Russian archaeologist, Ph.D. D., leading researcher of the Department of Paleolithic Archeology of the Institute of the History of Material Culture of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IIMK RAS, St. Petersburg).
“From the heat, the bamboo cracked and splinters
dispersed in different directions. So the first
people appeared hands and feet, and on the head
- eyes, ears and nostrils. But here it resounded especially
loud crack: "Waaah!". It's in the first people
their mouths opened and they were speechless.”
"Myths and Traditions of the Papuans Marind-Anim".
In almost any large work on the origin of language, one can find a mention of the fact that there were times in the history of science when this topic enjoyed a very bad reputation among scientists, and prohibitions were even imposed on its consideration. So, in particular, the Parisian Linguistic Society acted in 1866, introducing an appropriate clause into its charter, which then existed in it for decades. In general, it is not difficult to understand the reason for such discrimination: too many, based on nothing but imagination, not based, purely speculative, and even semi-fantastic theories, once gave rise to a discussion of the problem that interests us. As noted by O.A. Donskikh, in fact, the word "theory" in many such cases sanctified some elementary consideration, which then, thanks to an unrestrained flight of fancy, grew by various authors into pictures of the origin of speech. one
Now there are no formal prohibitions on discussing anything, but the topic of the origin of the language does not cease to be less slippery for this. If, thanks to archeology, there is information about the early stages of the evolution of material culture, although far from exhaustive, but still sufficient for some general reconstructions, then the early stages of the evolution of linguistic behavior have to be judged mainly by indirect data. Therefore, today, as in the 19th century, the topic of this section continues to give rise to many speculative assumptions and hypotheses based not so much on facts as on their absence. In such a situation, it is especially important to clearly distinguish between what we really know and what we can only assume with a greater or lesser degree of probability. Alas, we must immediately admit that the overall balance here is far from being in favor of the reliably known.
First of all, let's try to formulate the problem as clearly as possible. What, in fact, do we seek to learn and understand by exploring the origin of the language? To begin with, let us recall that we have agreed to call language any system of differentiated signs corresponding to differentiated concepts. This definition, as well as the definition of what a sign is, was already discussed in Chapter 4. Although language is often identified with speech, in principle any of the five senses can serve to transmit and perceive signs. The deaf-mute communicate by sight, the blind read and write by touch, it is quite easy to imagine the language of smells or taste sensations. Thus, despite the fact that for the vast majority of people, language is, first of all, sound, the problem of the origin of language is much broader than the problem of the origin of speech. The ability to use language can be exercised in many ways, not necessarily in sound form. Our speech is only one of the possible forms of sign communication, and the verbal-sound language underlying it is only one of the possible types of languages.
The problem of the origin of the language can be represented as a series of separate, albeit closely interrelated issues. Firstly, I would like to understand why the language was needed at all. Secondly, it is necessary to understand how its biological foundation was formed, i.e. organs serving for the formation, transmission and perception of linguistic signs. Thirdly, it would be interesting to try to imagine how these signs themselves were formed, and what they originally represented. Finally, the questions of when, in what epoch and at what stage of human evolution the language ability was formed and when it was realized stand apart. Let us consider all the selected aspects of the problem of the origin of language in the order in which we have listed them here.
So why does language appear at all? Does it arise in connection with the need to improve the ways of exchanging information, or only as a means of thinking? Which of these two functions was the original, main, and which was the secondary, derivative? What came first - language or thought? Is thought possible without language?
Some scientists are firmly convinced that the mind, thinking, is a product of language, and not vice versa. Even T. Hobbes believed that initially language served not communication, but only thinking, and some modern authors think the same way. 2 Others, on the contrary, are convinced that language is a means of communicating thoughts, not producing them, and, therefore, thinking is independent of language and has its own genetic roots and compositional structure. “For me, there is no doubt that our thinking proceeds mainly bypassing symbols (words) and, moreover, unconsciously,” wrote, for example, A. Einstein, and zoopsychologists have long been talking about “preverbal concepts” that higher animals have. In light of what we now know about the great apes, the second view seems more plausible. Their example shows that thinking, if we mean the formation of concepts and operating with them, clearly arises before the ability to communicate these concepts, i.e. before language. Of course, having arisen, the language began to serve as an instrument of thinking, but this role was still, most likely, secondary, derived from the main one, which was the communicative function.
According to a very popular and quite plausible hypothesis, initially the need for the formation of a language was associated, first of all, with the complication of social life in hominin associations. It was already mentioned in the first chapter that in primates there is a fairly stable direct relationship between the size of the cerebral cortex and the number of communities characteristic of a given species. The English primatologist R. Dunbar, starting from the fact of such a correlation, proposed an original hypothesis of the origin of the language. He noticed that there is a direct relationship not only between the relative size of the cerebral cortex and the size of groups, but also between their size and the amount of time that members of each group spend on grooming. 3 Grooming, in addition to the fact that it performs purely hygienic functions, also plays an important socio-psychological role. It helps to relieve tension in relationships between individuals, establish friendly relations between them, maintain cohesion within groups and preserve their integrity. However, the amount of time spent on grooming cannot increase indefinitely without compromising other vital activities (foraging, sleeping, etc.). Therefore, it is logical to assume that when hominid communities reach a certain threshold value of abundance, it should become necessary to replace or, in any case, supplement grooming with some other means of ensuring social stability, less time-consuming, but no less effective. According to Dunbar, language became such a means. True, it remains unclear what could have caused the constant growth in the size of groups, but it is possible that, speaking of hominids, the leading role should be given not to the quantitative change of communities (as Dunbar believes), but to their qualitative complication due to the emergence of new areas of social life. , new aspects of relationships, and also required an increase in the time spent on grooming.
We will return to Dunbar's hypothesis when we talk about the time of the origin of language, and now we will turn to the question of what anatomical organs our ancestors should have needed when they finally came to the conclusion that they had something to say to each other, and how these bodies evolved. Of course, our cognitive capabilities in this area are severely limited due to the specifics of fossil material - we have to judge everything only by bones, and, as a rule, anthropologists have much fewer of them than we would like - but still something interesting you can find out.
