🗣️
HC1: Introduction
Date @31/03/2025
courses 🎤 Evolution of language and music
Lecture
1. Uniqueness of language
What is special about human language?
Starting point: design features by Charles Hocket: useful for studying this more precisely
1. Meaning of language
Are these features unique to humans?
word meanings are conventional and (8) arbitrary: no direct connection between a word’s form and its
meaning
example: long words for big animals: whale
❌ arbitrariness in other animals: e.g vervet monkey alarm calls, different calls for different predators to
elicit different reactions
but this might be largely innate and not learned
words and their meanings are learned
❌ also vocal learning in other animals
learning fase in songbirds, need to hear adults singing to produce songs
seal adopted by fishermen produces sounds that sound like human words
languages are transmitted culturally and slowly change over generations, giving rise to an enormous variety
❌ cultural transmission in whales
songs do not have meaning (as far as we know), so we can’t say anything about arbitrariness
2. Language structure
1. inventory of meaningless units: sounds/vowels = phonemes
minimal difference in sound that corresponds to a difference in meaning
minimal pairs: e.g bed / bad / bet / bat
phonemes are different in every language and dialect, but phonemic coding is universal
2. inventory of meaningful units: words
(7) semanticity: arbitrary signals transmit meaningful messages
HC1: Introduction 1
HC1: Introduction
Date @31/03/2025
courses 🎤 Evolution of language and music
Lecture
1. Uniqueness of language
What is special about human language?
Starting point: design features by Charles Hocket: useful for studying this more precisely
1. Meaning of language
Are these features unique to humans?
word meanings are conventional and (8) arbitrary: no direct connection between a word’s form and its
meaning
example: long words for big animals: whale
❌ arbitrariness in other animals: e.g vervet monkey alarm calls, different calls for different predators to
elicit different reactions
but this might be largely innate and not learned
words and their meanings are learned
❌ also vocal learning in other animals
learning fase in songbirds, need to hear adults singing to produce songs
seal adopted by fishermen produces sounds that sound like human words
languages are transmitted culturally and slowly change over generations, giving rise to an enormous variety
❌ cultural transmission in whales
songs do not have meaning (as far as we know), so we can’t say anything about arbitrariness
2. Language structure
1. inventory of meaningless units: sounds/vowels = phonemes
minimal difference in sound that corresponds to a difference in meaning
minimal pairs: e.g bed / bad / bet / bat
phonemes are different in every language and dialect, but phonemic coding is universal
2. inventory of meaningful units: words
(7) semanticity: arbitrary signals transmit meaningful messages
HC1: Introduction 1
