Evolution + Mothers and Children = Language (Maybe), Part 3

In my last post (July 30) I spoke of the origins of language from within the mother-infant relationship, starting with human mothers having to put their babies down while gathering food.  This presented the danger that infant crying would attract predators, according to the hypothesis of Dean Falk in her book Finding Our Tongues.  So the mothers called back and forth with their babies to soothe them.

         From such beginnings, a form of language called “motherese” probably developed.  Motherese is the language adults all over the world use with their babies.  It consists of slow, very expressive talking, including facial expressions, gestures, patting and touching, alternating with listening while the baby waves its arms and legs and wiggles its body and face, and coos.

         Just as we learn much about evolution of physical structures by watching development, so we can learn much about evolution of language by watching language development in babies today.

         Falk points out that babies learn much from motherese.  The older a baby gets, the more its babbling mimics the sounds and cadence of its native tongue.  This could also have been how language began.  One generation after another, the babies grew up and enhanced the primitive sound repertoire of early mother-child “conversations,” inventing words for familiar things, using the words in new ways, until quite a large vocabulary was available.  Falk gives examples of such languages, such as Nicaraguan sign language among deaf children, developing from scratch in modern times.  She is very convincing.

         This series of blog posts grew out of a wish to ride a time machine back to the times when language was beginning and developing.  How I’d love to be able to listen in on this process at intervals of 25 years or so.  Alas, so far no time machine.  But Falk’s book is definitely the next best thing with regard to this topic.  Reading it, I felt transported back to that magic time of the invention of language.

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“The Pursuit of Wonder” is taking a week’s vacation.  I’ll post again August 12 or 13.  JSL