The development of the brain has been and is being studied most intensively. The main material for such studies is the so-called endocrine reflux, i.e. dummies of the brain cavity (Fig. 7.1). They make it possible to get an idea not only about the volume of the brain of fossil forms, but also about some important features of its structure, which are reflected in the relief of the inner surface of the skull. So. It has long been observed that the endocranial tides of late Australopithecus, and in particular of Australopithecus africanus, show bulges in some of the areas where the main speech centers are thought to be located in humans. Three such centers are usually distinguished, but one of them, located on the medial surface of the frontal lobe of the brain, does not leave an imprint on the bones of the skull, and therefore it is impossible to judge the degree of its development and its very existence in fossil hominids. The other two leave such prints. These are Broca's field (stress on the last syllable), associated with the lateral surface of the left frontal lobe, and Wernicke's field, also located on the lateral surface of the left hemisphere at the border of the parietal and temporal regions (Fig. 7.2). On the endocranial tides of Australopithecus africanus, the presence of Broca's field is noted, and in one case, Wernicke's field was also presumably identified. The first members of the genus Homo both of these structures are already quite distinct.
While understanding the evolution of the brain is important for evaluating the capacity for language behavior in general, studying the structure of the respiratory and vocal organs of fossil hominids sheds light on the development of the speech ability necessary for our verbal-sound language. 4 One area of this kind of research, called paleolaryngology, aims to reconstruct the upper airways of our ancestors. Reconstructions are possible due to the fact that the anatomy of the base of the skull (basicranium) to some extent reflects some features of the soft tissues of the upper respiratory tract. In particular, there is a relationship between the degree of curvature of the base of the skull and the position of the larynx in the throat: with a slightly curved base, the larynx is located high, and with a strongly curved base, it is much lower. The last feature, i.e. low location of the larynx, characteristic only for people. True, in children under two years of age, the larynx is located as high as in animals (which, by the way, gives them and animals the opportunity to eat and breathe almost simultaneously), and only in the third year of life does it begin to descend (which allows you to better and more articulate sounds, but poses a risk of choking).
In order to reconstruct changes in the position of the larynx during human evolution, basicraniums of fossil hominids have been studied. Australopithecus has been found to be much closer in this respect to the great apes than to modern humans. Consequently, their vocal repertoire was most likely very limited. Changes in the modern direction began at the stage of Homo erectus: analysis of the skull of KNM-ER 3733, about 1.5 million years old, revealed a rudimentary bending of the basicranium. On the skulls of early paleoanthropes, about half a million years old, a complete bend is already recorded, close to that characteristic of modern people. The situation with Neanderthals is somewhat more complicated, but, most likely, their larynx was located low enough so that they could pronounce all the sounds necessary for articulate speech. We will return to this topic again in the next chapter.
Another organ associated with speech activity is the diaphragm, which provides the precise control of breathing necessary for rapid, articulate speech. In modern humans, one consequence of this diaphragmatic function is an increase in the number of nerve cell bodies in the spinal cord of the thoracic vertebrae, resulting in an enlargement of the thoracic spinal canal compared to other primates. It is possible that such an expansion already occurred among the archanthropes, as evidenced by some finds from the eastern shore of Lake Turkana. True, there are materials that contradict this conclusion. In particular, judging by the thoracic vertebrae of the skeleton from Nariokotome in East Africa (about 1.6 million years old), its owner was closer to apes than to modern humans in the respect we are interested in. On the contrary, Neanderthals practically do not differ from us in terms of the trait under consideration.
Of great importance for the development of the speech abilities of fossil hominids, of course, were changes in the size and structure of the jaws and oral cavity, organs that are most directly involved in the articulation of sounds. The bulky, heavy jaws of most early hominids, such as Australopithecus massive (it was named massive because of the large size of the jaws and teeth), could be a serious obstacle to fluent speech, even if the brain and respiratory organs were they were no different from ours. However, soon after the appearance of the genus Homo this issue has been largely resolved. In any case, judging by the structure of the bones of the oral part of the skull, belonging to members of the Homo erectus species, they could make all the movements of the tongue necessary in order to successfully articulate vowels and consonants.
To many authors who touch upon the problem of the origin of language in one way or another, the most important thing in it seems to be the question of the natural sources and stages of the genesis of linguistic signs. How did they arise? In what form: verbal, gestural, or otherwise? What were the sources of their formation, how was a certain meaning attached to them? Often these questions simply obscure the whole problem. Meanwhile, they are, in general, secondary. They would be of paramount importance only if we returned to the concept of the intellectual gulf separating man and animals. Then the problem that interests us would be a match for the problem, say, of the origin of the living from the non-living. In fact, however, as I tried to show in one of the previous chapters, the formation of the signs of human language is rather the development of an already existing quality than the emergence of an absolutely new quality. Denying the abyss thus significantly lowers the rank of the question. It is in many ways akin to, for example, the question of whether our ancestors made their first tools from stone, bone, or wood, and perhaps even less hope to get a convincing answer to it someday. Both, of course, are extremely curious, awaken the imagination, give scope for many hypotheses, but at the same time, they are very reminiscent of such a fragment of a crossword puzzle with which no other line intersects and the solution of which, therefore, although interesting in itself , does little to solve the crossword puzzle as a whole.
There are two main points of view regarding the origin of linguistic signs. One is that they originally had a verbal-sound character and grew out of various kinds of natural vocalizations characteristic of our distant ancestors, while the other suggests that the sound language was preceded by sign language, which could have been formed on the basis of facial expressions and various movements that are so widely represented. in the communication repertoire of many monkeys. Within each of these two directions, speech and gesture, many competing hypotheses coexist. They consider various types of natural sounds and movements as source material for the genesis of linguistic signs and draw the details of the reconstructed processes in different ways. Over the years of disputes between supporters of opposing hypotheses, many interesting, witty, or simply funny ideas have been expressed by them. Some of them are able to strike the most sophisticated imagination. So, in one of the classic works of the speech direction, the authors, giving free rein to their imagination and wanting to emphasize the irreducibility of the problem of the origin of language to the question of the evolution of the vocal organs, point to the theoretical possibility that, in a slightly different scenario of anatomical realities, speech could, in principle, be carried non-verbally. - sound, and sphincter-sound character. 5 It remains only to thank nature for not taking advantage of this opportunity.
