Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T16:22:43.708Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Join the dots: A musical interlude in the evolution of language?1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 February 2013

MAGGIE TALLERMAN
MAGGIE TALLERMAN*
Affiliation:
Newcastle University, UK
*
Author's address: Linguistics Section, SELLL, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU, UKmaggie.tallerman@ncl.ac.uk
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This review article examines the major premises concerning the evolution of language offered in Tecumseh Fitch's The Evolution of Language (2010). Various aspects of Fitch's argumentation are disputed, specifically including the idea that language was preceded in evolution by a musical protolanguage stage in which there were no words, but which instead exhibited a prosodic, meaningless ‘bare phonology’. According to Fitch, this putative stage in language evolution also laid the foundations for syntax, providing musical phrases which were subsequently filled by meaningful words. Counterarguments to these ideas are presented, and an alternative, word-based model of protolanguage is defended.

Type
Review Article
Information
Journal of Linguistics , Volume 49 , Issue 2 , July 2013 , pp. 455 - 487
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

[1]

Various erudite scholars read the first draft and saved me from myself in numerous ways. I am truly grateful to Steve Anderson, Christina Behme, Kathleen Gibson, Jim Hurford, Nigel Vincent and also to three referees for the Journal of Linguistics. They may be a teeny bit to blame for the proliferation of footnotes, but all faults and errors are mine.

