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| Authoritative: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conb.2007.03.011 (Publisher's PDF... likely be available here.) |
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Abstract
Much debate has been stimulated by the recent hypothesis that human language consists of a faculty that is shared with non-human animals (faculty of language in a broad sense; FLB) and a faculty that is specific to human language (faculty of language in a narrow sense; FLN). This hypothesis has encouraged a tendency to emphasize one component of FLN: the cognitive operation of recursion. In consequence, non-syntactical, yet unique, aspects of human language have been neglected. One of these properties consists of vocal learning that enables an abundance of learned syllables. I suggest that FLN is not an independent faculty, but an 'emergent' property, arising from interactions between several other non-syntactical subfaculties of FLB, including vocal learning ability.BibTex
@article{okanoya07neurobiologyOfLangEv,
author={Kazuo Okanoya},
title={Language evolution and an emergent property.},
journal={Curr Opin Neurobiol},
year={2007},
month={Apr},
volume={17},
number={2},
pages={271--276},
doi={10.1016/j.conb.2007.03.011},
url={http://www.isrl.uiuc.edu/~amag/langev/paper/okanoya07neurobiologyOfLangEv.html}
}