One of the most famous and realistic scenarios of how the natural (innate) communication system of early hominids could turn into an artificial verbal-sound language was proposed by the American linguist C. Hockett. He paid special attention to the theme of the transformation of genetically fixed vocalizations of animals into words, explaining how and why individual sounds (phonemes) were formed into certain semantic combinations (morphemes) and how a certain meaning was assigned to the latter. Hockett noticed that the communication system of our distant ancestors, being closed, i.e. consisting of a limited number of signals attached to an equally limited number of phenomena, inevitably had to undergo a radical transformation if it became necessary to designate an increasing number of objects. The first step in such a transformation, leading to the transformation of a closed system into an open one, could, in his opinion, be an increase in the phonetic diversity of vocalizations. However, this path is naturally limited and, moreover, fraught with an increase in the number of errors both in the production of sounds, and especially in their perception, since the differences between individual sounds, as their number increased, had to become more and more subtle and difficult to perceive. Consequently, while maintaining the tendency to increase the number of objects, phenomena and relationships that required designation, a more effective way to increase the information capacity of the communication system became necessary. A natural solution to the problem was to give meaning not to individual, even complex sounds, but to their easily distinguishable and numerically unlimited combinations. Thus, according to Hockett, sounds became phonological components, and pre-language became language.
However, one cannot discount the hypothesis according to which language was originally sign language. Monkeys are known to communicate through several sensory channels, but vocalizations often serve not to convey specific information, but only to draw attention to gestural or other signals. In this regard, it is sometimes argued that a blind animal in the primate community would be much more disadvantaged in terms of communication than a deaf animal. The hypothesis of the existence of a subsonic stage in the development of language can also be supported by the fact that the artificial signs used by chimpanzees (both in nature and under experimental conditions) are gestural, while sound signals, apparently, are innate. Figurativeness, or, as they sometimes say, iconicity, which is inherent in visual signs to a much greater extent than in sound ones, is another property that could provide the historical priority of gestural communication. It is much easier to create a recognizable image of an object or action with hand movements than with movements of the lips and tongue.
The fact that speech was preceded by sign language, the development of which then led to the emergence of the language of exclamations, was written by Condillac. E. Taylor, LG Morgan, A. Wallace, W. Wundt and some other classics of anthropology, biology and philosophy also adhered to similar views. N. Ya. Marr wrote about "kinetic speech" that preceded sound speech. As for the present, now the number of adherents of the idea of the initial gestural stage in the history of language almost exceeds the number of those who believe that the language was originally sound. Various scenarios for the emergence and evolution of sign language to a sound language or in parallel with it have been proposed by a number of linguists, primatologists, and anthropologists. They have to solve, in general, the same essentially the same problems that the "speech people" are struggling with, and besides, they also have to explain how and why sign language eventually turned into sound. “If spoken language was preceded by sign language, then the problem of glottogenesis is the problem of the emergence of sign language. But it, in turn, remains the problem of the origin of language. In the same way as in the case of sounds, it is necessary to indicate the sources of the development of gestures, explain the reason that gestures have received a certain meaning, and describe the syntax of the sign language. If this is done, then the problem of the emergence of a spoken language becomes the problem of the displacement of gestures by the sounds accompanying them. 6
In principle, by the way, it cannot be ruled out that the formation of the language was originally polycentric in nature, i.e. occurred independently in several geographically isolated hominin populations. In this case, the process could proceed in very different forms, but there is no way to reconstruct them, or even simply assess the degree of plausibility of such a hypothesis.
One of the main, or perhaps the most important feature of our language, which clearly distinguishes it from the communication systems of monkeys and other animals, is the presence of syntax. Some researchers, who attach particular importance to this feature, believe that it is precisely and only with the advent of syntax that one can speak of language in the proper sense of the word, and archaic non-syntactic forms of sign communication, assumed for early hominids, are better called proto-language. There is a point of view that the lack of syntax limited not only the effectiveness of the language as a means of communication, but also had an extremely negative effect on thinking, making it impossible, or, in any case, making it very difficult to build complex logical chains of the type: “event x happened because an event happened y; x always happens when it happens y; if it doesn't happen x, then it will not happen and y" etc. True, in the latter case we are already talking about rather complex syntactic relations and constructions, while their simplest forms (like those that are sometimes used by chimpanzees trained in visual signs) are also allowed for the proto-language.
There are a number of hypotheses regarding the origin of syntax. Some authors believe that this event was like an explosion, i.e. happened quickly and abruptly, due to some kind of macromutation that caused a corresponding reorganization of the brain. Many adherents of this point of view believe that people have some kind of innate apparatus for acquiring a language, which not only provides an opportunity for learning, but also directly affects the nature of our speech, organizing it in accordance with a genetically determined system of rules. The American linguist N. Chomsky, the founder of the approach under consideration, considered this learning-independent system of rules as a kind of “universal grammar” common to our entire biological species, rooted in the neural structure of the brain (“language organ”) and providing speed and ease of learning the language and using it.
Supporters of the alternative view consider the origin of syntax to be the result of a gradual evolutionary process. In their opinion, Chomsky's theory requires a sudden qualitative change in the linguistic abilities of primates, which can only be explained either by divine intervention or by several simultaneous and coordinated mutations, which is extremely unlikely and is not consistent with the fact of the long evolution of the brain and vocal organs. There is a mathematical model that proves the inevitability of syntaxing a language, provided that the number of signs used by its native speakers exceeds a certain threshold level.
Having presented in general terms how things stood with the formation of the biological foundation of the language, and what could be the ways of the genesis of linguistic signs, we now turn to the question of the chronology of these processes. Although neither speech nor sign language, if it preceded it, are archaeologically elusive due to their immaterial nature, and it is very little to establish the exact time of their appearance, and even more so to date the main stages of the evolution of hope, approximate chronological estimates based on various kinds of indirect data are still quite possible. Most of these assessments are based on the analysis of anthropological materials, but information gleaned from primatology, comparative anatomy, archeology, and some other sciences may also be useful.
