(no subject)

[nny]

Ponderings (unrelated to A-level) prompted vaguely by de Saussure.

Something that's always interested me is the theory of language acquisition - whether language is something that's innate. I had a bit of trouble with this theory initially, and it's been a hell of a long time since I've read any Chomsky or Pinker or the like, but essentially there's the argument that language acquisition is something that's inborn; that features in common across languages, such as coherent grammatical structure and so forth, make for a pretty persuasive argument that it is in our nature not only to use language to communicate but to use a specific kind of language to communicate.

What interests me most about it is that it set me wondering whether there's a school of thought in Theology which covers the same sort of ground.

I did an essay for my Religious Studies A-level coursework which covered the topic 'why is there religion', and let me tell you I cursed that essay title with my every breath. I used to draw little doodles of wheels under the title and me, pushing, and a helpful nearby cliff. But a lot of the reading I did for that topic and a lot of the reading I've done since has shown certain similarities between religions, religions that really shouldn't have had much contact or any major effect on each other. So this could pretty much indicate a couple of things; that there is in fact something Up There, Down Here, or Somewhere Around The Place that's affecting the way we think and attempting to garner belief, or that we are in some way genetically programmed towards beliefs and the structuring of them. That spirituality is, along with a predisposition towards language, innate.

Anyway, yes. I'm going to go read some more de Saussure, now. I just thought that was interesting. :)

Comments

[sophistry]

Word - this is something that's always, always fascinated me, and it's been in my thoughts more than usual over the past month and a half, two months, given some of the reading I've been doing. Stories, too, and literature - if you'll remember the conversation we had about Milliways in this light, and the primal, eternal metacharacters, metaelements, metaplots, etc that are everywhere you look, independent of any connection between their source material.

I said it before and I said it again - I'm starting to conceive of it almost as a valid form of spirituality. It's certainly started to convince me that there is something bigger out there, even if that something is the collective unconscious of the human race.

[apiphile.livejournal.com]

I am so mature. My immediate response was "FERDINAND DE SAUSSURE? Magnetic Fields? Whee!"

And there are various biological whosits who have been claiming that we're *not* the only species to use language to communicate, which I suspect has interesting implications for this argument if it's ever proven.

[villainny.livejournal.com]

*makes note to read some Jung*

It's definitely making the threads of some sort of belief structure in my mind, 'though it's nothing nearly coherent enough to be articulated well. Just so many things I read slot together so neatly and make so much sense.

Maybe I'll start buying the Alan Moore thing when I have a wagepacket. :D

[villainny.livejournal.com]

Magnetic Fields are related to linguists how please? :D

And we're almost certainly not the only species to use language to communicate, but it does seem that we're the only ones with such a structure - grammar and the like. However I'm fully prepared to be proved wrong on this; if not through something I haven't read that's around now, then in a few years when they work out exactly what it is the monkeys are saying...

[soupytwist.livejournal.com]

I tend to think it's the other way round: languages (and religions) have things in common because they're doing the same thing, fulfilling the same need.

Languages, I would argue, evolved so we can communicate - and communicate fairly specific things. If you want to tell somebody about a danger, you need to be able to tell them 1. what the danger is, 2. when it's likely to be an issue, 3. how likely an issue it is, 4. where it is, 5. if it's likely to happen again, 6. what you think needs to be done about it... and that's just off the top of my head. Communication is a very complicated thing, and grammar, for instance, lets us do those complicated things. My little brother is learning to talk at the moment, and just attaching a sound to a particular person (i.e. naming them) is a huge deal. But each step on the road makes it more likely you'll survive - shouting somebody's name is better than nothing, and being able to give complex instructions is better than that. And similar arguments can be made for religions - if a religion is going to explain the world/help anybody live in it, which is what most people accept as being the main role that religions have historically fulfilled, there's a few basic things it has to discuss. The sun, what food is good and what food is bad, the rules for making more human beings in the future. Although I suppose there's an argument that the giving of explanations is itself 'spirituality'... I wouldn't say so, exactly, but hmm.

Which isn't to say that that means there isn't anything up there or whatever, because I obviously don't know for sure more than anybody else does, but I love that kind of thing and wanted to put it out there. :)

[soupytwist.livejournal.com]

AWESOME SONG!!!

Um, by which I mean, "Stephin Merrit wrote a song called 'The Death of Ferdinand de Saussure' and it rules."

[apiphile.livejournal.com]

I met Ferdinand de Saussure on a night like this (http://www.sing365.com/music/Lyric.nsf/The-Death-of-Ferdinand-de-Saussure-lyrics-The-Magnetic-Fields/4851B6386B1995F048256E8E000C8175).

One of my favourites, even replaced Papa Was A Rodeo for a bit.

