

By Kendra A. Palmer

What critical evolutionary events does the span of human progression include? Anthropologists agree that decisive transitions such as sedentism, domestication, the use of , and the arrival of and complex societies are associated. Although this is true, and all these issues will be addressed in some capacity, the main objective of this piece will be to examine the marvel of language thoroughly, along with its effects. Why is language so essential to humanity, and how has it affected human history so profoundly?

Examining the relationship between language and its derivatives is vital, and it becomes imperative to distinguish which came first in order to better understand the history of man. There are language principles that are “universal by biological necessity and not mere historical accident” (Chomsky, 4). It is this text’s declaration that language stands alone as the greatest accomplishment of man and it is language, sequentially, that fostered a myriad of cultural products.

The Oration
Photo: Graham Crumb

First, the concept of language should be discussed. What is it, exactly? As Joel Davis notes in his work, Mother Tongue, “Everybody uses language, but nobody knows quite how to define it” (6). He indicates that renowned linguists, such as Edward Sapir, G. Trager, and Robert Hall have all attempted their own classifications but have not quite succeeded. Some of these proposed definitions seemed accurate at the time, but then excluded individuals who use Sign Language (through a purely nonverbal transmission), or animals, some of which are known to employ a kind of communication in their own interaction. Perhaps a meaningful classification with which to proceed can be found in Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary, wherein the definition of language is: “A systematic means of communicating ideas or feelings by the use of conventionalized signs, sounds, gestures, or marks having understood meanings” (Davis, 8). This acknowledges that language is not necessarily limited to sounds and that, possibly, (some) other animals are capable of something like it.

The Characteristics of Language

Provided with a definition of language, it should be assigned more precise qualities. First, there is the characteristic of displacement. This is the ability to refer to an object, event, person or concept— to effectively discuss abstract ideas. Displacement “allows the users of language to talk about things and events not present in the immediate environment… [it allows] the human, unlike any other creature, to create fiction and to describe possible future worlds” (Yule, 21). Second, language holds an arbitrary nature in that its linguistic form has no natural relationship to the items to which it makes reference. In other words, linguistic signs have a subjective relationship and they do not match with the objects they specify. Third, there exists a property in language known as productivity, which means that the possible number of expressions in any human language is infinite. Fourth, language is passed from generation to generation through a characteristic process called cultural transmission (Yule, 24). Fifth, a distinction in meaning due to differences in sounds is described as discreteness. Each sound within a given language is treated as distinct, and it is possible “to produce a range of sounds in a continuous stream” (Yule, 24). Finally, language exhibits an attribute known as duality, which is related to discreteness. As individual sounds, none of the discrete forms holds intrinsic meaning, but “when we produce those sounds in a particular combination, as in bin, we have another level producing a meaning which is different from the meaning of the combination nib” (Yule, 25). These are the aspects that George Yule contends for as the “uniquely human characteristics” in his work, The Study of Language (25).

Given some of the qualities of authentic language, how does it differ from animal communication? Many of the answers can be derived from Laura Ann Petitto’s work, deliberated at length in Davis’s Mother Tongue. Petitto began studying the acquisition and use of language by humans in the 1970s; she was the primary teacher of ‘Nim Chimsky,’ the famous chimpanzee subject at Columbia University, for over three years. Petitto and Chimsky communicated via sign language. The object of this comprehensive scientific exploration was to determine whether nonhuman primates could, or do, possess language, and the study was dubbed ‘The Nim Chimsky Project’ (Davis, 269). Petitto deduced that “‘apes are very complex cognitively and communicatively. They can be referential and intentional, and they can demonstrate a variety of cognitive capacities… [But] no ape or primate project… claims that these apes master all the aspects of human language… there were key aspects of human language that they failed to master’”(Davis, 282).