The fact of a noticeable increase in the brain already in a skilled person is usually interpreted as an indicator of the increased intellectual and, in particular, the linguistic potential of these hominids. The presence in them of formations similar to our fields of Broca and Wernicke also serves as an argument in favor of the existence of the rudiments of speech already at this early stage of evolution. Moreover, some researchers even admit that some later Australopithecus could already have rudimentary speech abilities. However, it is worth remembering here that, firstly, as the example of great apes shows, having abilities does not mean using them, and secondly, the functions of both named fields, especially in the early stages of their evolution, have not yet been clarified exactly. It is possible that their formation was not directly related to the formation of sign behavior, and thus their presence cannot serve as "iron" proof of the existence of a language.
It is more difficult to question the evolutionary meaning of some transformations of the vocal organs. The fact is that the low position of the larynx, which is believed to provide the possibility of articulate speech, has a negative side - a person, unlike other animals, can choke. It is unlikely that the risk associated with this kind of anatomical changes was their only result and was not compensated from the very beginning by another, useful function (or functions). Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that those hominids in which the larynx was already located quite low, not only had the possibility of articulate speech, but also used it. If this assumption is correct, then at least the early paleoanthropes, who appeared about half a million years ago, should be considered speaking creatures, without denying the language abilities and their predecessors, attributed to the Homo erectus species.
Interesting possibilities for determining the time of the emergence of a language are opened by R. Dunbar's hypothesis already mentioned above. It is based, as we remember, on the fact that there is a direct relationship between the relative size of the cerebral cortex and the size of primate communities, on the one hand, and between the size of communities and the time that their members spend on grooming, on the other. The first of these regularities Dunbar used to calculate the approximate size of the groups of early hominids. The size of their cerebral cortex was estimated by him on the basis of data on endocranial reflux. However unreliable and controversial such calculations may seem, one cannot help but notice that the "natural" size of the community, derived by Dunbar for Homo sapiens(148 people), finds confirmation in ethnographic data on primitive and traditional societies. It corresponds to just that threshold value, up to which the relations of kinship, property and mutual assistance are quite sufficient to regulate relations between people. If this limit is exceeded, then the nature of the organization of society begins to become more complicated, it is split into subgroups, and special governing bodies and authorities appear.
Having calculated the "natural" size of communities for different species of hominids, Dunbar used the second pattern he identified to calculate how much of their time members of each species would have to spend on grooming. After that, it remains only to establish at what stage of our evolutionary history this number reached that threshold value at which it should have become necessary to replace or, in any case, supplement grooming with some other less time-consuming means of ensuring social stability. Since primates can spend up to 20% of their daily time on grooming without prejudice to other activities, 7 the critical point presumably corresponds to such a number at which these costs would increase to 25-30% (in modern humans, with a natural community size of 148 members, they reach 40%). Such a point, as calculations show, was probably already reached 250 thousand years ago, or even twice as long, which means that at least the early paleoanthropes, if not the archanthropes (homo erectus), must already have had speech. It is easy to see that the dating of the origin of language, obtained by Dunbar in such an original way, is fully consistent with the conclusions drawn from the study of the evolution of the larynx and oral cavity.
Archaeologists, based on their materials, are also trying to judge the chronology of the formation of the language. Although in order to make even very complex stone tools, or to depict animal figures in charcoal and ocher, in principle, it is not at all necessary to be able to talk, there are still such activities that are impossible or at least very difficult to carry out without at least some kind of then communication and preliminary discussion. Having fixed the reflection of such actions in the archaeological material, it is possible, therefore, with a high degree of probability to assume the presence of a language in the corresponding period.
It is sometimes argued that one of these activities was collective hunting, which required a pre-agreed plan and coordination of actions. There is undoubtedly a rational grain in this idea, but it is not so easy to use it in practice. Chimpanzees, for example, quite often hunt in large groups, which increases the chances of success, but each monkey acts at its own discretion. For hominids, for a long time, everything could have happened in a similar way, and it is not yet possible to determine exactly when the hunt turned from a group into a truly collective one, organized in accordance with a certain plan.
Another possible archaeological indicator of the emergence of more or less developed means of sign communication is the use by people of "imported" raw materials in the manufacture of stone tools. Indeed, in order to obtain flint or, say, obsidian from deposits located tens or hundreds of kilometers from the site, one must first somehow learn about their existence and the road to them, or else establish an exchange with those groups on whose land these deposits are located. Both would be difficult to do without language.
An even more reliable sign of the use of their linguistic abilities by our ancestors may, apparently, be the fact of navigation. Indeed, a long journey by sea is impossible without long-term special preparation, including the construction of swimming facilities, the provision of provisions and water, etc., and all this requires the concerted action of many people and preliminary discussion. Therefore, the settlement of remote islands, where it was impossible to reach except by sea, can be considered as indirect evidence of the existence of a language in the corresponding period. Knowing, for example, that people appeared in Australia about 50 thousand years ago, we can conclude that at that time they were already quite capable of explaining themselves to each other. It is possible, however, that in fact the era of great geographical discoveries and long-distance sea voyages began much earlier, and that the first settlers arrived on some islands, separated from the mainland by hundreds of kilometers of deep-sea spaces, at least 700 thousand years ago. It is this time that animal bones and stones with alleged traces of processing found at several points on Flores Island (eastern Indonesia) are dated. This island, according to geologists, did not have a land connection with the mainland, and therefore the presence of such ancient stone products here would mean its settlement by sea, which, in turn, would testify in favor of the existence of a language among archanthropes. 8 Such a conclusion, in fact, has already been made by a number of authors, although, strictly speaking, the artificial origin of the objects found on Flores is still in question.
Many archaeologists, without denying the possibility of the existence of a language already in the early stages of human evolution, nevertheless argue that a “completely modern”, “developed syntactic language” appeared only among people of a modern physical type. However, there is no direct evidence to support such a hypothesis. Of course, there is no doubt that already in the most ancient period of its existence, the language went through many stages of conceptual, syntactic and phonetic complication, but how and when these changes were made, how significant they were and what exactly they consisted of, we do not know, and probably we'll never know.
