Language Evolution and Computation Bibliography

The diverse and well-studied order Primates serves as an excellent model for understanding the evolution of acoustic communication among mammals. Over the past 60 million years, primates have evolved into more than 300 extant species that range from nocturnal to diurnal, arboreal to terrestrial, and solitary to groups of thousands, and they range in body mass from the 30-g pygmy mouse lemur (Microcebus myoxinus) to the 175-kg eastern lowland gorilla (Gorilla beringei graueri). Nonhuman primates vary in their auditory sensitivity and perceptual capabilities and emit a wide range of often complex vocalizations. Some aspects of primate audition and vocalizations have been related to each other and/or phylogeny, anatomy, and ecology, but many aspects have yet to be fully understood. The integration of anatomical and behavioral data on acoustic communication, and the correlates thereof, have significant potential for reconstructing behavior in the fossil record, including that of humans. This volume presents a comprehensive review of nonhuman primate audition and vocal communication to bridge these closely related topics that are often addressed separately. The first section of the book is a discussion of primate sound production, reception, and perception, as well as habitat acoustics in the environmental settings occupied by primates in the wild. The second section focuses on vocal communication in extant primates, including consideration of spectral analyses of primate calls and the evolutionary relationships among hearing, vocal communication, and human language. The goal for this comprehensive approach is to provide new insights into these related topics.