References

REFERENCES

Aiello, Leslie C. & Wheeler, Peter. 1995. The expensive-tissue hypothesis – the brain and the digestive system in human and primate evolution. Current Anthropology 36, 199–221.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, Stephen R. 2004. Doctor Doolittle's delusion: Animals and the uniqueness of human language. New Haven, CT & London: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Arbib, Michael A. & Bickerton, Derek (eds.). 2010. The emergence of protolanguage: Holophrasis vs compositionality. Amsterdam & Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beaken, Mike. 2011. The making of language, 2nd edn.Edinburgh: Dunedin Academic Press.Google Scholar
Berwick, Robert. 2011a. All you need is Merge: Biology, computation, and language from the bottom up. In Di, Sciullo & Boeckx, (eds.), 461–491.Google Scholar
Berwick, Robert. 2011b. Syntax facit saltum redux: Biolinguistics and the leap to syntax. In Di, Sciullo & Boeckx, (eds.), 65–99.Google Scholar
Berwick, Robert & Chomsky, Noam. 2011. The biolinguistic program: The current state of its development. In Di, Sciullo & Boeckx, (eds.), 19–41.Google Scholar
Bickerton, Derek. 1990. Language and species. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bickerton, Derek. 2000. How protolanguage became language. In Knight, Chris, Studdert-Kennedy, Michael & Hurford, James R. (eds.), The evolutionary emergence of language: Social function and the origins of linguistic form, 264–284. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bickerton, Derek. 2002. Foraging versus social intelligence in the evolution of protolanguage. In Wray, Alison (ed.), The transition to language, 207–225. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bickerton, Derek. 2009. Adam's tongue: How humans made language, how language made humans. New York: Hill & Wang.Google Scholar
Bickerton, Derek & Szathmáry, Eörs (eds.). 2009. Biological foundations and origins of syntax. Cambridge, MA & London: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bispham, John. 2006. “Music” means nothing if we don't know what it means. Journal of Human Evolution 50, 587–593.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boesch, Christophe. 1991. Teaching among wild chimpanzees. Animal Behaviour 41, 530–532.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Byrne, Richard W. & Russon, Anne E.. 1998. Learning by imitation: A hierarchical approach. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 21, 667–721.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cheney, Dorothy L. & Seyfarth, Robert M.. 2005. Constraints and preadaptations in the earliest stages of language evolution. The Linguistic Review 22, 135–159.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 1981. Lectures on government and binding. Dordrecht: Foris.Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 1995. The Minimalist Program. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 2010. Some simple evo devo theses: How true might they be for language? In Larson, et al. (eds.), 45–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 2011. On the poverty of the stimulus. Lecture presented at UCL, 10 October 2011. Available at http://www.ucl.ac.uk/psychlangsci/research/linguistics/news-events/latest-news/n_chomsky.Google Scholar
Christiansen, Morten H. & Kirby, Simon (eds.). 2003. Language evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Clark, Brady. 2011. Scavenging, the stag hunt, and the evolution of language. Journal of Linguistics 47, 447–480.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Culicover, Peter W. & Jackendoff, Ray. 2005. Simpler syntax. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Darwin, Charles. 1871. The descent of man, and selection in relation to sex. London: John Murray.Google Scholar
de Boer, Bart & Zuidema, Willem. 2010. Multi-agent simulations of the evolution of combinatorial phonology. Adaptive Behavior 18, 141–154.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Di, Sciullo, Maria, Anna & Boeckx, Cedric (eds.). 2011. The Biolinguistic enterprise: New perspectives on the evolution and nature of the human language faculty. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Diller, Karl & Cann, Rebecca L.. 2009. Evidence against a genetic-based revolution in language 50,000 years ago. In Botha, Rudolf P. & Knight, Chris (eds.), The cradle of language, 135–149. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Endicott, Phillip, Ho, Simon Y. W. & Stringer, Chris B.. 2010. Using genetic evidence to evaluate four palaeoanthropological hypotheses for the timing of Neanderthal and modern human origins. Journal of Human Evolution 59, 87–95.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Falk, Dean. 2004. Prelinguistic evolution in early hominins: Whence motherese? Behavioral and Brain Sciences 27, 491–541.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fitch, W. Tecumseh. 2004. Kin selection and ‘mother tongues’: A neglected component in language evolution. In Oller, D. Kimbrough & Griebel, Ulrike (eds.), Evolution of communication systems: A comparative approach. Cambridge, MA & London: MIT Press, 275–296.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fitch, W. Tecumseh. 2006. The biology and evolution of music: A comparative perspective. Cognition 100, 173–215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fitch, W. Tecumseh, Hauser, Marc D. & Chomsky, Noam. 2005. The evolution of the language faculty: Clarifications and implications. Cognition 97, 179–210.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gibson, Kathleen R. 1993. Tool use, language and social behavior in relationship to information processing capacities. In Gibson, Kathleen R. & Ingold, Tim (eds.), Tools, language and cognition in human evolution, 251–269. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gibson, Kathleen R. 1996. The ontogeny and evolution of the brain, cognition and language. In Lock, Andrew & Peters, Charles R. (eds.), Handbook of human symbolic evolution, 409–433. New York: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Gibson, Kathleen R. 2012. Are other animals as smart as great apes? Do others provide better models for the evolution of speech or language? In Tallerman, & Gibson, (eds.), 120–130.Google Scholar
