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This book proposes a radical alternative to dominant views of the evolution of language, in particular the origins of syntax. The authors draw on evidence from areas such as primatology, anthropology, and linguistics to present a groundbreaking account of the notion that language emerged through visible bodily action. Written in a clear and accessible style, Gesture and the Nature of Language will be indispensable reading for all those interested in the origins of language.
William C. Stokoe offers here in his final book his formula for the
development of language in humans: gesture-to-language-to-speech.
He refutes the recently entrenched principles that humans have a
special, innate learning faculty for language and that speech
equates with language. Integrating current findings in linguistics,
semiotics, and anthropology, Stokoe fashions a closely-reasoned
argument that suggests how our human ancestors' powers of
observation and natural hand movements could have evolved into
signed morphemes. Stokoe also proposes how the primarily gestural
expression of language with vocal support shifted to primarily
vocal language with gestural accompaniment. When describing this
transition, however, he never loses sight of the significance of
humans in the natural world and the role of environmental stimuli
in the development of language. Stokoe illustrates this contention
with fascinating observations of small, contemporary ethnic groups
such as the Assiniboin Nakotas, a Native American group from
Montana. Stokoe concludes Language in Hand with an hypothesis on
how the acceptance of sign language as the first language of humans
could revolutionize the education of infants, both deaf and
hearing, who, like early humans, have the full capacity for
language without speech.
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