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Language Origin: A Multidisciplinary Approach presents a synthesis of viewpoints and data on linguistic, psychological, anatomical and behavioral studies on living species of Primates and provides a comparative framework for the evaluation of paleoanthropological studies. This double endeavor makes it possible to direct new research on the nature and evolution of human language and cognition.
The book is directed to students of linguistics, biology, anthropoloy, anatomy, physiology, neurology, psychology, archeology, paleontology, and other related fields. A better understanding of speech pathology may stem from a better understanding of the relationship of human communication to the evolution of our species. The book is conceived as a timely contribution to such knowledge since it allows, for the first time, a systematic assessment of the origins of human language from a comprehensive array of scientific viewpoints.
List of contents
I. General Considerations.- History of Glottogonic Theories.- Speech Origin: A Review.- Adaptationist and Nativist Positions on Language Origins: A Critique.- II. Cranial Anatomy.- A Systematic Relationship between Brain Size Increase and Larynx Transformation during Hominization.- Auditory Ossicles and the Evolution of the Primate Ear: A Biomechanical Approach.- III. Neuroanatomy.- Basic Features of Cortical Connectivity and Some Consideration on Language.- IV. Neurophysiology.- The Motor Theory of Language: Origin and Function.- The Neural Circuitry Underlying Primate Calls and Human Language.- Evolving Mixed-Media Messages and Grammatical Language: Secondary Uses of the Neural Sequencing Machinery Needed for Ballistic Movements.- V. Neuropsychology.- The Contribution of Psycholinguistics to the Study of Language Origins.- Cerebral Lateralization of Human Languages. Clinical and Experimental Data.- The Origin of Visible Language.- Implications of the Evolution of Writing for the Origin of Language: Can a Paleoneurologist Find Happiness in the Neolithic?.- VI. Comparative Psychology.- Prelinguistic Development of Children and Chimpanzees.- Language Origin: the Role of Animal Cognition.- VII. Primatology.- Evolution and Lateralization of the Two Great Primate Action Systems.- The Primate Isolation Call and the Evolution and Physiological Control of Human Speech.- Vocal Communication of Pan troglogytes: "Triangulating" to the Origin of Spoken Language.- Early Signs of Language in Cross-fostered Chimpanzees.- VIII. Paleoanthropology.- Fossil Skulls and Hominid Vocal Tracts: New Approaches to Charting the Evolution of Human Speech.- On the Evolutionary Biology of Speech and Syntax.- The Origin of Language: An Anthropological Approach.- On Emergent Pre-Language andLanguage Evolution and Transcendent Feedback from Language Production on Cognition and Emotion in Early Man.- IX. General Linguistics.- Roots of Language: The Forbidden Experiment.- Pragmatics and the Evolution of Syntax.- X. Historical Linguistics.- Language Evolution: Evidence from Historical Linguistics.- Evolution in Language: Evidence from the Romance Auxiliary.- XI. Philosophy.- Pre-Linguistic Roots of Language and Its Innate Ideas.- On the Origins of Philosophical Language.
