WHAT IS LANGUAGE
Language is our primary form of communication and it made up of a series of words that convey a meaning. It is innate, no other creature seems to have it, and our understanding is not tied to a specific variety of language There is no other communication system like it and we can express an infinite number of emotions and feelings about an infinite variety of topics. Although there are over 6909 living languages catalogued in the Ethnologue.
And yet, as Bernard Campbell states, “We simply do not know, and never will, how or when language began.” However this essay seek to explore what we do know, looking at the studies made into the human (vocal language) and their different approaches.
WHY IT IS HARD TO FIND THE ORIGIN
It is easy to agree with Campbell as it is extremely hard to find the original source of language and there is no way of knowing what the first utterances of our ancestors were. Although writing dating back almost 5000 years gives us some idea about early words in use and is valuable in studying the evaluation of language, it cannot tell us where or when speech originated.
Christine Kenneally sums it up best when she writes:
‘For all its power to wound and seduce, speech is our most ephemeral creation; it is little more than air. It exits the body as a series of puffs and dissipates quickly into the atmosphere’. . . . ‘There are no verbs preserved in amber, no ossified nouns, and no prehistorical shrieks forever spread-eagled in the lava that took them by surprise.’
ESSAY APPROACH (VOCALISATION & SUBSEQUENT THEORIES)
Although there is no conclusive answer to this capacious question there are a number of theories which explore this issue. The investigation into the origins of language can be divided into two categories: vocalisations and gestures. This essay will focus on vocalisation looking at the theories of early speech and communication.
From looking whether language evolved from the natural sound source and/or the social interaction source. To exploring the physical adaptation source and the genetic source, which looks as the science of language as part of our anatomy. One might even consider the divine source of language given one’s beliefs. All these theories bring valid points to the floor however they all have their flaws in providing the answer wanted.
Looking at language as a science, one approach is to study the evolution of the early homo-sapiens to try and date speech through the development of brain and the skull.
WHEN LANGUAGE EVOLVED
Determining when language evolved is easier to an extent than determining why. Homo sapiens, began life on earth around 200,000 years ago. However we can only date cultural artefacts back between 100,000 and 50,000 years ago, suggesting there was some form of civilisation during this period. This in relation to the development of the human skull to facilitate a brain possible of speech dates language to possibly have been formed around… However there is no concrete evidence of this and even though scientists have been able to use cranial remains to look the evolution of the skull to facilitate speech it by no means tells us what the early brain could do.
OUR BIOLOGICAL MAKE UP ENABLES US TO SPEAK
Gibson and Tallerman conclude that ‘no piece of evidence can provide incontrovertible evidence for the presence of language in any fossil population’ .
Neurolinguistics explores the neurobiological origins of language. Language is produced in the left hemisphere of the brain in the Broca’s Area and Wernicke’s Area.
BRAIN
‘Most of the other speculative proposals concerning the origins of speech seem to be based on a picture of humans producing single noises to indicate objects in their environment. This activity may indeed have been a crucial stage in the development of language, but what it lacks is any structural organization. All languages, including sign language, require the organ- izing and combining of sounds or signs in specific arrangements. We seem to have developed a part of our brain that specializes in making these arrangements.’
MOUTH
Studying the evolution of the human skull the adaptation of the mouth to facilitated speech helps date the early use of language. For example, the teeth in the skull of a homo-sapient are roughly an even height in an upward position, not slanting outwards like the teeth of an ape. This tooth structure allows early man to make ‘f’ and ‘v’ sounds. The lips also developed a more intricate muscle interlacing and flexibility allowing sounds such as ‘p’ and ‘b’ to be easily formed. The whole mouth itself is found to be relatively smaller than other primates to be opened and closed at a faster rate
Hyoid bone
GENETICS
This seems to indicate that human offspring are born with a special capacity for language.
The ability children who are born deaf to communicate and become fluent sign language indicates that human offspring are born with a special capacity for language. Another unanswerable question is what stage of life language first evolved. Some generative linguistics beloved that language evolved as an aid to internal thought.
Noam Chomsky, often referred to as ‘the father of linguistics’, was one of these linguistics. Rekowned for taking a scientific approach to linguistics and writes about Plato’s Problem in his works. This is the idea that children display a appropriate and innovative understating of concepts from virtually their first words. Although this reflects the evolution of human genetics to its current complex state is poses and argument that language originated from a biological reasoning early man had upon birth.
The problem with this theory is not only the lack of evidence we have for it but that we cannot say the understanding children have today has always been the same. Just as our bodies have evolved over thousands of years so have our minds to an extent.
• They seem to know much more than they have been taught—or even could be taught. Such knowledge, therefore, must be innate in some sense.
• It has frequently been observed that children acquire both concepts and language with amazing facility and speed, despite the paucity or even absence of meaningful evidence and instruction in their early years.