Greenfield, Patricia M. 1991. Language, tools and brain: The ontogeny and phylogeny of hierarchically organized sequential behaviour. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 14, 531–595 (with continuing commentary and a new response (1998), 21, 154–163).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, William D. 1963. The evolution of altruistic behavior. American Naturalist 97, 354–356.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, William D. 1964. The genetical evolution of social behavior, parts I and II. Journal of Theoretical Biology 7, 1–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hauser, Marc D., Chomsky, Noam & Fitch, W. Tecumseh. 2002. The faculty of language: What is it, who has it and how did it evolve? Science 298, 1569–1579.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hauser, Marc D., Newport, Elissa L. & Aslin, Richard N.. 2001. Segmentation of the speech stream in a nonhuman primate: Statistical learning in cotton-top tamarins. Cognition 78, B53–B64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heine, Bernd & Kuteva, Tania. 2007. The genesis of grammar: A reconstruction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heinz, Jeffrey. 2007. Inductive learning of phonotactic patterns. Ph.D. dissertation, UCLA.Google Scholar
Hewes, Gordon. 1973. Primate communication and the gestural origin of language. Current Anthropology 14, 5–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hurford, James R. 2003. The language mosaic and its evolution. In Christiansen, & Kirby, (eds.), 38–57.Google Scholar
Hurford, James R. 2007. The origins of meaning: Language in the light of evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hurford, James R. 2012. The origins of grammar: Language in the light of evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jackendoff, Ray. 2002. Foundations of language: Brain, meaning, grammar and evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackendoff, Ray. 2009. Parallels and non-parallels between language and music. Music Perception 26, 195–204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackendoff, Ray. 2010. Your theory of language evolution depends on your theory of language. In Larson, et al. (eds.), 63–72.Google Scholar
Jackendoff, Ray. 2011. What is the human language faculty? Two views. Language 87, 586–624.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jarvis, Erich D. 2004. Learned birdsong and the neurobiology of human language. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1016, 749–777.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Johansson, Sverker. 2005. Origins of language: Constraints on hypotheses. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katz, Jonah & Pesetsky, David. 2011. The identity thesis for language and music. http://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz/000959.Google Scholar
Larson, Richard K., Déprez, Viviane & Yamakido, Hiroko (eds.). 2010. The evolution of human language: Biolinguistic Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lerdahl, Fred & Jackendoff, Ray. 2006. The capacity for music: What's special about it? Cognition 100, 33–72.Google Scholar
Lieberman, Philip. 1984/2006. Toward an evolutionary biology of language. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Lindblom, Björn. 1992. Phonological units as adaptive emergents of lexical development. In Ferguson, Charles A., Menn, Lisa & Stoel-Gammon, Carol (eds.), Phonological development: Models, research, implications, 131–163. Timonium, MD: York Press.Google Scholar
Lindblom, Björn. 1998. Systemic constraints and adaptive changes in the formation of sound structure. In Hurford, James R., Studdert-Kennedy, Michael & Knight, Chris (eds.), Approaches to the evolution of language: Social and cognitive bases, 242–264. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Locke, John L. 2009. Evolutionary development linguistics: Naturalization of the faculty of language. Language Sciences 31, 33–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Locke, John L. & Bogin, Barry. 2006. Language and life history: A new perspective on the development and evolution of human language. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 29, 259–325.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MacLarnon, Ann. 2012. The anatomical and physiological basis of human speech production: Adaptations and exaptations. In Tallerman, & Gibson, (eds.), 224–235.Google Scholar
MacLarnon, Ann & Hewitt, Gwen. 1999. The evolution of human speech: The role of enhanced breathing control. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 109, 341–363.3.0.CO;2-2>CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MacLarnon, Ann & Hewitt, Gwen. 2004. Increased breathing control: Another factor in the evolution of human language. Evolutionary Anthropology 13, 181–197.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marler, Peter. 1998. Animal communication and human language. In Jablonski, Nina & Aiello, Leslie (eds.), The origin and diversification of language, 1–19. San Francisco, CA: California Academy of Sciences.Google Scholar
