The-origin-of-language.doc

The Origin of Language

Keywords: Origin, Language, Creation, Invention, Evolution

Scholars have been studying the origin of language for years. Various theories have been suggested on the subject, but we still have not got a definitive conclusion. Here we will introduce the major theories in regard to the origin of language, which can be grouped under three broad categories: Creation, Invention, and Evolution.

1. Creation (Divine Origin)
To put it simply, the Divine Origin theory refers that human beings have received their language from God, which is obviously a theory with religious coloring.
Almost every religion has stories about how man received language from God, but the best known story can be seen in the book of Genesis. The Lord God created the trees and the rivers, and then “formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto the man what he would call them; and whatsoever the man called every living creature, that was the name thereof. And the man gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air and to every beast of the field”.[1]
However, it is impossible for man to name things without acquiring language.[2] Divine Origin lacks scientific evidence and foundation, and is obviously not correct.

2. Invention
With the advancement of science and the rise of rationalism, more and more people began to support the Invention theory, which means that language was invented by human themselves. But scholars differ in the idea of how humans exactly invented language. Major theories are as follows:
l Gestures
Those who support this theory think that humans had no language at first, they used gestures to express themselves just as we use gestures to talk to strangers using different languages. Gestures indeed played an important role in the early-stage of language development. However, there would be many limitations if gestures are used as an independent means of communication. For instance, it is not able to express abstract and complicate concepts.
l Pooh-pooh theory
Those who hold this view state that language at first consisted of interjections to express emotions like pain, fear, surprise, pleasure, anger, and so on. However, the amount of interjections in language is small. Moreover, interjections are used to express emotions directly, which does not mean that they could be used as the names of these emotions. And words that could express human’s emotions are not limited just as interjections.
l Bow-bow theory (Ding-dong theory)
This theory sees the origin of language in the imitation of natural sounds and seeks to explain the correspondence between sound and meaning. They point to words such as the moo (of a cow), the cockadoodle doo (of a rooster), and the bowbow (of a dog), that tends to “imitate” the sounds of nature, as proof of human invention of language.[3] The rather simple-minded nature of such a theory earned its name such as “bow-wow” and “ding-dong”.But we find that such “nature” words are extremely few. In fact, they form only a small percentage of a language’s vocabulary and even vary from language to language.[4] It is not all correct.
l Yo-he-ho theory
In the 1970s, L. Noire put forward the labour shout theory, which is also named yo-he-ho theory. He proposed that with the shoutings primitive people emit when they were working, language was formed. The word heave and haul were formed in this way. But this kind of words are extremely few.
l Social Contract Theory
Scholars who support this theory believe that for the inconvenience of the absence of language had brought, somehow there was a council meeting at which people gave the “correct” and “natural” names to everything on earth, thus the problem could be solved. But this theory is illogic for the reason that since there were no language and communication means, how could the attendees of the meeting hold the discussion?

Compared to Creation theory, Invention theory is certainly a progressive step. However, on the whole, different hypotheses of Invention are one-sided. It can be reasonable only for some certain parts of speech, but can not explain the origin of language fundamentally.[5]

3. Evolution
Biologists, anthropologists, neurologists, primatologists, and linguists have done a wide range of studies in the origin of language. In 1876, Engels published the book Dialetics of Nature, which involved the origin of language. The publishing of the book again aroused people’s enthusiasm to searching for the answer to the question. In the book, Engels pointed out that language are formed to satisfy the need of communication in the process of collective labour, and are created concurrently with human’s abstract thinking. Labour created man as well as man’s language in the meantime. That is to say, labour created the physiological, physical, thinking and social premise which were the foundation of the emergence of language.
Engels’ view is based on the achievements that had been made in the field of diversified subjects especially in Biological Evolution in the 19th century. His theory, that language was originated from labour, is undoubtedly correct. It answers the premise of the origin of language: Laour decided the need of language, and created the possibility of its emergence. However, being limited to scientific knowledge of that time, he was not able to explain or provide concrete clues of the origin of language. “Need” does not equal to reality, and could not created language by itself.[6]
Apart from Engels, other scholars also did some researches.
Some have looked at the problem of whether primitive man had the physiological capacity to speak. The reports show that the human vocal tract evolved from a non-human primate form to facilitate efficient communication. Some hold that learning to use tools and learning language are interrelated skills. With the development of the human society, man learned to use tools by hand and tools promoted the development of speech, because learning involved language. As tools came to be used for more advanced purposes, food would be stored, so that there were intervals between meals, and thus more time available for the mouth to be put to other use---such as the development of language (Crystal,1987:291)[7]
But these theories are not as scientific as Engels’s theory.

On the whole, in regard to the theories of the origin of language, Invention is a progressive step compared to Creation, and is less progressive compared to Evolution.[8] We still hold the view that there is no definitive conclusion. We should say that the advancement of modern scientific technology and the deeper research in some relevant subjects may provide more convenience to uncover the mystery of the origin of language.
References:
[1] Yang Xinzhang, An Introduction to Linguistics[M], Higher Education Press, 2005, Page 22;
[2] Yang Xinzhang, An Introduction to Linguistics[M], Higher Education Press, 2005, Page 22;
[3] Yang Xinzhang, An Introduction to Linguistics[M], Higher Education Press, 2005, Page 23;
[4] Yang Xinzhang, An Introduction to Linguistics[M], Higher Education Press, 2005, Page 24;
[5] 王远新, 语言学教程[M]，中央民族大学出版社, 2009年，第24页；
[6] 王远新, 语言学教程[M]，中央民族大学出版社，2009年，第25页；
[7] Yang Xinzhang, An Introduction to Linguistics[M], Higher Education Press, 2005, Page 23;
[8] 王远新，语言学教程[M]，中央民族大学出版社, 2009年, 第28页；