparatus for an advanced
form of vocalization, that should be
called language, is compelling.

Was there one or more than one original

language? Was there one or more than one
invention of language?

There are about 5,000 languages

spoken on Earth today. We know
that there were even more spoken in
the past, when most people lived in
small bands or tribes rather than in
large states.

Monogenesis vs.
polygenesis

1) The oldest belief is that there was

a single, original language. The idea
of a single ancestor tongue is known
today as monogenesis. In JudeoChristian tradition, the original
language was confused by divine
intervention, as described in the
story of the Tower of Babel in
Genesis.

The hypothesis of multiple linguistic

origins that often goes along with
this hypothesis is known as
polygenesis. Each of the original
languages then would then have
diverged into numerous forms. The
major language families of today
would be descended from these
separate mother tongues.

Animal communication

Transmission of information from

one animal to another by means of
sound, viisble sign or behavoiur,
taste or odour, electrical impulse,
touch, or a combination of these.
The vehicle for the provision of this
information is called a signal.

Different contexts require different

kinds of information and thus
different signals.
The number of signals in a species
repertoire can range from 5 or 6 in
the simplest non-social animals to 1020 in social insects, such as bees and
ants, or to 30-40 in social vertebrates,
such as wolves and primates.

Design features of human

language

The following properties of human language have

been argued to separate it from animal
communication:
Arbitrariness: There is no rational relationship
between a sound or sign and its meaning. (There is
nothing intrinsically "housy" about the word
"house".)
Cultural transmission: Language is passed from one
language user to the next, consciously or
unconsciously.
Discreteness: Language is composed of discrete
units that are used in combination to create

meaning.

Displacement: Languages can be used to

communicate ideas about things that are not in
the immediate vicinity either spatially or
temporally.
Duality: Language works on two levels at once,
a surface level and a semantic (meaningful)
level.
Metalinguistics: Ability to discuss language
itself.
Productivity: A finite number of units can be
used to create an infinite number of utterances.

Animals and language?

Is language use a uniquely

human ability?

Parrots - can memorize chunks of

human speech
Pollywannacracker

But are they really producing utterances

based on an underlying meaning?

Animals and language?

Is language use a uniquely

human ability?

Bird use songs to serve territorial

and courtship functions.
Tweetchirpchirp
warble
warblechirp.
Translation: this is my tree

Can songs be used productively?

Animals and language?

Is language use a uniquely human

ability?

Honey bees dance to indicate where a

source of nectar is.
Angleofthedanceindicates
direction
Rateofloopingindicates
distance

Some examples

Animals - use a variety of methods

to communicate
Dogs bark
Birds sing
Bees dance
People talk - we use language (as well
as other methods) for communication

Animals and language?

Parrot

Dog

Bird
song

Arbitrariness

?
?
?
?
?

Displacement
Productivity
Discreteness
Semanticity
Duality of
patterning

Bee
dance

Human
Language

Research with apes, like that of

Francine Patterson with Koko or
Herbert Terrace with Nim Chimpsky,
suggested that apes are capable of
using language that meets some of
these requirements. However, no
experiment has shown a non-human
being to be proficient in all of these
areas.

Can Chimpanzees Talk?

Conclusion

It seems that we have a language organ which

other species do not possess, a segment of our brain
which is triggered by a storage of development.
The results suggest that while chimpanzees and
gorillas are quite intelligent they are not capable of
human language. Rather they have a primitive
version of the semantic ability children use to begin
learning language. Human beings seem to have a
different kind of intelligence!
Language has been shaped over many generations
into a system which reflects the way human thought
is structured.