What were these key aspects? First, based on the hypothesis that language plays an important role in how sophisticated a level of consciousness a being has, and that consciousness is a result of the brain “attending” to output and paying intense attention to it, Petitto observed that Nim Chimsky did not attend to the relevant aspects of the signing he was seeing (Davis, 283). To the apes that are the subjects of these studies, Petitto submits, the language is “almost superfluous,” and they are not fully aware of some of the information they are relating (Davis, 283). The apes, next, do not have a lexical or vocabulary knowledge, nor do they possess a phonemic inventory (which is, essentially, the collection of basic speech sounds or speech forms from which all human language is shaped). Animals cannot achieve complex syntax. They aren’t capable of referring to abstract things that are not physically present. “The ape doesn’t do that… probably because it doesn’t have the relevant brain tissue,” Petitto surmises, and as complex as the brains of apes may be, they do not have the intricacy in the human brain or the language regions found in the human brain (Davis, 284). Of course, apes are not the only animals to be able to communicate effectively. Dolphins and whales communicate with a varied system of whistles and clicks. “No one is arguing that these animals do not communicate,” Petitto urges, “but… communication and language are not the same thing” (Davis, 283).

The of Language in Humans

Next, how did this noted difference between animal communication and human language transpire? Most essentially, early hominids noticed a need for more involved, intellectually fulfilling expression.

In response to this need, humans biologically adapted for the capability. Davis notes, “we are Homo sapiens, ‘the thinking human.’ Our brains are uniquely endowed with an innate ability to detect the basic rhythms and structures in sound or movement that can become the building blocks of symbolic communication” (285). As Charles Yang, professor of linguistics and psychology at Yale University explains, “this means that the neural hardware for language must be plastic; it must leave space and possibilities to respond to… the environment” (Yang, 4). But, Yang acknowledges, this “great leap forward,” the development of language as the latest step that led to the rise of Homo sapiens, must have been preceded by other developments in history (7). The gift for language must have built upon and interacted “with other cognitive and perceptual systems that existed before language” (Yang, 7). What were these developments, and how do they prevail as proof?

It is accurate to maintain that the capacity for complex language in humans has become more accommodating in the course of evolution. This can be seen in the progressive selection for both corporal faculties more amenable for complex language and for bigger brains. Frank Wilson, author of The Hand, explains that “the brain and the musculoskeletal systems, as organs, evolve[d] just as organisms themselves do, by modification of structure and function over time” (16).

Anthropologists argue that the acquisition of upright posture, the change in dentition, and the alteration of the hand were the triggers that made the advancements in language possible. William H. Calvin, neurobiologist and author, confirms that early hominids became bipedal in adapting for scavenging, to be able to run more quickly (17). Bipedalism also seems to have developed in order to free the hands for using tools and for other various activities. Further, Calvin maintains that, unlike other primates who have large canine teeth for fighting, “smaller [teeth] in the hominid line suggest that something was going on that made aggression less important” (19). The changes from the ape-like hand to that of A. afarensis moved the radial (thumb) side of the hand dramatically, providing the “capacity to conform the thumb and first two fingers to a very wide range of object sizes and shapes, allowing them to be held and manipulated easily” (Wilson, 26).

Other changes in the pattern of evolution were beneficial. By the time of Homo erectus, the pelvis had become more bowl-shaped. The hominid knees were indented, while chimps’ legs still articulate straight down from the hip joint. The hole in the bottom of the skull, where the spinal cord is located, had moved forward, better balancing the head. The spinal column was now vertically-aligned. Body size was growing, and that encouraged the increase in brain size and enlarged cranial capacity. This all paved the way for the new complexities in the brain at the time of Homo erectus. Speaking in terms of cranial capacity, A. afarensis was 400 cc; H. erectus, emerging roughly 1.5 million years ago, had an average brain volume of 850 cc (Elgin, 39). Indeed, “the thought processes of Homo erectus were surely different from what is seen in great apes” (Calvin, 43).

Around 750,000 years ago is the time when, Calvin claims, there were profound enlargements in the hominid brain. Why then, and what caused it to happen? This is unclear, but conjecture suggests improved hunting techniques as well as the development of a proto-language. In this case, proto-language can be defined as “just a growing vocabulary and then two words paired for a third meaning” (Calvin, 49). The motivation for the early form of communication probably had much to do with socialization and sexual selection, where “verbal grooming” and even gossip grew to be important. At the same time that Neanderthals were dominant in Europe (around 100,000 to 35,000 BC), a more lightly built Homo sapiens was evolving in Africa and the .