Well quite. I imagine it would be stretching it a bit for other species to use a structure like ours, but I don't think that necessarily means language acquisition is innate. Hrm. I don't know. I have such terrible trouble getting over the idea that "this is unique to humans" doesn't necessarily mean some hideous back-slapping bullshit "isn't humanity SO MUCH BETTER THAN EVERY OTHER FORM OF LIFE EVER". :/ I should probably, like, deal with that so the conversations are more fun.

[apiphile.livejournal.com]

I agree with this, basically. Nny? I vote soupytwist speaks for me in the post.

[villainny.livejournal.com]

But monkeys can do pretty much all of that.

There's a certain kind, and I'm not going into species or the research here because it was in a lecture a long time ago, not to mention the fact that I've passed my degree now and therefore don't have to know such things in huge amounts of detail... but there's a certain kind of monkey that has different calls for different types of danger. There's also a modification in that - the frequency of the cry, I think, can note how close the danger is, plus an all-clear signal. There's also another call which is a lie-call. So, like, each call is independently confirmed by another member of the group so that one monkey can't go OMG LOOK EAGLE! and then snag all the food when everyone else is hiding in the bushes. Also small children-monkeys going OMG LOOK EAGLE! have parental monkeys going DON'T WORRY, EVERYBODY, GEOFFREY JUST SAW A LEAF!

So there's pretty complex communication going on which still doesn't have the level of complexity of our language structure; it's kind of indicated that much of the structure we have isn't necessary for survival or the like and yet it's something that humankind as a whole has put together.

I don't know if I'm making my point in any coherent manner and I'm going to make tea, so I stop now.

XD

[villainny.livejournal.com]

*grins*

I do see your point, but it is not my point. It's a point of interest, not a YAYXORS HUMANITY!

[(Anonymous)]

Actually, I'd say that's kind of my point - we needed some way of communicating those things, and it just happens that we and this other kind of monkey (cause we are WAY more related to monkeys than anything else) came up with different solutions. And not simple ones either - the different frequencies and having stuff confirmed sounds pretty damn complicated to me.

(And the parental monkeys going DON'T WORRY, EVERYBODY, GEOFFREY JUST SAW A LEAF is the cutest thing ever.)

By which I mean, I think we and the other monkeys doing the same thing implies it is the same thing, just that slightly different ways of doing it worked better for the two groups. That our way of doing it turns out to be able to evolve sufficiently to give us Shakespeare and the Beatles and Walt Whitman doesn't, I don't think, change that - and doesn't stop those things being really cool, either. It's like food; food is necessary for survivial, and that's why we learned to cook and not eat rotten things and stuff. But once we were surviving in large enough numbers that it wasn't an immediate issue any more, we could start having fun, make bolognase sauce and chocolate and different kinds of tea and stuff. Cause having fun is another thing both we and the monkeys do quite well. :D

[soupytwist.livejournal.com]

Ah fuck, that was me. Heh.

[villainny.livejournal.com]

I don't see that we're arguing particularly different sides of the issue, here. You're arguing that we evolved language because we needed to communicate certain things, and I'm saying that we evolved language because we needed to communicate certain things and also evolved a predisposition towards linguistic structure. According to the linguists who go into this theory, the speed at which children learn grammatical rules, along with the way this ability deteriorates as they grow older, shows that they are learning from more than just their parents, outside sources such as television, overhearing adult conversations etc. (which is what the other side argue is where the learning comes from). If the learning was coming from these sources then the critical learning period during childhood wouldn't be an issue - people would be able to learn language with the same effectiveness regardless of their starting point.

Likewise with religion - the predisposition is towards structuring things in a certain way. We have an inbuilt need to explain things like the sun, different kinds of foods, that sort of thing, when it really isn't necessary for our continued survival that we structure our minds in that sort of way. Something in the make-up of our brains insists on it, and it does that across the board, and that argues (as Soph mentioned above) some sort of a collective unconscious.

*laughs* It's like Dogbert - God is not our past, but our future. The collective unconscious is being brought to the fore and amplified by the internet.

[villainny.livejournal.com]

I guessed. Responded above. :D

[josepheenie.livejournal.com]

did you ever read about this kid called Victor in America? Basically Victor's parents were both deaf and dumb but decided that Victor (because he could hear) should be allowed to watch TV and other thing with sound. So victor spent 3 years sat in front of Sesame Street before Social Services (or whoever) found him. This is where it gets interesting. Despite the fact that victor had been encouraged to hear/speak through educational programs for children, he could not speak a word. He had no vocabulary and didn't know how to communicate through speech. Victor was, however, fluent in sign language. This basically proves that language comes from interaction, because although he could see the telly, and hear Big Bird or whoever, he couldn't interact with them. He could interact with his parents who could only communicate with sign language though. So people tried to tech Victor to speak/teach him some vocab etc.. and they managed to do this but still Victor had problems because they couldn't get him to make any sense. He knew words but couldn't put them into any "useful" order... or so it seemed. Eventually someone worked out that Victor was using the grammar of sign language which is different to ours. and yeh... basically. that's it. although I don't know if this is helpful at all *blushes*

[villainny.livejournal.com]

I hadn't actually come across that. Thanks, that's really interesting! (Partly, admittedly, 'cos I'm hoping to learn sign language through my job this year).

