This handbook provides a detailed account of the many methodological tools and approaches used in the field of language evolution. The field has seen a rapid growth over the last decade, with a greater focus on empirical data and interdisciplinary syntheses. This volume aims to make sense of these recent developments, to provide a clear map of the current research landscape, and to showcase some of the most important advances. Each chapter highlights a particular methodology and outlines a question or set of questions that can be addressed using that methodology, illustrated by a key example from the recent literature.
The volume is divided into three parts. Part I showcases the many ways in which humans can shed light on the evolution of language when placed in specific experimental settings, as well as discussing the use of clinical, genetic, observational and historical data. Part II is devoted to simulations and models that enable the careful control of biases, mechanisms, and environments, while Part III revolves around the idea that the study of non-human animals can provide valuable insights into the evolution of human language. The handbook as a whole demonstrates that multiple complimentary approaches are necessary to do justice to the complexity of language evolution.
Limor Raviv and Cedric Boeckx: Introduction Part I. Human data 1: Monica Tamariz and Aliki Papa: Iterated learning experiments 2: Shira Tal, Inbal Arnon, and Jennifer Culbertson: Artificial language learning 3: Thomas Franz Müller and Limor Raviv: Communication experiments: Social interaction in the formation of novel communication systems 4: Jonas Nölle and David Peeters: Virtual reality as a tool to study language evolution 5: Vera Kempe and Marisa Casillas: Studying child-directed speech 6: Stefan Hartmann and Michael Pleyer: Corpus-based approaches to evolutionary dynamics in language 7: Caleb Everett: Adaptation 8: Wendy Sandler, Svetlana Dachkovsky, and Rose Stamp: The evolution of the grammar of the body in sign languages 9: Danielle Naegeli and Marieke Schouwstra: Silent gesture: Gesture studies with hearing participants 10: Anita Slonimska and Asli Özyürek: Methods to study evolution of iconicity in sign languages 11: Damian Blasi, Felicia Bisnath, and Pui Yiu Szeto: The study of Creole languages 12: Juan Moriano, Cedrix Boeckx, and Martin Kuhlwilm: Paleogenomics: A window into the genetic basis of derived traits in Homo sapiens 13: Yakov Pichkar and Nicole Creanza: Joint analysis of human linguistic and genomic variation 14: Maxime Derex and Charlotte Brand: Studying long-term evolutionary processes over short time scales: Methods in cumulative cultural evolution 15: Isobel Wisher and Kristian Tylén: An integrative approach to early symbolic evolution: Experimenting with the past Part II. Simulations 16: Vanessa Ferdinand: The Bayesian iterated learning model 17: Xenia Ohmer and Christine Cuskley: Communication games: Modelling language evolution through dyadic agent interactions 18: Katie Mudd and Bart de Boer: Computational methods for language variation and convergence 19: Mathieu Rita, Paul Michel, Rahma Chaabouni, Olivier Pietquin, Emmanuel Dupoux, and Florian Strub: Language evolution with deep learning 20: Nicolas Cambier and Roman Miletitch: Task-driven language evolution with swarm robotics 21: Chundra Cathcart and Balthasar Bickel: Linguistic evolution in time and space: Addressing the methodological challenges 22: Francis Mollica and Noga Zaslavsky: Information-theoretic and machine-learning methods for semantic categorization 23: Kateryna Krykoniuk and Seán G. Roberts: Causal graphs as a tool for exploring language evolution Part III. Animal data 24: Marco Gamba and Chiara De Gregorio: Observational work 25: Erica A. Cartmill, Emilie Genty, Kirsty E. Graham, Charlotte Grund, and Catherine Hobaiter: Re-imagining great ape gesture (coding) 26: Simone Pika and Ray Wilkinson: Evolutionary roots of human cooperative communication: Using the CA-assisted comparative approach for quantitative and qualitative analyses 27: Marlen Fröhlich and Carel P. van Schaik: From species- to individual-level comparisons: What variation in great ape communication can tell us about language evolution 28: Mélissa Berthet, Maël Leroux, Simon W. Townsend, and Stuart K. Watson: ethods of examining the processing and production of rule-based sequences in animals 29: Daria Valente and Andrea Ravignani: Bioacoustics and rhythm 30: Ronald J. Planer, Elisa Bandini, and Claudio Tennie: Hominin tool evolution and its (surprising) relation to language origins 31: Nicole Eichert and Rogier B. Mars: Comparative neuroimaging to study the neural infrastructure for language 32: Toshitaka N. Suzuki: How to study animal syntax
Limor Raviv leads the Language Evolution and Adaptation in Diverse Situations (LEADS) group at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, and is also a part-time lecturer in social interaction at the University of Glasgow. Her work simulates language evolution and diversification de novo and in silico by using a range of experimental and computational tools. She aims to uncover the major social, cognitive, and environmental pressures that shape human languages past and present, and to link core aspects of learning, cultural evolution, and ecology to explain the emergence and cross-linguistic variation of languages. Cedric Boeckx is a research professor at ICREA, and the principal investigator of the Cognitive Biology of Language research group at the University of Barcelona, as well as a member of the University of Barcelona Institutes of Neuroscience and of Complex Systems. His current research focuses on the neurobiological foundations of the human language faculty, with special emphasis on evolutionary issues. His work is intended to facilitate integration among disciplines with the aim of achieving both better experimental testing of theoretical hypotheses and more solid interpretations of experimental findings.
