Evolang 2012 wrap-up

Nuestros amigos at Sintaxi de Butxaca have posted some very nice video interviews with many participants from Evolang 2012, and you can also find coverage at A Replicated Typo here (reaction to Boeckx), here (on Tamariz' poster), here (on Suzkuki, Sakai, & Adachi), here (on L2 learners affecting language change), here (reaction to Fisher), here (reaction to McCrohon), here (reaction to Smith), here (reaction to Piattelli-Palmarini), and even more here. Be sure to check it out!

Recently in the headlines

• SD: Brain's involvement in processing language depends on language's graphic symbols
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• Caltech Today: Do you hear what I hear?
• SD: Scientists ID 2,000 genes in zebra finch linked to singing
• SD: Deafening affects vocal nerve cells within hours
• ArXiv: How to build a speech-jamming gun
• SD: Open your eyes and smell the roses
• SD: Predicting children's language development

Evolution of Language at Poznan

Theory and evidence in language evolution research

PLM2012 Thematic session

http://ifa.amu.edu.pl/plm/2012/Language_evolution

Call for abstracts due April 15, 2012

for the thematic session on September 8-10, 2012.

Organisers: Przemysław Żywiczyński (Nicolaus Copernicus University, Toruń); Sławomir Wacewicz (Nicolaus Copernicus University, Toruń); Luke McCrohon (University of Tokyo)

Invited speaker: Prof. Jim Hurford (University of Edinburgh)

The problem of the emergence of the uniquely human ability to acquire language was traditionally perceived to be as intriguing as it was elusive, leading to reflections that were interesting but conjectural. Even thirty years ago it was fair for linguists to claim that the phylogeny of language was irrelevant to linguistic research, constituting a proprietary area of mythological, religious or philosophical reflection (e.g. Fisiak 1985). The rapid advances that the research area of language evolution (Evolution of Language or EoL, for short) has seen recently testify to a profound change in that perception. These changes result from many breakthroughs, some in disciplines such as primatology or genetics, some in linguistics itself, reflecting its closer alliances with neighbouring fields. While gesturology, pidginisation and creolisation, computational models, and language acquisition have so far been the main sources of evidence, the EoL studies have recently been complemented e.g. by statistical analyses over bodies of linguistic data (e.g. Atkinson 2011, Dunn et al. 2011).

The evolution of language can be approached from at least two major perspectives:

• of evolutionary changes leading to the development of the biological potential for language, or
• of mechanisms of the cultural evolution of the communicative code.

However, such efforts remain grounded in a higher-order theoretical discussion touching upon the foundations of modern linguistic theory, e.g. concerning the status of language universals or the notion of the “faculty of language” (cf. the debate between Chomsky, Hauser, Fitch, and Pinker and Jackendoff).

The aims of the session can be summarised as follows:

• to assess the present range of available evidence and to discuss the status of the new sources of evidence
• to assess the role of theoretical syntheses and holistic scenarios of language emergence and evolution
• to identify the ways in which linguistic methodologies can be made relevant to answering the ‘origins’ type questions,
• to identify the limitations of linguistic methodologies alone and thus directions of interdisciplinary collaboration
• to bridge the gap between conceptions of evidence in biology and linguistics

Recently in the headlines

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• NS: Young goats can develop distinct accents
• NS: The only primate to communicate in pure ultrasound
• NYT: They're, like, way ahead of the linguistic currrrve

Recently in the headlines

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• SD: Scientists decode brain waves to eavesdrop on what we hear
• ScienceNOW: Do dolphins speak whale in their sleep?
• CBS: The secret language of elephants (2010 from 60 Minutes that replayed recently)
• Royal Soc B: Rejection of a serial founder effects model of genetic & linguistic coevolution

Biolinguistics in Japan

The website for the Biolinguistics Project, Japan is here: http://www.bioling.jp/english/

Please visit http://www.bioling.jp/english/events/ for information about biolinguistic events in Kyoto this March:

Kyoto Conference on Biolinguistics

- The Human Language Faculty: Its Design, Development and Evolution -

 March 12, Monday, 2012, 10am – 6pm

Shirankaikan Inamori Hall, Kyoto University, Medical School Area

Yoshida Konoe-cho, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8501, Japan [ access map ]

Special Lectures

Cedric Boeckx (ICREA/University of Barcelona) Clarifying the Content of the Third Factor in Language Design

Denis Bouchard (University of Quebec at Montreal) Solving the UG Problem

Naoki Fukui (Sophia University) Merge and (A)symmetry

Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini (University of Arizona) (in collaboration with Juan Uriagereka and David Medeiros) Steps towards the Physics of Language

Charles Yang (University of Pennsylvania) Toward a Natural History of Language

Following KCB, EVOLANG IX will be held at Campus Plaza Kyoto on March 13-16, 2012. There will be five workshops on the first day, two of them co-organized by the Biolinguistics Project Japan:

 Theoretical Linguistics/Biolinguistics

Invited Speakers:

• Cedric Boeckx & Youngmi Jeong
• Denis Bouchard
• Anna Maria Di Sciullo
• Angel Gallego
• Koji Sugisaki

Organizers: Roger Martin (Yokohama National University) & Koji Fujita (Kyoto University)

Contact Address: martin@ynu.ac.jp

Language and Brain

Invited Speakers:

• Michael A. Arbib (University of Southern California):  Evolving the Direct Path in Praxis as a Bridge to Duality of Patterning in Language
• Stefano F. Cappa (Vita-Salute University and San Raffaele Scientific Institute):  Imaging Syntax and Semantics in the Brain

Organizers: Noriaki Yusa (Miyagi Gakuin Women’s University) & Hajime Ono (Kinki University)

Contact Address: n_yusa@me.com

Recently in the headlines

• PLoS Computational Biology: A hierarchical neuronal model for generation & online recognition of birdsongs
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• NS: Do thoughts have a language of their own?
• SD: Babies track word patterns long before word-learning starts
• SD: Synesthesia linked to a hyper-excitable brain
• SD: To children (but not adults) a rose by any other name is still a rose
• SD: Children don't give words special power to categorize their world
• NS: Pigeons match monkeys in abstract counting skills
• SD: I know something you don't know! Wild chimpanzees inform ignorant group members of danger
• SD: Bat brains parse sounds for multitasking
• NS: Learn language faster with gestures
• SD: Deaf sign language users pick up faster on body language