Book Review: Evolingo, or Evolutionary Psychology Meets Linguistics:
Abstract
Evolutionary Psychology www.epjournal.net – 2008. 6(2): 213-216 ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯ Book Review Evolingo, or Evolutionary Psychology Meets Linguistics A review of Christine Kenneally, The First Word: The Search for the Origins of Language. Penguin Group: New York, 2007, US$26.95, 357pp. ISBN 978-0-670-03490-1 (hardback) Erika Hoff, Department of Psychology, Florida Atlantic University, Davie, FL, USA. Email: ehoff@fau.edu. The capacity for language is central to what it means to be human and, thus, the question of how language came to be should be central to the question of human origins. For a long time, however, this question received no serious scientific attention. There were theories, to be sure—the “bow-wow” theory that language arose from imitations of animal calls, the “ding-dong” theory that language arose from imitations of physical noises, and the “heave-ho” theory that language arose from sounds accompanying physical exertion (see Pinker and Bloom, 1990). But these theories were speculations, and scientific study of the evolution of a phenomenon that leaves no physical artifacts or fossil traces seemed hopeless when the primary method of research was literally to dig for clues. One indication of the stature of the field 150 years ago is the famous ban on any papers concerning language origins