The biological and neurological capacity to symbolize, and the products of behavioral, cognitive, sociocultural, linguistic, and technological uses of symbols (symbolism), are fundamental to every aspect of human life. The Oxford Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution
explores the origins of our characteristically human abilities - our ability to speak, create images, play music, and read and write. The book investigates how symbolization evolved in human evolution and how symbolism is expressed across the various areas of human life. The field is intrinsically interdisciplinary - considering findings from fossil studies, scientific research from primatology, developmental psychology, and of course linguistics.
Written by world leading experts, thirty-eight topical chapters are grouped into six thematic parts that respectively focus on epistemological, psychological, anthropological, ethological, linguistic, and social-technological aspects of human symbolic evolution. The handbook presents an in-depth but comprehensive and interdisciplinary overview of the of the state of the art in the science of human symbolic evolution. This work will be of interest to academics and students active in all fields contributing to the study of human evolution.
1: Nathalie Gontier, Andy Lock, Chris Sinha: Introduction: Current Topics and Debates in Human Symbolic Evolution PART 1: Studying symbolism: Epistemological considerations 2: Nathalie Gontier: The evolution of the biological sciences 3: Nathalie Gontier: The evolution of the symbolic sciences 4: Ian Tattersall: A timeline for the acquisition of symbolic cognition in the human lineage 5: Ana Majkic: Behavioral modernity, evolutionary synergies, and the symbolic species 6: Michael A. Arbib: On the aboutness of language and the evolution of the construction-ready brain 7: Antonio Benítez-Burraco and Dan Dediu: The evolution of language and speech: What we know from genetics PART 2: Pathways to symbolization: Psychological considerations 8: Francesco Suman: The evolution of the human life course: The role of culturally driven plasticity 9: Chris Sinha: Artefacts, symbols, and the socio-cultural dynamics of niche construction 10: Peter Gärdenfors and Anders Högberg: Evolution of intentional teaching 11: Nick J. Enfield and Jack Sidnell: Intersubjectivity is activity plus accountability 12: Camilla Power, Ian Watts, and Chris Knight: The symbolic revolution: A sexual conflict model 13: Maria Botero: Primate parents: Theories, bias, and change in the study of the evolution of parenting PART 3: Symbolic lifeways: Anthropological considerations 14: Elisabeth V. Culley and Iain Davidson: Art, sign, and representation 15: Antonis Iliopoulos and Lambros Malafouris: Symbols and material signs in the debate on human origins 16: April Nowell and Amanda Cooke: Culturing the Paleolithic body: Archaeological signatures of adornment and body modification 17: Rupert Till: The evolution of music: The development of sonic representation and meaning 18: Fabio Silva, Fernando Pimenta, and Luís Tirapicos: Symbolism and archeoastronomy in prehistory 19: Roslyn M. Frank: Exploring the evolutionary pathways from number sense to numeracy PART 4: Grounding symbolism: Ethological considerations 20: Guenther Witzany: How viruses made us human 21: Ulrike Griebel and D. Kimbrough Oller: Animal signals and symbolism 22: Augusta Gaspar: Emotion expression, empathic reception, and prosocial behavior: Are they linked in evolution? 23: David A. Leavens and Kim A. Bard: Primate cognition in captivity 24: Heidi Lyn: Kanzi or can't he? Animal language projects 25: Lana M. Ruck and Natalie T. Uomini: Artifact, praxis, tool, and symbol PART 5: From protolanguage to language: Linguistic considerations 26: Francesco Ferretti: The narrative origins of language 27: Slawomir Wacewicz and Przemyslaw Zywiczynski: Pantomimic conceptions of language origins 28: Tania Kuteva and Bernd Heine: On the structure of early language: Analytic vs holistic language processing and grammaticalization 29: Susan Goldin-Meadow: Gesture is an intrinsic part of modern-day human communication and may always have been so 30: Ulf Liszkowski and Johanna Rüther: Ontogenetic origins of infant pointing 31: Gerd Carling, Chundra Cathcart, and Erich Round: Reconstructing the origins of language families and variation PART 6: Expanding symbolism: Socio-technological considerations 32: Todd Oakley: The origins of money and its role in modernity 33: Prem Poddar: Force fields of the modern: the symbolic contestation of power 34: Alex de Voogt: The evolution of writing systems: An introduction 35: Rukmini Bhaya Nair: Archewriting: The Symbolic Evolution of Script and Narrative 36: Sverker Johansson and Ylva Lindberg: Cybercultures 37: Francis Heylighen: Transcending the rational symbol system: How information and communication technology integrates science, art, philosophy, and spirituality into a global brain 38: Natasha Vita-More: 1. Technoscience, transhumanism, and telos 39: Chris Sinha: Metaphor, myth, and symbol in the grain of time
Nathalie Gontier has a background in philosophy of science and comparative anthropology. Her research investigates how evolutionary theories develop in biology, how they are applied to study symbolic (sociocultural and linguistic) evolution, and how they are depicted in diagrams. She is the founding director of the Applied Evolutionary Epistemology Lab and she currently holds a research position at the Faculty of Science of the University of Lisbon. Her work has been sponsored, amongst others, by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology, the European Marie Curie actions, the American Museum of Natural History, and the John Templeton Foundation. Andy Lock was Professor Emeritus at the School of Psychology at Massey University, New Zealand. With a background in zoology and developmental psychology, his early research focused on the development of communication and language in infancy and early childhood. He was a pioneering researcher in language evolution and human symbolic evolution, and was widely recognised for his work in a broad range of fields including indigenous psychologies, social constructionism and therapeutic practice. He was also known for his innovative and early engagement with online learning and teaching, through his establishment in the 1990s of The Virtual Faculty. Chris Sinha gained his BA in developmental psychology at the University of Sussex, and his doctorate (cum laude) at the University of Utrecht. His research is in the relations between language, cognition and culture in human development and evolution. Methodologically, his research seeks to integrate cognitive linguistic with socio-cultural approaches to language and communication in the construction of a biocultural approach to human symbolic evolution. He is experienced in field experimental and observational methods in human communication and human development. He has published in disciplines including anthropology, linguistics, education, evolutionary biology, connection science, as well as developmental and cultural psychology.