[josepheenie.livejournal.com]

no problem. I did a teaching course this summer and we had a seminar from Sue Palmer, author of toxic childhood and it was so interesting. There is quite a bit in it about the development of language and so forth. Mainly in an anti-sitting your children in front of the tv as free babysitting vein but interesting nonetheless.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0752873598/202-3609447-9289433?v=glance&n=266239&s=gateway&v=glance

take a look I reckon it's worth a read, whe I get the chance :)

[la-rainette.livejournal.com]

You know, the monkey debate reminds me of my old Biology teacher. She used to say that the day the New Apes stopped using their hands to walk was a key point in evolution. Once you didn't need your hands to walk, why, you found yourself equiped with uncommonly precise tools, and you could devise new and different ways to use them!

And somehow, it's possibly the same for language. Language was certainly born out of a necessity to communicate, but it has evolved WAY beyond that (there is for instance no necessity for this discussion, and yet it is really interesting and fun to read and participate in. But is it in any way crucial for our survival? Not really. :D Language has evolved way beyond the strictly utilitarian and has become an instrument of pleasure, too.)

As for language acquisition in small children: oh yes, it's fascinating to watch HOW they tackle grammar -- actually, nothing is more interesting to analyse than the grammatical mistakes little ones make. It's like they listen really hard to everyone, and they draw their own conclusion as to what the grammar is. Sometimes they have it right, sometimes they have it wrong, but what's interesting to watch is how they test it on their environment. And then they correct their theories according to the response they get. :D

If I look at my two children (both brought up in a bilingual environment, but keeping in mind that the Froglet arrived here when she was 2 1/2 and Tadpole a lot earlier), it's quite obvious that while they're both trying to make sense of both French and English grammar and derive their own rules (to be then tested on us :D), Tadpole is much more influenced by English than Froglet, and she tends to blend both grammars a lot more. The mistakes she makes are typical of English speaking kids (for instance, gendered nouns make no sense to her, so one day everything is feminine, another everything is masculine).

So -- yes, there appears to be a moment in your development where language acquisition just happens. Whichever language happens to be around you at that moment will be the language you learn; and when you learn a foreign language much later, in school for instance, your knowledge of this language is stored in a different part of your brain. The part of your brain that is used for Native Language Acquisition -- yes, that one more or less closes down as you grow up.

This is actually one of the reasons why we SO wanted to try and raise our children in a bilingual environment. :) Apparently, bilingual children use a part of their brain that people who learn a language in school will never use -- no matter how well they speak that other language.

[la-rainette.livejournal.com]

*blinks* do I win a prize for posting a Really Long Comment?

[la-rainette.livejournal.com]

Ooooh, that's SUCH an interesting story.

There once was a King (In Germany, I think? My memory is hazy on the details) who decided to study the Natural Language, i.e., the language that just naturally happens if infants are left to themselves.

So he put all these infants together, in a nursery, and the nurses were instructed to communicate as little as possible with them, just feed, change, bathe, but not talk or sing.

The children all died. Interaction with members of the species seems to be essential to simply enable survival. I believe (very strongly, actually) that we are programmed that way.

[josepheenie.livejournal.com]

tell me about it. Of course the scientists had a field day when they found him, I mean it would be completely unethical todeliberately subject a child to that but here he was, in the ideal situation for them. There is a lot of evidence that you can't learn without interaction.. I'm sure we have all been sat in some dull lectures/seminars/lessons and if you're not engaged you may as well not be there. I guess languauge is the most sophisticated form of interaction but it is built on so muchg more, facial expressions, all sorts really :D

[ms-ntropy.livejournal.com]

I honestly didn't think people still used the term "deaf and dumb".

[ms-ntropy.livejournal.com]

Man, this makes me want to break out my "Physiology of Language" course notes.
Maybe read The Language Instinct all the way through this time, instead of just the parts I needed for class.

[josepheenie.livejournal.com]

sorry I was trying to get the story out quickly in between freeze drying and mounting lab samples. the point is not how politically correct I am (although it was just spouted exactly as told to me) but the fascinating proof about interaction and learning

[ms-ntropy.livejournal.com]

OH no no, don't mistake me the story is interesting. HAH! I almost wrote entertaining.