1 Donskikh O.A. To the origins of language. Novosibirsk: "Nauka", 1988, p. 42.
2 This point of view is also represented in fiction. For example, A. Platonov in the novel "Chevengur" writes about a man who "muttered his thoughts to himself, unable to think silently. He could not think in the dark - first he had to put his mental excitement into words, and only then, hearing the word, he could clearly feel it.
3 Grooming is the search by animals for each other's insects, cleaning of wool and similar actions.
4 True, according to some authors, the evolution of the larynx, pharynx, etc. had only a third-rate significance for the development of human speech, since, as medical practice shows, people with a removed larynx can still speak, like people with a damaged tongue, palate, and lips. On the basis of these data, it has even been suggested that if a chimpanzee's larynx is transplanted into a person, then his speech will differ little from the speech of other people. So far, no one has dared to test this hypothesis.
5 Hockett C.F., R. Ascher. The human revolution // Current Anthropology, 1964, vol. 5, p. 142.
6 Donskikh O.A. The origin of language as a philosophical problem. Novosibirsk: "Nauka", 1984, p. 6-7.
7 It is interesting that today, as a rule, people spend on various types of social interaction (conversations, participation in rituals, visits, etc.) no more or only a little more than 20% of the daytime. Data supporting this has been obtained for a wide variety of cultures from Scotland to Africa and New Guinea (Dunbar R.I.M. Theory of mind and the evolution of language // Approaches to the Evolution of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998, p. 97, tabl .6.1).
8 Bednarik R.G. Seafaring in the Pleistocene // Cambridge Archaeological Journal. 2003 Vol. 13. No. 1.
So, the primitive language cannot be investigated and experimentally verified.
However, this question has interested mankind since ancient times.
Even in the biblical legends, we find two conflicting solutions to the question of the origin of the language, reflecting different historical epochs of views on this problem. In the first chapter of the book of Genesis it is said that God created by a verbal spell and man himself was created by the power of the word, and in the second chapter of the same book it is said that God created “silently”, and then led to Adam (i.e. to the first man) all creatures, so that a man gives them names, and whatever he calls, so that it will be in the future.
In these naive legends, two points of view on the origin of the language have already been identified:
1) language is not from a person and 2) language is from a person.
In different periods of the historical development of mankind, this issue was resolved in different ways.
The extrahuman origin of language was initially explained as a “divine gift”, but not only ancient thinkers gave other explanations for this issue, but also the “church fathers” in the early Middle Ages, who were ready to admit that everything comes from God, including the gift of speech, doubted so that God could turn into a “school teacher” who would teach people vocabulary and grammar, from where the formula arose: God gave man the gift of speech, but did not reveal to people the names of objects (Gregory of Nyssa, IV century AD) 1 .
1 See: Pogodin A. L. Language as creativity (Questions of the theory and psychology of creativity), 1913. P. 376.
Since antiquity, there have been many theories about the origin of the language.
1. The theory of onomatopoeia comes from the Stoics and received support in the 19th and even 20th centuries. The essence of this theory is that the “languageless person”, hearing the sounds of nature (the murmur of a stream, the singing of birds, etc.), tried to imitate these sounds with his speech apparatus. In any language, of course, there are a number of onomatopoeic words like coo-coo, woof-woof, oink-oink, bang-bang, cap-cap, apchi, xa-xa-xai etc. and derivatives of the type cuckoo, cuckoo, bark, grunt, pig, ha-hanki etc. But, firstly, there are very few such words, and secondly, “onomatopoeia” can only be “sounding”, but how then can we call “mute”: stones, houses, triangles and squares, and much more?
It is impossible to deny onomatopoeic words in language, but it would be completely wrong to think that language arose in such a mechanical and passive way. Language arises and develops in a person together with thinking, and with onomatopoeia, thinking is reduced to photography. Observation of languages shows that there are more onomatopoeic words in new, developed languages than in the languages of more primitive peoples. This is explained by the fact that in order to “imitate onomatopoeia”, one must be able to perfectly control the speech apparatus, which a primitive person with an undeveloped larynx could not master.
2. The theory of interjections comes from the Epicureans, opponents of the Stoics, and lies in the fact that primitive people turned instinctive animal cries into “natural sounds” - interjections that accompany emotions, from where all other words allegedly originated. This view was supported in the 18th century. J.-J. Rousseau.
Interjections are included in the vocabulary of any language and can have derivative words, as in Russian: ax, ox and gasp, groan etc. But again, there are very few such words in languages and even fewer than onomatopoeic ones. In addition, the reason for the emergence of language by supporters of this theory is reduced to an expressive function. Without denying the presence of this function, it should be said that there is a lot in the language that is not related to expression, and these aspects of the language are the most important, for which the language could have arisen, and not just for the sake of emotions and desires, which animals are not deprived of, however, they do not have a language. In addition, this theory assumes the existence of a "man without language", who came to the language through passions and emotions.
3. The theory of "labor cries" at first glance seems to be a real materialistic theory of the origin of language. This theory originated in the 19th century. in the writings of vulgar materialists (L. Noiret, K. Bucher) and boiled down to the fact that language arose from the cries that accompanied collective labor. But these "labor cries" are only a means of rhythmizing labor, they do not express anything, not even emotions, but are only an external, technical means at work. Not a single function that characterizes the language can be found in these "labor cries", since they are neither communicative, nor nominative, nor expressive.
The erroneous opinion that this theory is close to the labor theory of F. Engels is simply refuted by the fact that Engels does not say anything about “labor cries”, and the emergence of language is associated with completely different needs and conditions.
4. From the middle of the XVIII century. the social contract theory emerged. This theory was based on some opinions of antiquity (the thoughts of Democritus in the transmission of Diodorus Siculus, some passages from Plato's dialogue "Cratylus", etc.) 1 and in many respects corresponded to the rationalism of the 18th century itself.
1 See: Ancient Theories of Language and Style, 1936.
Adam Smith proclaimed it the first opportunity for the formation of a language. Rousseau had a different interpretation in connection with his theory of two periods in the life of mankind: the first - "natural", when people were part of nature and language "came" from feelings (passions), and the second - "civilized", when language could be a product "social agreement".