Maynard Smith, John & Harper, David. 2003. Animal signals. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Geoffrey. 2000. Evolution of music through sexual selection. In Wallin, Nils L., Merker, Björn & Brown, Steven (eds.), The origins of music, 329–360. Cambridge, MA & London: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Miller, Geoffrey. 2001. The mating mind: How sexual choice shaped the evolution of human nature. London: Vintage.Google Scholar
Mithen, Steven. 2005. The singing Neanderthals: The origins of music, language, mind and body. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.Google Scholar
Ohnuma, Katsuhiko, Aoki, Kenichi & Akazawa, Takeru. 1997. Transmission of tool-making through verbal and non-verbal communication: Preliminary experiments in Levallois flake production. Anthropological Science 105, 159–168.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Patel, Aniruddh D. 2008. Music, language, and the brain. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pepperberg, Irene M. 2000. The Alex studies: Cognitive and communicative abilities of Grey parrots. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piattelli-Palmarini, Massimo & Uriagereka, Juan. 2011. A geneticist's dream, a linguist's nightmare: The case of FOXP2. In Di, Sciullo & Boeckx, (eds.), 101–125.Google Scholar
Pinker, Steven & Bloom, Paul. 1990. Natural language and natural selection. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 13, 707–784.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ploog, Detlev. 2002. Is the neural basis of vocalisation different in non-human primates and Homo sapiens? In Crow, Timothy J. (ed.), The speciation of modern Homo sapiens (Proceedings of The British Academy 106), 121–135. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Savage-Rumbaugh, Sue & Rumbaugh, Duane. 1978. Symbolization, language, and chimpanzees: A theoretical reevaluation based on initial language acquisition processes in four young Pan troglodytes. Brain and Language 6, 265–300.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Savage-Rumbaugh, Sue, Shanker, Stuart G. & Taylor, Talbot J.. 1998. Apes, language, and the human mind. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scott-Phillips, Thomas C. 2008. On the correct application of animal signalling theory to human communication. In Smith, Andrew D. M., Smith, Kenny & Cancho, Ramon Ferrer i (eds.), The evolution of language: Proceedings of the 7th International Conference (EVOLANG7), 275–282. New Jersey: World Scientific.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scott-Phillips, Thomas C., Kirby, Simon & Ritchie, Graham R. S.. 2009. Signalling signalhood and the emergence of communication. Cognition 113, 226–233.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Simon, Herbert A. 1990. A mechanism for social selection and successful altruism. Science 250, 1665–1668.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Slater, Peter. 2012. Bird song and language. In Tallerman, & Gibson, (eds.), 96–101.Google Scholar
Studdert-Kennedy, Michael. 2012. The emergence of phonetic form. In Tallerman, & Gibson, (eds.), 417–422.Google Scholar
Studdert-Kennedy, Michael & Goldstein, Louis. 2003. Launching language: The gestural origin of discrete infinity. In Christiansen, & Kirby, (eds.), 235–254.Google Scholar
Tallerman, Maggie. 2007. Did our ancestors speak a holistic protolanguage? Lingua 117, 579–604.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tallerman, Maggie. 2010. Holophrastic protolanguage: Planning, processing, storage, and retrieval. In Arbib, & Bickerton, (eds.), 83–97.Google Scholar
Tallerman, Maggie. 2013a. The evolutionary origins of syntax. In Carnie, Andrew, Sato, Yosuke & Siddiqi, Dan (eds.), The Routledge handbook of syntax. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Tallerman, Maggie. 2013b. Kin selection, pedagogy, and linguistic complexity: Whence protolanguage? In Botha, Rudie & Everaert, Martin (eds.), The evolutionary emergence of human language, 77–96. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tallerman, Maggie & Gibson, Kathleen R. (eds.). 2012. The Oxford handbook of language evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Thornton, Alex & Raihani, Nichola J.. 2008. The evolution of teaching. Animal Behaviour 75, 1823–1836.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomasello, Michael. 1999a. The human adaptation for culture. Annual Review of Anthropology 28, 509–529.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomasello, Michael. 1999b. The cultural origins of human cognition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Tomasello, Michael. 2008. Origins of human communication. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomasello, Michael, Carpenter, Malinda, Call, Josep, Behne, Tanya & Moll, Henrike. 2005. Understanding and sharing intentions: The origins of cultural cognition. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 28, 675–735.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Whiten, Andrew, Horner, Victoria, Litchfield, Carla A. & Marshall-Pescini, Sarah. 2004. How do apes ape? Learning and Behavior 32, 36–52.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wynn, Thomas. 2012. The Palaeolithic record. In Tallerman, & Gibson, (eds.), 282–295.Google Scholar
Zuidema, Willem & Boer, Bart de. 2009. The evolution of combinatorial phonology. Journal of Phonetics 37, 125–144.CrossRefGoogle Scholar