It is suggested that, where other animals and even other species of Homo “knew,” Homo sapiens “knew that they knew.” This reflective consciousness became essential to “social as well as to personal evolution… [providing] an increased capacity for self-determination, reconciliation, cooperation, and creativity” (Elgin, 18). Homo sapiens, around 100,000 years ago, possessed a cranial capacity average of about 1,400 cc (Elgin, 39). This branch of hominids was the one that eventually developed modern language and gained all the advantages involved with rapid speech, and even though that development may have taken some thirty thousand years, by about forty thousand years ago, the fossil record demarcates that modern man had arrived (McCrone, 171). The use of symbols appeared approximately 50,000 years ago among Homo sapiens and, in the words of Richard Leakey, speak “‘of a mental world we readily recognize as our own’” (Calvin, 83). With the influx of modern humans, the blade forms of stone tools proliferated—scrapers, chisels, spear blades, knives, and the like—demonstrating notable creativity, as well as practical ingenuity, in tool-making. This was, most likely, in response to more changes in hunting—a task should not be underestimated in terms of mental and social development (Osborne, 20). It is clear that “man must have been self-conscious and articulate by this time… [man] had made the break with the present tense and lived in a mental world of his own creation” (McCrone, 172). So, in their long history, physically and mentally, humans have essentially “adapted” for conditions that make complex language more feasible.

Using the Advantages of Evolutionary Adaptations

But still, the question remains: how and when did humans begin using fully evolved language?

Greenspan and Shanker contest that individuals must be able to connect and engage with one another and have the ability to form relationships (Greenspan and Shanker, 322, 360). In order to assemble supportive groups with shared goals, these early peoples had to be able to converse more productively. They experienced the desire to express themselves and to talk. They were equipped with adaptations which selected for language, and they built upon it. Then, a sound was paired with a meaning. This involves what is called the “arbitrariness of the sign”— the word cat does not look like a cat, walk like a cat, or meow like a cat, but it carries the meaning of ‘cat’ nevertheless. This is because every speaker has undergone a like act of learning in childhood that associates the sound with the meaning. Due to this uniform memorization, “the members of a language community receive an enormous benefit: the ability to convey a concept from mind to mind virtually instantaneously” (Pinker, 75).

When examining human history, the language community is a natural sort of unit. “Languages, by their nature as means of communication, divide humanity into groups: only through a common language can a group of people act in concert, and therefore have a common history” (Ostler, 7). The most basic way in which a language can come to thrive is called the Farmer’s Approach (Ostler, 19). All the community needs to do is stay united, understand and communicate in the same designated language, and grow in population. This language becomes natural to the defined group. It is then enculturated, learned by the young from transmission of the old, steeped in habit. Steven Pinker claims, “once invented, language would entrench itself… as parents taught their children and children imitated their parents” (19). Use of language, in practice, is persistent over generations.

Trying to determine exactly when humans began using language is extremely difficult, but one method is to date the emergence of certain languages or language families. Proto-Indo-European, the ancestral language of Indo-European (of which English is a part), is thought to have emerged six to eight thousand years ago in the general area of Turkey (Davis, 25). However, some paleolinguists propose that Proto-Indo-European, in its earlier phase, belonged to a more ancient and larger “superfamily” of languages known as Nostratic, believed to be spoken 15,000 years ago by the peoples living between the areas of the Caspian and Black seas. (It should be noted that this puts the emergence of language before the invention of , before sedentism and the appearance of the complex society). Even more, Davis indicates, the real date is “likely more than twice as long ago as that… [and] some scientists… think they can push the date for the origin of human language back even further” (Davis, 26). Stanford University geneticist Luigi Cavalli-Sforza, for example, believes that tracing the earliest migrations of humans around the world coincides closely with previous work by historical linguists. Provided with recent discoveries of archaic Homo sapiens in the Middle east around 90,000 B.C., Cavalli-Sforza supports the notion that modern humans were speaking some form of real language nearly 100,000 years ago.