In these arguments, the grain of truth lies in the fact that in the later epochs of the development of languages it is possible to “agree” on certain words, especially in the field of terminology; for example, the system of international chemical nomenclature was developed at the international congress of chemists from different countries in Geneva in 1892.
But it is also quite clear that this theory does nothing to explain the primitive language, since, first of all, in order to “agree” on a language, one must already have a language in which they “agree”. In addition, this theory assumes consciousness in a person before the formation of this consciousness, which develops along with the language (see below about F. Engels' understanding of this issue).
The trouble with all the theories outlined is that the question of the origin of language is taken in isolation, without connection with the origin of man himself and the formation of primary human groups.
As we said above (Chapter I), there is no language outside of society and there is no society outside of language.
Various theories of the origin of language (meaning spoken language) and gestures that have existed for a long time also do not explain anything and are untenable (L. Geiger, W. Wundt - in the 19th century, J. Van Ginneken, N. Ya. Marr - in the XX century). All references to supposedly purely "sign languages" cannot be supported by facts; gestures always act as something secondary for people who have a spoken language: such are the gestures of shamans, intertribal relations of the population with different languages, cases of the use of gestures during periods of a ban on the use of spoken language for women among some tribes standing at a low stage of development, etc.
There are no "words" among gestures, and gestures are not connected with concepts. Gestures can be indicative, expressive, but by themselves they cannot name and express concepts, but only accompany the language of words that has these functions 1 .
1 Under the conditions of a conversation in the dark, on the telephone, or reporting into a microphone, the question of gestures generally disappears, although the speaker may have them.
It is also unjustified to derive the origin of the language from the analogy with the mating songs of birds as a manifestation of the instinct of self-preservation (C. Darwin), and even more so from human singing (J.-J. Rousseau - in the 18th century, O. Jespersen - in the 20th century) or even "fun" (O. Jespersen).
All such theories ignore language as a social phenomenon.
We find a different interpretation of the question of the origin of language in F. Engels in his unfinished work "The Role of Labor in the Process of the Transformation of Apes into Humans", which became the property of science in the 20th century.
Based on a materialistic understanding of the history of society and man, F. Engels in his "Introduction" to the "Dialectics of Nature" explains the conditions for the emergence of language in the following way:
“When, after a thousand-year struggle, the hand finally differentiated from the leg and a straight gait was established, then man separated from the monkey, and the foundation was laid for the development of articulate speech ...” 1
1 Marx K., Engels F. Works. 2nd ed. T. 20. S. 357.
W. von Humboldt also wrote about the role of the vertical position for the development of speech: “The vertical position of a person (which is denied to the animal) also corresponds to speech sound”, as well as H. Steinthal 2 and J. A. Baudouin de Courtenay 3 .
1 Humboldt V. On the difference in the structure of human languages and its influence on the spiritual development of the human race // Zvegintsev V. A. The history of linguistics in the 19th–20th centuries in essays and extracts. 3rd ed., add. M .: Education, 1964. S. 97. (New ed.: Humboldt V. fon. Selected works on linguistics. M., 1984).
2 See: S t e i n t h a 1 H. Der Ursprung der Sprache. 1st ed., 1851; 2nd ed. Uber Ursprung der Sprache im Zusammenhang mit den letzen Fragen alles Wissens, 1888.
3 See: Baudouin de Courtenay I. A. About one of the sides of the gradual humanization of the language in the process of development from monkey to man in the field of pronunciation in connection with anthropology // Yearbook of the Russian Anthropological Society. Part I, 1905. See: Baudouin de Courtenay, I. A. Selected Works on General Linguistics. T. 2, M., 1963. S. 120.
Vertical gait was in human development both a prerequisite for the emergence of speech, and a prerequisite for the expansion and development of consciousness.
The revolution that man introduces into nature consists, first of all, in the fact that man's labor is different from that of animals, it is labor with the use of tools, and, moreover, made by those who should own them, and thus progressive and social labor. No matter how skillful architects we consider ants and bees, they “do not know what they are doing”: their work is instinctive, their art is not conscious, and they work with the whole organism, purely biologically, without using tools, and therefore no progress in their work no: both 10 and 20 thousand years ago they worked in the same way as they work now.
The first human tool was the freed hand, other tools developed further as additions to the hand (stick, hoe, rake, etc.); even later, a person shifts the burden on an elephant, a camel, an ox, a horse, and he only manages them, finally, a technical engine appears and replaces the animals.
Simultaneously with the role of the first instrument of labor, the hand could sometimes also act as an instrument of communication (gesture), but, as we saw above, this is not connected with “incarnation”.
“In short, the forming people came to what they had the need to say something each other. Need created its own organ: the undeveloped larynx of the monkey was slowly but steadily transformed by modulation for more and more developed modulation, and the organs of the mouth gradually learned to pronounce one articulate sound after another.
1 Engels F. Dialectics of nature (The role of labor in the process of turning a monkey into a man) // Marx K., Engels F. Works. 2nd ed. T. 20. S. 489.
Thus, not mimicry of nature (the theory of "onomatopoeia"), not an affective expression of expression (the theory of "interjections"), not meaningless "hooting" at work (the theory of "labor cries"), but the need for reasonable communication (by no means in "public contract”), where the communicative, semasiological, and nominative (and, moreover, expressive) functions of the language are carried out at once - the main functions without which the language cannot be a language - caused the appearance of the language. And language could arise only as a collective property necessary for mutual understanding, but not as an individual property of this or that incarnated individual.
F. Engels presents the general process of human development as the interaction of labor, consciousness and language:
“First, labor, and then, along with it, articulate speech were the two most important stimuli, under the influence of which the brain of a monkey gradually turned into a human brain ...” abstraction and inference had a reciprocal effect on labor and language, giving both more and more impetus to further development. “Thanks to the joint activity of the hand, the organs of speech and the brain, not only in each individual, but also in society, people have acquired the ability to perform increasingly complex operations, set themselves ever higher goals and achieve them” 3 .
1 Ibid. S. 490.
3 T a m. S. 493.
The main propositions arising from Engels's doctrine of the origin of language are as follows:
1) It is impossible to consider the question of the origin of language outside the origin of man.
