Derek Bickerton
2011
BMC evolutionary biology 11(1):261, 2011
Abstract The emergence of language and the high degree of cooperation found among humans seems to require more than a straightforward enhancement of primate traits. Some triggering episode unique to human ancestors was likely necessary. Here it is argued that ...
The Oxford Handbook of Language Evolution, 2011
The basic processes of syntax are categorized into four main categories. These categories include a process for assembling words into hierarchical structures, processes for determining the boundaries of segments within such structures, and processes for moving segments within ...MORE ⇓
The basic processes of syntax are categorized into four main categories. These categories include a process for assembling words into hierarchical structures, processes for determining the boundaries of segments within such structures, and processes for moving segments within such structures and lastly, processes for determining the reference of elements that are not phonetically expressed. The syntax characterizes all languages, whether signed or spoken, in a highly developed form but it is entirely absent both from the productions of language-trained animals and the natural communication systems of other species. Children first acquire nouns, then a few verbs, and only later begin to add other word classes. The acquisition of grammatical items follows some time after the emergence of recognizable syntactic structures, even if those structures do not normally begin to appear until age two or thereabouts, and the earliest stages of development constitute an example of protolanguage, rather than full human language. The emergence of these structures is typically quite rapid with several types of both simple and complex sentence appearing within a few weeks. Creole languages are really a special case of child language development, representing what the language faculty produces when structured input is severely reduced.
2008
Two Neglected Factors in Language Evolution
Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on the Evolution of Language, pages 26-33, 2008
TWO NEGLECTED FACTORS IN LANGUAGE EVOLUTION.
Interaction Studies 9(1):169-176, 2008
In dealing with the nature of protolanguage, an important formative factor in its development, and one that would surely have influenced that nature, has too often been neglected: the precise circumstances under which protolanguage arose. Three factors are involved in this ...MORE ⇓
In dealing with the nature of protolanguage, an important formative factor in its development, and one that would surely have influenced that nature, has too often been neglected: the precise circumstances under which protolanguage arose. Three factors are involved in this neglect: a failure to appreciate radical differences between the functions of language and animal communication, a failure to relate developments to the overall course of human evolution, and the supposition that protolanguage represents a package, rather than a series of separate developments that sequentially impacted the communication of pre-humans. An approach that takes these factors into account is very briefly suggested.
2007
Lingua 117(3):510-526, 2007
For the benefit of linguists new to the field of language evolution, the author sets out the issues that need to be distinguished in any research on it. He offers a guided tour of contemporary approaches, including the work of linguists (Bickerton, Carstairs-McCarthy, Chomsky, ...MORE ⇓
For the benefit of linguists new to the field of language evolution, the author sets out the issues that need to be distinguished in any research on it. He offers a guided tour of contemporary approaches, including the work of linguists (Bickerton, Carstairs-McCarthy, Chomsky, Hurford, Jackendoff, Pinker, Wray), animal behaviour experts (Dunbar, Hauser, Premack, Savage-Rumbaugh), neurophysiologists (Arbib, Calvin), psychologists (Corballis, Donald), archaeologists (Davidson), and computer modellers (Batali, Kirby, Steels). He criticises the expectation that recent discoveries such as `mirror neurons' and the FOXP2 gene will provide easy answers. He emphasises the extremely interdisciplinary nature of this field, and also the importance of involvement in it by linguists, after more than a century of neglect.
2003
Symbol and structure: a comprehensive framework for language evolution
Language Evolution: The States of the Art, 2003
I approach the evolution of language as a linguist. This immediately puts me in a minority, and before proceeding further I think it's worth pausing a moment to consider the sheer oddity of that fact. If a physicist found himself in a minority among those studying the ...
2002
Selection 3(1):127-130, 2002
Foraging Versus Social Intelligence in the Evolution of Protolanguage
The Transition to Language 10.0, 2002
2000
How protolanguage became language
The Evolutionary Emergence of Language: Social Function and the Origins of Linguistic Form, 2000
1998
Catastrophic evolution: The case for a single step from protolanguage to full human language
Approaches to the Evolution of Language: Social and Cognitive Bases, 1998
1991
Language and Communication 11(1-2):37-39, 1991
Abstract 1. Comments on FJ Newmeyer's (see record 1991-23770-001) article on language origins and evolutionary plausibility. Although Newmeyer endorses the view that language is rooted in prior representational (REP) rather than prior communicative (COM) systems, ...
1990
University of Chicago Press, 1990
Language and Species presents the most detailed and well-documented scenario to date of the origins of language. Drawing on 'living linguistic fossils' such as 'ape talk,' the 'two-word' stage of small children, and pidgin languages, and on recent discoveries in ...MORE ⇓
Language and Species presents the most detailed and well-documented scenario to date of the origins of language. Drawing on 'living linguistic fossils' such as 'ape talk,' the 'two-word' stage of small children, and pidgin languages, and on recent discoveries in paleoanthropology, Bickerton shows how a primitive 'protolanguage' could have offered Homo erectus a novel ecological niche. He goes on to demonstrate how this protolanguage could have developed into the languages we speak today.
1984
The Language Bioprogram Hypothesis
Behavioral and Brain Sciences 7(2):173-222, 1984
Abstract: It is hypothesized that Creole languages are largely invented by children and show fundamental similarities, which derive from a biological program for language. The structures of Hawaiian Pidgin and Hawaiian Creole are contrasted, and evidence is ...
1981