Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

This collection of papers deals primarily with topics in general linguistics, including history of linguistic science. The volume is divided in 5 parts: I. Origin and Prehistory of Language, II. Historiography of Linguistics, III. Phonology and Phonetic Change, IV. Morphology and Syntax, and V. Socio-Neurolinguistics and Multilingualism.

Linguistics. --- Language and languages --- Origin. --- Linguistics --- Linguistic science --- Science of language --- Origin of languages --- Speech --- Origin --- Language and languages - Origin.

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

Human language is not the same as human speech. We use gestures and signs to communicate alongside, or instead of, speaking. Yet gestures and speech are processed in the same areas of the human brain, and the study of how both have evolved is central to research on the origins of human communication. Written by one of the pioneers of the field, this is the first book to explain how speech and gesture evolved together into a system that all humans possess. Nearly all theorizing about the origins of language either ignores gesture, views it as an add-on or supposes that language began in gesture and was later replaced by speech. David McNeill challenges the popular 'gesture-first' theory that language first emerged in a gesture-only form and proposes a groundbreaking theory of the evolution of language which explains how speech and gesture became unified.

Linguistics --- Semiotics --- Language and languages --- Speech and gesture. --- Langage et langues --- Parole et gestes --- Origin. --- Origines --- Speech and gesture --- Origin --- Linguistic change. --- Gesture and language --- Gesture and speech --- Language and gesture --- Gesture --- Origin of languages --- Speech --- Arts and Humanities --- Language & Linguistics --- Language and languages - Origin

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

Symbolic thought is what makes us human. Claude Lévi-Strauss stated that we can never know the genesis of symbolic thought, but in this powerful new study Alan Barnard argues that we can. Continuing the line of analysis initiated in Social Anthropology and Human Origins (Cambridge University Press, 2011), Genesis of Symbolic Thought applies ideas from social anthropology, old and new, to understand some of the areas also being explored in fields as diverse as archaeology, linguistics, genetics and neuroscience. Barnard aims to answer questions including: when and why did language come into being? What was the earliest religion? And what form did social organization take before humanity dispersed from the African continent? Rejecting the notion of hunter-gatherers as 'primitive', Barnard hails the great sophistication of the complex means of their linguistic and symbolic expression and places the possible origin of symbolic thought at as early as 130,000 years ago.

Linguistics --- Ethnology. Cultural anthropology --- Symbolic anthropology. --- Language and languages --- Human evolution. --- Thought and thinking. --- Origin. --- Symbolic anthropology --- Human evolution --- Thought and thinking --- Origin --- Mind --- Thinking --- Thoughts --- Educational psychology --- Philosophy --- Psychology --- Intellect --- Logic --- Perception --- Psycholinguistics --- Self --- Evolution (Biology) --- Physical anthropology --- Evolutionary psychology --- Human beings --- Origin of languages --- Speech --- Symbolism in anthropology --- Anthropology --- Social Sciences --- Language and languages - Origin

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

"How did the biological, brain and behavioural structures underlying human language evolve? When, why and where did our ancestors become linguistic animals, and what has happened since? This book provides a clear, comprehensive but lively introduction to these interdisciplinary debates. Written in an approachable style, it cuts through the complex, sometimes contradictory and often obscure technical languages used in the different scientific disciplines involved in the study of linguistic evolution. Assuming no background knowledge in these disciplines, the book outlines the physical and neurological structures underlying language systems, and the limits of our knowledge concerning their evolution. Discussion questions and further reading lists encourage students to explore the primary literature further, and the final chapter demonstrates that while many questions still remain unanswered, there is a growing consensus as to how modern human languages have arisen as systems by the interplay of evolved structures and cultural transmission"--

Language and languages --- Anthropological linguistics --- Human evolution --- Origin --- Anthropological linguistics. --- Human evolution. --- Origin. --- LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES --- Linguistics --- Historical & Comparative. --- Language arts & disciplines --- Historical & comparative. --- Ethnology. Cultural anthropology --- Origin of languages --- Speech --- Evolution (Biology) --- Physical anthropology --- Evolutionary psychology --- Human beings --- Anthropo-linguistics --- Ethnolinguistics --- Language and ethnicity --- Linguistic anthropology --- Linguistics and anthropology --- Anthropology --- Language and culture --- Arts and Humanities --- Language & Linguistics --- Language and languages - Origin

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

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.

Psycholinguistics --- Historical linguistics --- Language and languages --- Origin of languages --- Speech --- Diachronic linguistics --- Dynamic linguistics --- Evolutionary linguistics --- Language and history --- Linguistics --- Origin --- History --- Evolution (Biology). --- Evolution. --- Historical linguistics. --- Language and languages ¡ Origin. --- Origin. --- Langage et langues --- Linguistique historique --- Origines --- Arts and Humanities --- Language & Linguistics