The Evolution of Language
$155.00 (P)
Part of Approaches to the Evolution of Language
- Author: W. Tecumseh Fitch, University of St Andrews, Scotland
- Date Published: May 2010
- availability: Available
- format: Hardback
- isbn: 9780521859936
$
155.00
(P)
Hardback
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Language, more than anything else, is what makes us human. It appears that no communication system of equivalent power exists elsewhere in the animal kingdom. Any normal human child will learn a language based on rather sparse data in the surrounding world, while even the brightest chimpanzee, exposed to the same environment, will not. Why not? How, and why, did language evolve in our species and not in others? Since Darwin's theory of evolution, questions about the origin of language have generated a rapidly-growing scientific literature, stretched across a number of disciplines, much of it directed at specialist audiences. The diversity of perspectives - from linguistics, anthropology, speech science, genetics, neuroscience and evolutionary biology - can be bewildering. Tecumseh Fitch cuts through this vast literature, bringing together its most important insights to explore one of the biggest unsolved puzzles of human history.
Read more- Explores a fascinating puzzle - how did we humans develop the ability to speak?
- Unlike previous books, it combines insights from many different disciplines
- A useful glossary of terms helps readers from all backgrounds understand the concepts
Reviews & endorsements
“Reconstructing the evolution of language is a daunting task but Tecumseh Fitch brings it off with style. An impressive synthesis.” --Robert Seyfarth, Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania
See more reviews“The evolution of language has been described as the hardest problem in science, fraught with conflict, entrenched views, and misunderstandings between the multifarious disciplines involved. Fitch guides us through this tangled and often treacherous domain with clarity, equanimity, and encyclopedic reach. No other book so completely, fairly, and eloquently presents contemporary notions as to how language evolved.” --Michael Corballis, University of Auckland
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×Product details
- Date Published: May 2010
- format: Hardback
- isbn: 9780521859936
- length: 624 pages
- dimensions: 254 x 178 x 33 mm
- weight: 1.29kg
- contains: 25 b/w illus. 6 tables
- availability: Available
Table of Contents
Introduction
Part I. The Lay of the Land:
1. Language from a biological perspective
2. Evolution
3. Language
4. Animal cognition and communication
Part II. Meet the Ancestors:
5. Meet the ancestors
6. The last common ancestor
7. The hominid fossil record
Part III. The Evolution of Speech:
8. The evolution of the human vocal tract
9. The evolution of vocal control
10. Modelling the evolution of speech
Part IV. Phylogenetic Models of Language Evolution:
11. Language evolution before Darwin
12. Lexical protolanguage
13. Gestural protolanguage
14. Musical protolanguage
15. Conclusions and prospects.Instructors have used or reviewed this title for the following courses
- A Missing Link: the Intersection of Evolution and Literature
- Langauge Evolution
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