This is a useful summary of various classical views on the origins of language, together with one or two rather less classical ones, by Dr C. George Boeree:
It is an intriguing question, to which we may never have a complete answer: How did we get from animal vocalization (barks, howls, calls...) to human language?
Animals often make use of signs, which point to what they represent, but they don’t use symbols, which are arbitrary and conventional. Examples of signs include sniffles as a sign of an on-coming cold, clouds as a sign of rain, or a scent as a sign of territory. Symbols include things like the words we use. Dog, Hund, chien, cane, perro -- these are symbols that refer to the creature so named, yet each one contains nothing in it that in anyway indicates that creature.
In addition, language is a system of symbols, with several levels of organization, at least phonetics (the sounds), syntax (the grammar), and semantics (the meanings).
So when did language begin? At the very beginnings of the genus Homo, perhaps 4 or 5 million years ago? Or with the advent of modern man, Cro-magnon, some 125,000 years ago? Did the neanderthal speak? He had a brain that was larger than ours, but his voice box seems to be higher in his throat, like that of the apes. We don’t know.
There are many theories about the origins of language. Many of these have traditional amusing names (invented by Max Müller and George Romanes a century ago), and I will create a couple more where needed.
1. The mama theory. Language began with the easiest syllables attached to the most significant objects.
2. The ta-ta theory. Sir Richard Paget,
influenced
by Darwin, believed that body movement preceded language.
Language
began as an unconscious vocal imitation of these movements -- like the
way a child’s mouth will move when they use scissors, or my tongue
sticks
out when I try to play the guitar. This evolved into the popular
idea that language may have derived from gestures.
3. The bow-wow theory. Language began as imitations of natural sounds -- moo, choo-choo, crash, clang, buzz, bang, meow... This is more technically refered to as onomatopoeia or echoism.
4. The pooh-pooh theory. Language began with interjections, instinctive emotive cries such as oh! for surprise and ouch! for pain.
5. The ding-dong theory. Some people, including the famous linguist Max Müller, have pointed out that there is a rather mysterious correspondence between sounds and meanings. Small, sharp, high things tend to have words with high front vowels in many languages, while big, round, low things tend to have round back vowels! Compare itsy bitsy teeny weeny with moon, for example. This is often referred to as sound symbolism.
6. The yo-he-ho theory. Language began as rhythmic chants, perhaps ultimately from the grunts of heavy work (heave-ho!). The linguist A. S. Diamond suggests that these were perhaps calls for assistance or cooperation accompanied by appropriate gestures. This may relate yo-he-ho to the ding-dong theory, as in such words as cut, break, crush, strike...
7. The sing-song theory. Danish linguist Jesperson suggested that language comes out of play, laughter, cooing, courtship, emotional mutterings and the like. He even suggests that, contrary to other theories, perhaps some of our first words were actually long and musical, rather than the short grunts many assume we started with.
8. The hey you! theory. A linguist by the name of Revesz suggested that we have always needed interpersonal contact, and that language began as sounds to signal both identity (here I am!) and belonging (I’m with you!). We may also cry out in fear, anger, or hurt (help me!). This is more commonly called the contact theory.
9. The hocus pocus theory. My own contribution to these is the idea that language may have had some roots in a sort of magical or religious aspect of our ancestors' lives. Perhaps we began by calling out to game animals with magical sounds, which became their names.
10. The eureka! theory. And finally, perhaps language was consciously invented. Perhaps some ancestor had the idea of assigning arbitrary sounds to mean certain things. Clearly, once the idea was had, it would catch on like wild-fire!
Another issue is how often language came into being (or was invented). Perhaps it was invented once, by our earliest ancestors -- perhaps the first who had whatever genetic and physiological properties needed to make complex sounds and organize them into strings. This is called monogenesis. Or perhaps it was invented many times -- polygenesis -- by many people.
We can try to reconstruct earlier forms of language, but we can only
go so far before cycles of change obliterate any possibility of
reconstruction.
Many say we can only go back perhaps 10,000 years before the trail goes
cold. So perhaps we will simply never know.
Perhaps the biggest debate among linguists and others interested in
the origins of language is whether we can account for language using
only the basic mechanisms of learning, or if we need to postulate some
special built-in language-readiness. The learning-only people
(for example, B. F. Skinner) say that childhood conditioning, or maybe
modeling, can account for the complexity of language. The
language-acquisition-device (LAD)
people (such as Chomsky and Pinker) say that the ease and speed with
which children learn language requires something more.
The debate is real only for those people who prefer to take one or
the other of these extreme views. It seems very clear to most
that neither is the answer. Is there some special neural
mechanism for language? Not in the sense of a LAD.
© Copyright 2003, C. George Boeree
Now one or two extra points of mine. I think the above is generally clear, except for the term "ta-ta theory" for Paget's view. "Ta-ta" is a colloquial way of saying "goodbye", common to many British dialects. According to the theory, in saying "ta-ta", the tongue makes similar movements in the mouth to those made by the hand in waving goodbye.
Chimpanzees, song birds and parrots tend always to be mentioned when comparing humans to other animals, as we have seen. Those creatures are clearly pretty good at some of the skills necessary for human language, so theorists try to work out just where they fall short. It seems to me that we might also learn something from animals which have hardly any such skills, by trying to find out what other skills - or "tools" - they lack when compared to humans. And this is not just because I'm interested in cat behaviour!
One particular point that intrigues me is that humans may take just one or two features of an object, and use them to indicate the whole thing to others. For instance, suppose one of a group of early humans drew a wiggly line in the sand with her finger, and then pointed to the river. The others would surely understand that the line represented the river, and a hunting plan might then be presented without any language use at all, by pointing at various places on the "map" of the river, indicating kinds of animal by imitating their sounds or shapes or movements, and pointing at people and places to indicate where they should take up positions during the hunt, and so on and so on.
Cats seem to lack even the basic elements of such behaviour. The other day, while one of our cats was sitting on my desk, I turned over the page of a calendar to reveal quite a large photo of a cat. That attracted the real cat's attention for a moment, but no more than a moment. She clearly recognised something in the photo, but maybe since the size was wrong, there was no movement and no scent such as would go with a real cat, she quickly gave up bothering. If any bit of the whole is missing, there is nothing to be interested in. Similarly if I place a mirror on the floor near where she is walking, the cat may get excited for a moment - she goes up to the mirror, imitated by the strange cat she sees there, but once she arrives, and there is no cat touch or scent, she promptly gives up even looking. If I pick up the cat, and point us both out in a mirror, she takes no notice whatsoever - presumably being with the real me absorbs all her attention. Or maybe there is a bit of a puzzle there: why is there no reaction at all? If I imitate the sound of a cat, she looks at me in astonishment, but rather as if to say, "What are you doing, you stupid man?"
I feel there is some important point there, but I would like your help in working out more!