2) The origin of the language cannot be scientifically proven, but one can only build more or less probable hypotheses.
3) Some linguists cannot solve this issue; thus this question is subject to resolution of many sciences (linguistics, ethnography, anthropology, archeology, paleontology and general history).
4) If the language was “born” together with the person, then there could not be a “languageless person”.
5) Language appeared as one of the first "signs" of a person; without language man could not be man.
6) If “language is the most important means of human communication” (Lenin), then it appeared when the need for “human communication” arose. Engels says so: "when the need arose to say something to each other."
7) Language is called upon to express concepts that animals do not have, but it is the presence of concepts along with language that distinguishes man from animals.
8) The facts of the language in varying degrees from the very beginning must have all the functions of a real language: the language must communicate, name things and phenomena of reality, express concepts, express feelings and desires; without it, language is not "language".
9) Language appeared as a spoken language.
This is also mentioned by Engels in his work The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (Introduction) and in his work The Role of Labor in the Process of the Transformation of Apes into Man.
Consequently, the question of the origin of the language can be resolved, but by no means on the basis of linguistic data alone.
These solutions are hypothetical in nature and are unlikely to turn into a theory. Nevertheless, the only way to solve the question of the origin of the language, if based on the real data of languages and on the general theory of the development of society in Marxist science.
The problem of the origin of human language is part of a more general problem of anthropogenesis (the origin of man) and sociogenesis, and it must be solved by the concerted efforts of a number of sciences that study man and human society. The process of the formation of man as a biological species Homo sapiens (“reasonable man”) and at the same time as a being “the most social of all animals” continued for millions of years.
The forerunners of man were not those species of great apes that exist now (gorilla, orangutan, chimpanzee, etc.), but others restored from fossil remains found in different parts of the Old World. The first prerequisite for the humanization of the monkey was the deepening separation of the functions of its fore and hind limbs, the assimilation of a straight gait and an upright position of the body, which freed the hand for primitive labor operations. By freeing the hand, as F. Engels points out, "a decisive step was taken for the transition from ape to man." It is no less important that great apes lived in herds, and this later created the prerequisites for collective, social labor.
Known from excavations, the oldest species of great apes that adopted a straight gait is Australopithecus (from Latin australis `southern` and other Greek pithekos `monkey`), who lived 2-3 million years ago in Africa and southern parts of Asia . Australopithecus did not yet make tools, but they already systematically used stones, branches, etc. as tools for hunting and self-defense and for digging up roots.
The next stage of evolution is represented by the most ancient man of the early (lower) Paleolithic era - first the Pithecanthropus (literally, ape-man) and other close varieties that lived about a million years ago and a little later in Europe, Asia and Africa, and then the Neanderthal man (up to 200 thousand years ago). years ago). Pithecanthropus was already hewing pieces of stone around the edges, which he used as a hand-axe - tools of universal use, and knew how to use fire, and the Neanderthal man made specialized tools from stone, bone and wood, different for different operations, and, apparently, knew the initial forms of division labor and social organization.
“... The development of labor,” as F. Engels pointed out, “necessarily contributed to a closer rallying of the members of society, since thanks to it cases of mutual support, joint activity became more frequent, and the consciousness of the benefits of this joint activity for each individual member became clearer. . In short, people who were forming came to the point that they had a need to say something to each other.
At this stage, there was a big leap in brain development: a study of fossil skulls shows that the Neanderthal brain was almost twice the size of the Pithecanthropus (and three times that of the gorilla), and already showed signs of asymmetry of the left and right hemispheres, as and special development of sites corresponding to the Broca and Wörnicke zones. This is consistent with the fact that the Neanderthal, as the study of the tools of that era shows, predominantly worked with the right hand. All this suggests that the Neanderthal already had a language: the need for communication within the team "created its own organ."
What was this primitive language? Apparently, it acted primarily as a means of regulating joint labor activity in the emerging human team, that is, mainly in the appellative and contact-establishing, and also, of course, in the expressive function, as we observe at a certain stage of development in child. The “consciousness” of primitive man captured not so much the objects of the environment in the totality of their objectively inherent features, but rather “the ability of these objects to “satisfy the needs” of people.” The meaning of the "signs" of the primitive language was diffuse: it was a call to action and, at the same time, an indication of the tool and product of labor.
The "natural matter" of the primitive language was also profoundly different from the "matter" of modern languages and, undoubtedly, in addition to sound formations, gestures were widely used. In a typical Neanderthal (not to mention Pithecanthropus), the lower jaw did not have a chin protrusion, and the oral cavity and pharynx were shorter in total and of a different configuration than in a modern adult (the oral cavity rather resembled the corresponding cavity in a child in the first year of life). This indicates rather limited possibilities for the formation of a sufficient number of differentiated sounds.
The ability to combine the work of the vocal apparatus with the work of the organs of the oral cavity and pharynx and quickly, in a fraction of a second, to move from one articulation to another, was also not yet developed to the required extent. But little by little the situation changed: "... the undeveloped larynx of the monkey was slowly but steadily transformed by modulation for more and more developed modulation, and the organs of the mouth gradually learned to pronounce one articulate sound after another."
In the era of the late (upper) Paleolithic (about 40 thousand years ago, if not earlier), Neanderthals are replaced by neoanthropes, that is, the `new man`, or Homo sapiens. He already knows how to make composite tools (such as an ax + handle), which is not found among Neanderthals, he knows multi-colored rock art, and in terms of the structure and size of the skull, it does not fundamentally differ from modern humans.
In this era, the formation of a sound language is being completed, acting as a full-fledged means of communication, a means of social consolidation of emerging concepts: “... after they have multiplied and developed further ... the needs of people and the types of activities by which they are satisfied, people give separate names for entire classes ... of objects. The signs of the language gradually acquire a more differentiated content: from the diffuse word-sentence, individual words are gradually distinguished - prototypes of future names and verbs, and the language as a whole begins to act in the fullness of its functions as an instrument for cognizing the surrounding reality.
Summing up all the above, we can say in the words of F. Engels: “First, labor, and then articulate speech along with it, were the two most important stimuli, under the influence of which the brain of a monkey gradually turned into a human brain.”
