The particulate origins of language generativity: from syllable to gesture.
| Number | 1092 |
|---|---|
| Year | 1998 |
| Drawer | 20 |
| Entry Date | 11/22/1999 |
| Authors | Studdert-Kennedy, M. |
| Contact | |
| Publication | In: Hurford, J., Studdert-Kennedy, M., & Knight, C. (eds.), Approaches to the evolution of language, Cambridge, U.K.: Cambrdge University Press. |
| url | http://www.haskins.yale.edu/Reprints/HL1092.pdf |
| Abstract | [Introduction] Generativity here refers to two ‘creative’ aspects of normal language use: unbounded scope of reference and freedom from control by identifiable stimuli (Chomsky 1966: passim). These two aspects, though obviously independent, are closely related in their origin (as will be argued below) and in their effects. Together they distinguish language from other forms of animal communication. So far as we know, the vocal repertoires of other species, including our closest primate relatives, are limited to a few dozen calls, associated with present needs, such as food, sex, predators and various social contingencies. Humans, by contrast, can talk about whatever they choose: past, present, or future, concrete, abstract, or even imaginary objects and events. Not suprisingly, Maynard Smith & Szathmary (1995) regard the shift from primate call to human speech as ‘the decisive step in the origin of specifically human society’ (p.12). They view the step as the latest of eight major evolutionary transitions in the way information is transmitted between generations. Human speech introduced a new code, a new physical medium of transmission, and a shift from largely genetic to largely cultural inheritance. Drawing the familiar parallel between language and the genetic cod, Szathmary & Maynard Smith (1995) observe: ‘Grammar enables a speaker with a finite vocabulary to convey an indefinitely large number of meanings, just as the genetic code enables DNA to specify an indefinitely large number of proteins’ (p321). But they do not ask how or why the two systems have such extraordinary power. In fact, until recently, the principle that links them was no better understood than a quarter of a century ago, when Roman Jakobson (1970) wrote: “ One could venture the legitimate question whether the isomorphism exhibited by these two different codes, genetic and verbal, results from a mere convergence induced by similar needs, or whether, perhaps the foundations of the overt linguistic patterns superimposed upon molecular communication have been modeled directly on its structural principles’ (p.440). Here, Jakobson framed the issue as a question, but was evidently inclined to reject functional, evolutionary convergence in favor of structural homology. The answer to the question came, however, from William Abler (1989) who recognized that at least three natural systems-chemical compounding, biological inheritance and human language-share a hierarchical structure, based on particulate units. |
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