Given anthropological and paleolinguistic evidence, it becomes clear that humans have biologically and mentally provided themselves with a way to take communication to a higher, more complicated level.

How Language Works: Functions in The Body and Mind

So then, how do these conditions—the physical changes in body and brain, and the history of use of language, manifest themselves now? Physically, what are the faculties that humans possess so that they are capable of forming various and wide-ranging sounds? There are many more than one might think. In regards to the body, all of what are known as the vocal organs aid in the production of speech. These include, generally, the lungs, mouth, throat, and nose. Inside the mouth, the lips, tongue, teeth, palate, and uvula are all involved. How Language Works, by linguist David Crystal, states that inside the throat, the pharynx (upper part), larynx (lower part), vocal folds, and glottis are engaged in the speech process. The vocal tract, which consists of the pharynx, mouth, and nose, form a system of cavities that can alter their shape, and this is what allows the many different sounds of spoken language to be created. Crystal explains that the lungs produce a stream of air (called pulmonic air), which helps the chest to contract and expand and the ribs to move, causing the diaphragm to move downwards; all of this reduces the air pressure in the lungs (Crystal, 20). But pulmonic air has to be converted into audible vibrations, in the lower region of the vocal tract, the larynx.

Thus, one of the main functions of the larynx is to create a kind of buzzing sound, known as phonation, which is used for most of the consonants and all of the vowels. The larynx is also capable of pitch movements (when the vocal-fold vibration is altered at will), glottal stops (when the vocal folds are held tightly closed), and glottal friction (when the vocal folds are held wide apart). Once the given air stream passes through the larynx, it enters the vocal tract and is manipulated by several mobile vocal organs—the tongue, soft palate, and lips, mostly. This is the point at which articulation is achieved (Crystal, 27). The tongue is able to conform to more shapes and positions than any other vocal organ; it therefore assists in the making of a high number of speech sounds (Crystal, 29). It is the soft palate that, during normal breathing, is lowered to allow air to pass through the nose, and it affects the quality of sounds. The lips are employed for sounds such as “p” and “m” and create the various spreading used with vowels. Resonance is produced through the cavities in the throat, mouth, and nose. When the body exhales, the chest and lungs are then contracted, the ribs lowered, and the diaphragm raised, forcing air out. When one speaks, “the pattern [of the respiratory cycle] changes to one of very rapid inhalation and very slow exhalation... [carrying] much larger amounts of speech than would otherwise be the case” (Crystal, 21). As Crystal clarifies, of course, humans are capable of many other “sound effects,” possibly considered more emotional noises than speech sounds—but these communicate something nonetheless (23).

The physical means for language within the body have been discussed. Now, what of the brain’s role as it relates to the human capability for language? Neurolinguists contend that, in fact, extremely detailed processes trigger speech; although as of now there is no set, detailed model of neurolinguistic operation, it is still possible to speak generally of neurolinguistic processing. It seems that the theory of cerebral localization (the idea that a single area of the brain is related directly to a single behavioral ability), proposed by neurolinguists such as Broca and Wernicke, has some validity. For example, the area in front of the fissure of Rolando is mostly involved in motor functioning, thus significant in speaking and writing. Part of the upper temporal lobe (known as Wernicke’s area) plays a major role in the comprehension and production of speech, and the lower back part of the frontal lobe (Broca’s area) is primarily concerned with the encoding of speech. Part of the left parietal region performs tasks related to manual signing. And the area at the back of the occipital lobe is mainly used for the processing of visual input.


More Proof for Innateness




A. Sarah appeared to Angela to like herself.

B. Sarah appeared to Angela to like her.

C. Sarah appealed to Angela to like herself.

D. Sarah appealed to Angela to like her.




Everything that Followed: Ideas brought to Fruition

But what did this innate ability to possess language do? Were there social consequences to such a mental, seemingly single ability? Yes, in fact—many. After language came the actualization of culture, the description of which will be presented briefly. All of the functions of culture necessitate communication, but more specifically, complex language; they also require an evolved intellect.



