THE BIOLOGY OF LANGUAGE -- Title page -- Copyright page -- Preface -- Acknowledgements -- Table of Contents -- Chimps, children and creoles: the need for caution -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Linguistic evidence: some sources and their problems -- 2.1 Primate vocalizations -- 2.2 Ape signing -- 2.3 Child language -- 2.4 Pidgin -- 2.5 Creoles -- 3. Similarities and pseudo-similarities -- 4. Treatment of repetitions -- 4.1 Repetitions in ape signing -- 4.2 Repetitions in child language -- 4.3 Repetitions in pidgins -- 5. Omissions -- 5.1 Omissions in ape signing -- 5.2 Omissions in child language -- 5.3 Omissions in pidgins -- 6. Discussion -- 7. Conclusion -- REFERENCES -- Some problems with an evolutionary view of written language -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Writing as evolution -- 2.1 The metaphor of evolution -- 2.2 Evolution towards the alphabet -- 3. What gets left out -- 3.1 Two principles of writing systems -- 3.2 The fit between language and writing system -- 3.3 Contact as a mechanism f or change -- 4. Comparing writing systems -- 5. Conclusions -- NOTES -- REFERENCES -- Essentialism in language:a convenient, but fallacious premise -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 2. The rise of essentialism -- 2.1 Stressing developmental history -- 2.2 Making way for synchronic studies -- 2.3 Turning away from evolution in language -- 3. The synchronic approach -- 3.1 The cyclical theories -- 3.2 Genetically coded grammars -- 3.3 The essentialist conception: a convenient premise -- 4. The evidence from linguistics -- 4.1 The evidence from phonology -- 4.1.1 The evolution of obstruents -- 4.1.2 The evolution of vowels -- 4.2 The evidence from morphology -- 4.2.1 The evolution of grammatical markers -- 4.2.2 The evolution of the verbal system -- 4.3 The evidence from syntax -- 4.3.1 The development of subordination -- 4.3.2 Word-order change.

5. Making way for evolution -- NOTE -- REFERENCES -- The invention of the syllable: reflections of a humanist on the biology of language -- Summary -- REFERENCES -- Genetic classification and the historical method -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 1.1 The essentialistic paradox -- 2. Principles of classification: a brief historical account -- 2.1 Biological essentialism -- 2.1.1 Biological evolutionism -- 2.2 Biological classifications and the historical method -- 3. Genetic linguistics -- 3.1 The method -- 3.2 Linguistic typology and the historical method -- 4. The biology of language -- 4.1 Language's origins -- 4.2 Linguistic essentialism -- 4.3 Linguistic evolutionism -- 5. Mechanisms of perception and categorization -- 5.1 Perception -- 5.2 Perception and thought -- 5.3 Analogy and abduction -- 6. Concepts and categories -- 7. Language and culture -- 8. Historical semantics -- 8.1 Iconicity and indexicality -- 8.2 An example of the historical method -- 9. Conclusion -- NOTES -- REFERENCES -- Animal communication and human language: searching for their evolutionary relationship -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Some theoretical considerations on biological evolution -- 3. The evolutionary relationship between animal communication and human language -- 4. A search for the unique feature of human language -- 5. Conclusion -- REFERENCES -- From proto-language to grammar: psychological considerations for the emergence of grammar in language evolution -- Summary -- 1. The initial question -- 2. Communication and the division of labor -- 3. The difference between sense and meaning -- 4. Problems in the motivational background of individual actions within cooperative activities -- 5. The symbolic dimension of practice -- REFERENCES -- The biological imperatives in communicative interaction -- Summary -- REFERENCES.

Ritual/representation as the semiogenetic precursor of hominid symbol use -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Symbolicity continuum -- 3. Ritualization/representation -- 4. Routes and maps -- 5. Conclusion -- REFERENCES -- Language acquisition and the essentialist-evolutionist debate -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Continuity between capacities at the pre-linguistic and linguistic ages -- 3. Speech to children -- 4. Cross cultural comparisons of social processes -- 5. Joint attention and communication -- 6. Social and linguistic input and language acquisition -- 7. How specific are the cognitive processes involved in language acquisition? -- 8. The essentialist-evolutionist debate -- 8.1 The ontogeny of language and the essentialist position -- 8.2 The ontogeny of language and evolution -- 9. Conclusions -- REFERENCES -- Group selection in the biocultural evolution of language: fate of the Neanderthals revisited -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Intergroup competition and hominid evolution: gestural origins of language and glottogenesis -- 3. Implication of language and culture in competition between (and displacement or extinction of) groups in hominid prehistory -- 4. Recent findings in genetics and archaeology: implications for glottogenesis -- 5. Conclusion: the evolutionary and biocultural character of glottogenesis -- NOTES -- REFERENCES -- The biology of language: essentialist vs. evolutionist in the nature of language -- Summary -- 1. Preface -- 2. Limitations of this debate description -- 2.1 The framework -- 3.0 Essentialism -- 3.0.1 Essentialists' "Juxtaposition Theory" -- 3.0.2 CETI -- 3.0.3 Racism -- 3.0.4 Technology, Messianism, and Essentialism -- 3.1 Evolutionism in language -- 3.2 Comparativist -- 4.0 Dramatis personae -- 4.1 Biological Essentialists -- 4.2 Evolutionists -- 4.3 Comparativists.

5.0 Rhetoric, discourse, interaction -- 5.1 The "locus" of language -- NOTES -- REFERENCES -- A possibility of quantum evolution of language -- Summary -- 1. Introductory remarks -- 2. The bioelectronic context of the problem -- 3. Some considerations of the quantum basis of the evolution of language -- REFERENCES -- Biological and cultural factors in the evolution of language -- Summary -- 1. Introduction -- 2. The social environment as selective pressure -- 3. Biologically constructed environments and the evolution of paleolanguage -- 4. Sociocultural differentiation and the origin of modern languages -- 5. Conclusions -- REFERENCES -- Index of names -- Index of terms.