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The Origins of Language Jordan Zlatev

Lecture 7 Studies of “Animal language”. The Origins of Language Jordan Zlatev. Discussion. Based on evidence and arguments given in the previous lectures “What is language?” “Systems of animal communication” and the course literature, please discuss in groups:

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The Origins of Language Jordan Zlatev

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  1. Lecture 7 Studies of “Animal language” The Origins of LanguageJordan Zlatev

  2. Discussion • Based on evidence and arguments given in the previous lectures • “What is language?” • “Systems of animal communication” • and the course literature, please discuss in groups: 1. Is the distinction between animal communication and (human) language mostly quantitative or qualitative? (Why?) 2. What are the major differences?

  3. Characteristic features of language(Zlatev, Persson and Gärdenfors 2005)

  4. Implications • “No animal in the wild has anything approaching the socially transmitted, voluntary controlled, contextually flexible, triadic semiotic system that is language” (Zlatev, Persson, Gärdenfors 2005: 3) • What about: • in a human home? • in the lab? • in a hybrid ”Pan/Homo culture”?

  5. In a human home: chimps • Gua (Kellogg 1931) – vocal language, comprehension, but not production; sensorimotor skills surpassing Donald • Viki (Hayes 1951) – mama, papa, up, cup

  6. ”Near the home”: chimps • Washoe (Gardner & Gardner 1966) “When the Gardners realized that Washoe was not going to acquire language in a spontaneous fashion, they introduced sign training. This consisted of showing Washoe an object, demonstrating the sign, then taking Washoe’s hands and molding them into the proper hand configuration for the sign. Slowly, the molding was less emphasized until Washoe produced the sign on her own.” (http://www.greatapetrust.org)

  7. Both home and lab: chimps • Nim Chimpsky (Terrace 1979): ASL training, initial enthusiasm, turned into disillusionment • Terrace: one of the most bitter critiques of ”ape language” studies: ”a Clever Hans effect”?

  8. In the lab: chimps • LANA project (1971-1976): “…the lexigram keyboard, developed by Duane Rumbaugh, which has served as the primary communicative interface for ape language research at Decatur, Georgia, for the last several decades. This keyboard is composed of three panels with approximately 384 noniconic arbitrary symbols. When the apes depress a key, the word represented there is spoken by a digital voice and the lexigram is displayed on a video screen” See video

  9. In the lab: chimps • Sherman and Austin (Savage-Rumbough 1975-1980) • Focus on chimp-chimp communication, ”negotiation” of meaning: ”Pointing back and forth between the token and the item, they establish jointly the correspondence between referent and symbol...” (: 131) • No comprehension of spoken langauge

  10. ”ape/human culture”: bonobos • Kanzi (Savage-Rumbough 1980-1993): • Spontaneous early acquisition • Informal social environment • Controlled comprehension

  11. ”ape/human culture”: bonobos (Greenfield and Savage-Rumbough 1990) CHASE (lexigram) YOU (point at person)

  12. ”ape/human culture”: chimps • Panpanzee and Panbanisha (Savage-Rumbough 1986-1990): • Similar comprehension of English • No essential differences b/nPan paniscus and Pan troglodytes • The key role of ”enculturation”: ”a shared way of living containing characteristic activites, tools, environments, communication means, social relations, personalities, games, gestures, and so on” (Segerdahl et al. 2005: 8)

  13. Other apes: less stringent control • Koko (Patterson 1981): gorilla, taught a simplified form of American Sign Language • Chantek (Miles 1990): orangutan, “(Chantek) can talk about places he doesn’t see. He can talk about things that aren’t present. I can ask him to sign better and he will. ”

  14. Summary (Zlatev 2008a: 232) • ”The ape language literature contains rather convincing evidence that apes can: • Comprehend the referential (representational) function of spoken words, ASL signs, visual lexigrams, and the combinations of these; • Use the sign-tokens in the absence of their referents, i.e. ”displancement” (Hockett 1960); • Acquire a considerable vocabulary of words/signs; according to some measurements extending 600 signs, but even according to the most conservative criteria no less that 140 signs; • Understand novel combinations of spoken or signed words; • Produce novel combinations of signs”

  15. Other species • Alex (Pepperberg 2001): grey parrot, over 100 English words, including superordinate terms such as color, shape, how many... • Betsy (Kaminski 2001): border collie, over 300 words, spoken English comprehension • Phoenix and Akeakamai (Herman 1984): bottlenose dolphins, comprehesion of simple grammar: GOAL THEME ACTION

  16. Summary • All great apes ”have the intelligence for a rudimentary, referential, generalizable, imitative, displacebale symbol system” (Miles 1999: 204) • Dogs, Dophins, Parrots? • Is this language, or at least some substantial part of it? Implications?

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