The History of Writing









As Jerrold S. Cooper words it, “many scholars would be happy with the proposition that Sumerian, Egyptian, Chinese, and Maya were all created in response to local needs… [it] was a response to increasing social and political complexity” (Cooper, 71). These societies, as well as others discussed, recognized the necessity of the written word as they grew more complex and changed their focus. As the systems of writing became solidified and standardized, they became cultural derivatives of language.

Writing: An Ability of the “Upper Class” Only

But who was using writing in these societies? There is a further way that writing began as a cultural construct, and that is perceived through social stratification. Culture brought about the distinction of upper and lower classes. Wealth came to matter. The ‘ruling class” of a given society “relies on language to diversify and stratify the varied segments of the population, thus reinforcing a social order” (Kottak and Kozaitis, 272). The ability to write and read, and the access to in general, were and are not permitted to everyone. Regrettably, it has been observed repeatedly that a “fund of information… is accessible only to those who can afford it and to those who can make sense of it… [knowledge] remains chiefly the property of an academic elite” (Kottak and Kozaitis, 303).

“Scholars have often asserted… that ancient cities were full of things to read, and there is some truth in this claim; but it must not lead us to the assumption that the majority of city-dwellers were able to read for themselves, still less to the assumption that they could write,” William Harris, author of Ancient Literacy, affirms (14). For one thing, most of the populations in earlier societies found writing materials to be superfluous and expensive. The possession of these “prestige items,” as they are identified in anthropological terms, would denote societal status— along with being educated. Also, Harris notes that in many advanced societies such as Greece and Rome, a widespread system of educational institutions was not realized. He acknowledges their significance by saying that “in every single early modern or modern country which has achieved majority literacy, an essential instrument has been an extensive network of schools… [with a] large-scale literacy campaign effectively sponsored by the state” (Harris, 15).

But perhaps more importantly, literacy itself was a way to separate rulers and nobility from the craftsmen and farmers. Certain jobs or roles within these populations required literacy; many more (mostly those among the poor) simply did not. This characteristic became more or less perpetuated within various early cultures— it was just that way. As mentioned previously in many of the examples, literacy and the ability to write was an important requirement for royals and nobles in various societies. Scribes were usually elites, and learning to read and write was a privilege within a culture. There was a “general pattern of restricted literacy applicable to many cultures: shortly after the introduction of writing a ‘craft literacy’ [developed],” (Ong, 94). At this craft literacy stage, there is no need for the individual to know reading and writing; he or she could have gotten by without attaining these skills. These are common conditions concerning literacy, noted in countless civilizations across time and distance. In this way, the distinction between the ability to speak a language and the ability to document something in that prescribed language indicates a partition between groups in the given society. Writing was used as an instrument of discrimination; elites and scribes maintained this as a way to keep “commoners” common.

Germany, for example, in 1517, at the time of the Luther-fueled Reformation, can illustrate this point. Everyone in the clergy of the Roman Catholic Church spoke and read and wrote Latin, so that the common people were unable to read the Bible for themselves. In this way, the Church was able to keep the masses who prescribed to in their control— the Church had to be sought for spiritual help and guidance, and it could demand money for indulgences. Part of the reason that Protestantism rose so quickly in Europe was because when Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of Wittenburg Castle, they were written in the vernacular, something that everyone could read (or listen to as it was read). Copies were written and translated and spread rapidly (Stephanek, 59).

What about a more recent example of this discrimination in action? A fitting case would be the legal discrimination of African Americans in the United States in the first half of the twentieth century. State and local codes were set against blacks in many central areas of life, such as housing, jobs, and politics— but what is critical to note here is that education and literacy were a key mechanism of oppression. “In education, African Americans in the South attended segregated and inferior schools, a circumstance… enforced with threats of actual from the white community” (Aguirre and Turner, 106). There were also forced literacy tests for blacks in states like Virginia, another tool of humiliation. It was finally with the Brown v. Board of Education ruling that declared segregated schooling inferior and therefore discriminatory.