• Specifying precisely what children acquire and how they acquire it are aspects of what Chomsky called in LSLT the “fundamental problem” of linguistics.
• These theories proposed that the mind of the human infant is endowed with a “format” of a possible grammar (a theory of linguistic data).
These beliefs are contrasted by those of evolutionary linguists who argue that language evolved form its communicative potential.
IMITATION HYPOTHESES
Jesperson’s or Max Muller’s theories?
With early man’s biological ability to produce sound given an estimated date it doesn’t explain how language then developed. Linguist XXX PRODPSOED HIS IDESAS IN HIS imitation hypotheses.
The Bow-Wow Theory is the idea that ‘primitive words derive[d] from imitations of the natural sounds that early men and women heard around them’. This language echoes sounds such as ‘moo’, ‘splash’ and ‘bang’. However this onomatopoeic form of language is a limited form of expression. Relatively few words in today’s language are onomatoepic and of those which are in use come from a modern origin. Also, the idea that primates copied the sounds of animals, which essentially make the same sound, doesn’t explain the difference in the linguistic renditions of animal sounds from language to language. For example, take the titular sound of the dog; ‘bow-wow’. It is referred to as ‘wu-wu’ by the Chinese, au au in Brazil. And these sounds have little relation to the names now given to these animals.
A more popular theory, supported by Plato and Pythagoras, is the Ding-Dong Theory
which suggests that speech evolved from a harmony with the natural environment as an emotional response to the activities of the people and objects that surrounded our ancestors.
This theory is supported by the study of sound symbolism (fl- words in English associated with light and quick)
However there is no innate connection between sound and meaning. Also, this theory has similar onomatopoeic qualities to the previous theory which also discredits it.
The Pooh-Pooh Theory
– speech developed from the instinctive sounds people make in emotional circumstances. These sounds are thought to have come from cries of emotion. Some critics also refers to these sounds as interjections.
INVENTION THEORIES
Language began as a response to an acute necessity for communication. There are several so-called necessity hypotheses of the invention of language. One is the “yo he ho” theory which is thought to have originated from the need for people to work together.
It is fairly certain that the first poetry and song came from this theory of the language origin. These songs have been studied in their own right as working song. Whether they were sued to keep time rowing a boat, marching an army or harvesting a field they allow large groups of people to communicate with each other.
Jesperson developed this idea of in the La La theory proposing that speech may have developed from emotion and song.
However this theory doesn’t explain the difference between the ration and emotional aspect of language. David Crystal notes in How Language Works (Penguin, 2005),
These theories all allow a propose a connection between a sound translating to a meaning or action however language is far more complex than this.
POETRY OF LANGUAGE (EMOTION)
Rousseau (1712-1778) notes that ‘it seems then that need dictated the first gestures while the passions stimulated the first words’ . His approach looks at the idea that one doesn’t begin by reasoning but by feeling. Rousseau believed that the origin of speech comes from figurative language. Understanding that some may ask how can figurative expression come before the proper meaning of things, he explains that feelings dictate and understanding of the world which gives them a definition.
As “The Father of Romanticism” is understandable he takes this poetic approach to language dictated by ‘passion’.
All these theories provide an answer to different aspect of this problem of the origin of language.
DEVINE ORIGIN
Despite these list of theories of theories proposed by linguists and scientists, some may find their answer in religion. The divine origins of the spoken word are the oldest beliefs in this study and they often uphold the idea that there was a single, original language. Different religions state different sources of language in their texts however all hark to this idea that language was given to humans by a deity upon the creation of the earth. The biblical source gives credit to Adam, the first man, who “called every living creature, that was the name thereof.”
‘The Greek writer Herodotus reported the story of an Egyptian pharaoh named Psammetichus (or Psamtik) who tried the experiment with two new born babies more than 2,500 years ago’
-but this is disproven
Although there is little evidence to support these ideas they still hold valid. If you subscribe to a religion which offers an explanation to the origin of language then this provides you with an answer.
MENTION OF WRITTEN WORD & GESTURE
Although this approach to the origins of human language has focussed on vocalisations when concidering what is known on the subject it is important to acknowledge that there are many other approaches. This includes the origins of language studies through the written word and even through gesture. Although the written word is an easier to approach in regard to the physical evidence obtained to support it, it is far more useful in a study of language change than in finding out the origins of language as speech came far before the written word. On the other hand gestures may have come even before language however it is near impossible to site the evidence to substantiate this claim. This highlights the ambiguity of this study.
Conclusion
In conclusion, despite the inconclusive evidence, it is clear that we do have some knowledge of the origin(s) of human language which stems from a number of different approaches and which are supported by valued research. We may never be able to find a definitive origin but the theories discussed give an explanation for the way in which 7 billion people on this earth communicate.