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![]() Contents ![]() Section 1 Palaeoanthropology
![]() Section 2 Social and socio- cultural systems ![]() Section 3 Ontogeny and symbolism ![]() Section 4 Language systems ![]() Links
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![]() A history of the study of language origins and the gestural primacy hypothesis![]() Gordon W. Hewes![]() Abstract ![]() Speculative writings on language origins seem mainly to be confined, until very recently, to the Classical and Judaeo-Christian West. Until the Enlightenment nearly everything that was said about language origins in the West proceeded from the assumption that language began with Adam in the Garden of Eden.
LinksFor a recent view see M. Corballis (1999) The gestural origins of language. American Scientist, 87: 138-145.
Caption: Speculative scenarios can serve as a framework for understanding the events that might have occurred in the evolution of human language. In this scheme, simple gestures first anticipated more complex forms of communication about 6 or 7 million years ago, shortly after the human line diverged from the great apes. At this stage, vocalizations served only as emotional cries and alarm calls. By about 5 million years ago, with the advent of bipedalism, a more sophisticated form of gesturing involving hand signals may have evolved among the early hominids that we now recognize as Australopithecus. About 2 million years ago, in association with the increasing brain size of the genus Homo, hand gestures became fully syntactic, but vocalizations also became prominent. It may have been only 100,000 years ago that Homo sapiens switched to speech as its primary means of communication, with gestures now playing a secondary role. In modern times, the development of telecommunication has permitted the routine use of spoken language in the complete absence of hand gestures. Even so, many people find themselves gesturing when they speak on the telephone. Caption and figure Copyright © American Scientist. |
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