It is clear that access to become literate was and is not granted to everyone. It has been used, time and time again, as an implement of subjugation: to keep the poor poor, to keep the lower-class in the lower-class.

Dialects: Speaking the Same Language?

Dialects are also one of language’s cultural archetypes. Dialect, in definition, is variation in pronunciation, along with specific features of grammar and vocabulary, which may suggest where the speaker is from, regionally and/or socially (Yule, 227). Differences in language lead to differences in ethnic identification with far-reaching effects (Pinker, 242). Trey Wilson, narrator of American Tongues says of dialects: “It’s how we size each other up” (American Tongues, 1988). Accents and speech are very essential to identity. The dialect that a certain group applies holds real meaning for that group.

And, it holds meaning for other speakers of the same language who note the dialect but do not sound the same way— speech creates multifarious assumptions for listeners. These assumptions can have tangible repercussions. For example, when a woman from the southern United States was asked what she thought of New Yorkers, she responded, “I don’t think they have the same values [we do]. I associate all of that with the sound of their voice… it’s very grating” (American Tongues, 1988). Another illustration of the effects of numerous dialects can be seen in the following anecdote:

Man (on his accent): They laugh at me. I took an ahs chest out at a wedding. And I say, ‘I got the ahs.’ And these three guys say, ‘You brought the what?’ And I say, ‘I got the ahs.’ And they say, ‘Well, we’re not quite sure what you’re saying.’ And I open up the chest and say, ‘See? Ahs, asshole’ (American Tongues, 1988).

The way that humans talk is stigmatized. Some dialects are more “preferred” than others and sound “more educated” than others, revealing discrimination and negative feelings related with the less-favored dialects. “The social classes sound different” George Yule claims (Yule, 240). He borrows support from the Labov study conducted in 1972, who researched place of occupation and socioeconomic status together, scrutinizing pronunciation differences among salespeople in three New York City department stores: Saks (high status), Macy’s (middle status), and Klein’s (low status). Labov asked these salespeople questions that would elicit expressions with the [r] sound, and a pattern emerged: the higher the socioeconomic status, the more [r] sounds that were produced. “So,” Yule concludes, “the difference in a single consonant could mark higher versus lowah social class” (Yule, 241).

Many dialects involuntarily divulge to listeners where the speaker is from, allowing for further assumptions to be made. This is because, according to folklorist Cratis Williams, “cultural overtone of [dialects] remain… it’s culture expressing itself in sound” (American Tongues, 1988). It is the differences in various cultures are obvious in the different dialects of a language that are spoken.

Man #2 (on the effects of different dialects): It’s like a vibration thing, you know? It’s not too much what they say out of their mouth; it’s how they say it, you know? Because you can meet a person for the first time, and automatically draw an opinion: ‘I’m not going to like him; we’re not going to get along together.’ And you don’t know him from Adam or Eve—just from what he’s said and how he said it (American Tongues, 1988).

In effect, though the users of English (or any language) may be able to understand each other and are using the same language on the surface, it is clear that, in interaction, the subconscious makes judgments about the way people speak. This can lead to misunderstandings about the users of a dialect on the whole.

Language: What Started it All

Even though human culture incorporates language, language is what started it all. As Kottak and Kozaitis conclude, “the use of language creates social institutions, practices, and the ideology that supports them” (Kottak and Kozaitis, 272). Through language and speech, other aspects of culture developed; language made possible the presentation of more abstract ideas, which led to cultural depth and differences. The innate language facility, therefore, produced derivatives such as writing and reading, incongruities in access to literacy, and accents and dialects, which are cultural archetypes. These constructs have been interpreted culturally and have had extensive consequences.

The mind is a treacherous thing. It is where language is processed, understood, and stored, which is in itself an astonishing capability. But it is also where the products of language are created in order to form opinions— where the decision to discriminate is made. Cultural factors are molded by mankind’s simple desire to express oneself, to be heard, to communicate.

Works Cited

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