Truth be told I don't see the findings as being all that surprising.

What we learn has to be meaningful to us, or we don't really learn it. I think one of the major reasons that the US is as "single language" as it is, is because we don't have a context for learning anything other than English.

I mean, a Spanish Class once a week is clearly not enough to become fluent. So why would someone pick up vocal speech when they get all their meaning out of sign.

I wish I could remember where I read it, but evidently there's some sort of parenting movement to teach infants sign language, because they learn handmovements far sooner than they learn how to vocalize.

[schiarire.livejournal.com]

May I rec? Daniel Dennett: Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. Assesses the development of religion from an evolutionary standpoint.

It is problematic in some ways, but it also has multiple merits.

[josepheenie.livejournal.com]

ah that would be baby-(oh damn can't remember the name of it right now, begins with an m).. I used to work in a nursery and we used to work alot with sign language as well as speech.. especially with children who are slower than others at developing linguistic skills.

The findings aren't that surprising but they weren't proven, because obviously you can't subject a child to that deliberately. Although I think trhe stats say that 80% of under 4's in the UK have a tv in their room that they are allowed to watch unsupervised (as an alternative to interacting with tyheir parents) so that must be causing their language development to become slower.

[ashen_key]

Sex, Time, and Power: How Women's Sexuality Shaped Human Evolution - language came about, essentially, so men could convince women that sex was worth the risk of childbirth. Utterly facinating book, and covers a hell of a lot more topics then just that, but I do buy into that theory for language. Danger signals don't quite cut it for me.

Still on the language...point of interest are the so-called 'wild children', children either raised by animals or just survived on their own in the forest/jungle. I've recently read a book called 'Savage Girls and Wild Boys' on just that subject, although I can't remember who wrote it. And, uniformly?

They couldn't speak, and they couldn't be taught how to speak. They were all, except for a girl called Memmie and a boy call Kaspar, stuck at the mental age of ten months. Memmie had learnt language before escaping slavery by running into the French forest, and I can't remember why Kaspar could speak, but none of the others could. Not Victor, or Peter, or the wolf-girls Kamala and Amala. Because they were in the wild during or just after learning to speak, they forget and just could not learn. Just as they could not learn to understand language, nor to gain a sense of self as humans understand it. Not sure what that says about innate language, but it's interesting from that point of view anyway.

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure it's a parental-guidance thing. There are so very many correspondences with the way we view our parents when we're very young and the way people think of God. Our parents can fix anything, they can do no wrong, they love us unconditionally, they punish us when we do wrong and reward us when we do right, and we don't understand half of the stuff they do (so, essentially, Mummy Works In Mystrerious Ways)... anything sound familiar there?

Growing up involves a process of disillusionment, of realising our parents are not all-powerful. Teenage rebellion often follows thanks to the subconscious logic of "parents can fix anything, are always right" therefore if parents can't fix everything they are not always right, and why should they order us around when they can't make everything better?

People who are brought up religious see God as just like their parents, only bigger, sometimes even blur the lines - see what you did, daddy will spank you when he gets home, see what you did, God will send you to hell when you die. And I expect kids often pick up religion when they figure out their parents are not allpowerful because somebody has to be, right?

There are so many human habits that don't make sense on their own because they've twisted and evolved and extrapolated from something that's actually quite basic.

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Also, I've read of a theory in which humanity evolved from early primates via the ocean. In that theory, we evolved language because water confuses vision, and you can't always just yell a general come-here noise and the other person will see what you're seeing, you have to tell them about it. I'm a bit sceptical as to why that couldn't happen in tall grass, too, but the theory exists.

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

The critical-learning period could be just neurology, though. Kids of that age are making sooo many more neurons and brain-pathways than adults are - they're creating the equipment, and if it isn't used it dies. That's why the "wild children" couldn't learn to speak.

And having the equipment to learn how to speak is genetic, so it makes sense that once we had that it could start out at the monkey level and gradually evolve till it was complex enough for what we have now.

Did you know that chimpanzees basically have an attention-based economy? We do, too, otherwise we wouldn't have celebrities. The most powerful person in the tribe is the one getting the most attention. Baby chimpanzees learn new things and go "LOOK AT ME LOOK AT ME". The primate group we evolved from is also intensely curious, so once we had the basic language for going DANGER! or FOOD! it was only a matter of time before somebody had a chance genetic arrangement with just a little more complexity and invented a cool word like TREE WITH NO LEAVES! and that would be really interesting, and gain the word-inventor attention, thus making him/her a more desirable breeding partner, and passing on the more-complex-language-centers gene...

[apiphile.livejournal.com]

Oh, quite. (See, I *do* understand this, really, I'm just being fucking obtuse again)