The Problem of the Origin of Language in an Evolutionary Frame  

Oleh:

Sebeok, Thomas A.

Jenis: Article from Journal - ilmiah internasional
Dalam koleksi: Language Sciences (Full Text) vol. 8 no. 2 (1986), page 169-176.
Fulltext: 08_02_Sebeok.pdf (428.71KB)

Isi artikel

Three often loosely used terms - communication, language, and speech - are distinguished and discussed, in that order of their evolutionary sequence. Communication (more technically, "semiosis") eriteriaUy characterizes all living entities, from solitary cells to entire organisms, including humans (as well as some of their inorganic products, such as automata). Language appeared much later, a little more than two million years ago. It is an exclusive trait characteristic of all normal members in all the species of the genus Homo, first evident in habilis, then erectus, then sapiens. In respect to its historical genesis, the function of language was not communicative, but is assumed to have been a biological adaptation for modeling the Umwelt of our hominid ancestors. Its great success in phylogenesis is due to its syntactic component, which enables people to operate not only in the "real" world, but also with "possible" worlds. Over a period of some two million years more, language acquired a secondary function (was "exapted") for communication in the utilitarian form we currently possess and call speech; the mutual f'me-tuning of man's encoding capacity to his decoding capacity is still progressing.

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