Yu.S. Maslov. Introduction to Linguistics - Moscow, 1987
There are a number of hypotheses about the origin of the language, but none of them can be confirmed by facts due to the huge remoteness of the event in time. They remain hypotheses, since they can neither be observed nor reproduced in an experiment.
Religious theories
Language was created by God, gods or divine sages. This hypothesis is reflected in the religions of different nations.
According to the Indian Vedas (XX century BC), the main god gave names to other gods, and holy sages gave names to things with the help of the main god. In the Upanishads, religious texts from the 10th century B.C. it is said that being created heat, heat - water, and water - food, i.e. alive. God, entering into the living, creates in it the name and form of the living being. What is absorbed by a person is divided into the grossest part, the middle part and the subtlest part. Thus, food is divided into feces, meat and mind. Water is divided into urine, blood and breath, and heat is divided into bone, brain and speech.
Labor hypotheses
Spontaneous jump hypothesis
According to this hypothesis, the language arose abruptly, immediately with a rich vocabulary and language system. Hypothesized by a German linguist Wilhelm Humboldt(1767-1835): “Language cannot arise otherwise than immediately and suddenly, or, more precisely, everything must be characteristic of the language at every moment of its existence, thanks to which it becomes a single whole ... It would be impossible to invent a language if its type was no longer embedded in the human mind. In order for a person to be able to comprehend at least one word not just as a sensual impulse, but as an articulate sound denoting a concept, the entire language and in all its interconnections must already be embedded in it. There is nothing singular in language; each individual element manifests itself only as part of the whole. No matter how natural the assumption of the gradual formation of languages may seem, they could arise only immediately. A person is a person only because of language, and in order to create a language, he must already be a person. The first word already presupposes the existence of the whole language.
Jumps in the emergence of biological species also speak in favor of this seemingly strange hypothesis. For example, when developing from worms (which appeared 700 million years ago) to the appearance of the first vertebrates - trilobites, 2000 million years of evolution would be required, but they appeared 10 times faster as a result of some kind of qualitative leap.
Animal language
- Animal language is innate. He doesn't have to learn from animals. If the chick hatched in isolation, then he has the "vocabulary" that a hen or a rooster is supposed to have.
- Animals use language unintentionally. Signals express their emotional state and are not intended for their associates. Their language is not an instrument of knowledge, but the result of the work of the sense organs. The gander does not report danger, but with a cry infects the flock with its fear. The thinking of animals is figurative and not connected with concepts.
- Animal communication is unidirectional. Dialogues are possible, but rare. Usually these are two independent monologues, pronounced simultaneously.
- There are no clear boundaries between animal signals; their meaning depends on the situation in which they are reproduced. Therefore, it is difficult to count the number of words and their meanings, to understand many "words". They do not put words into phrases and sentences. On average, animals have about 60 signals.
- In the communication of animals, information not about oneself is impossible. They cannot talk about the past or the future. This information is operational and expressive.
However, animals are able to assimilate the signals of animals of other species (“Esperanto” of ravens and magpies, which is understood by all the inhabitants of the forest), that is, to passively master their language. Such animals include monkeys, elephants, bears, dogs, horses, pigs.
But only a few developed animals are able to actively master someone else's speech (reproduce words and sometimes use them as signals). These are parrots and mockingbirds (starlings, crows, jackdaws, etc.). Many parrots "know" up to 500 words, but do not understand their meaning. It's different with people. A tax collector in Stockholm provoked dogs by imitating 20 kinds of barks.
Since the speech apparatus of monkeys is poorly adapted to pronouncing the sounds of the human language, the spouses Beatrice and Allende Gardners taught the chimpanzee Washoe sign language (up to 100 - 200 words of American Sign Language for the deaf and dumb - Amslen ( amslang), more than 300 combinations of several and words, and Washoe even learned to independently compose simple phrases like “dirty Jack, give me a drink” (offended by a zookeeper), “water bird” (about a duck). Other monkeys have been taught to communicate by typing messages on a computer keyboard.
Human origin and language
The brain of a chimpanzee is about 400 grams (cc), a gorilla is about 500 grams. Australopithecus, the predecessor of man, had the same brain. Archanthrope appeared about 2.5 million years ago.
- First stage - homo habilis(man of skill).
He worked stones. Brain - 700 gr.
This is the stage of transition from monkey to man. The approximate boundary separating the brain of a monkey from a person is approximately 750 gr.
- Second phase - homo erectus(upright man).
Represented by various species: Pithecanthropus, Sinanthropus, Heidelberg man. It originated about 1.5 million years ago. Knew fire. The mass of the brain was 750 - 1250 gr. Apparently, during this period, the beginnings of speech already appeared.
Paleoanthropist appeared about 200-400 thousand years ago.
Homo sapiens(reasonable man) - this is already the species to which we belong - was first presented in the form of a Neanderthal. He made tools from stone, bone, wood. Buried the dead. The weight of the brain even reached 1500 gr. more than the average for a modern person.
Neoanthrope lived about 40 thousand years ago. Represented by Cro-Magnon man. Height 180 cm. Brain - 1500 gr. Perhaps we are not the descendants of Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon man, but of another branch of protohumans, whose fossil remains have not been preserved.
Modern man
On average, the weight of the brain of a man is 1400 grams, women - 1250 grams, the brain of a newborn weighs about 350 grams. Since the 19th century, the brain has become heavier in men by 50 grams, in women by 25 grams.
The maximum weight - 2000 grams - was with I. S. Turgenev, at least 1100 grams - with the French writer Anatole France.
The heaviest female brain - 1550 grams - belonged to the killer.
The yellow race has a slightly larger brain than the white race.
Humans have the highest brain to body weight ratio of 1 to 40-50. Dolphin is in second place. An elephant has a larger brain than a human. Therefore, it is not the absolute weight that is more important, but the relative one. Women have smaller brains on average due to their lower body weight, and the ratio is the same.
Language is the second signaling system
The thinking of animals is at the level of the first signal system, that is, the system of direct perception of reality created by the senses. These are direct concrete signals.
Human thinking is at the level of the second signal system. It is created not only by the sense organs, but also by the brain, which turns the data of the sense organs into second-order signals. These second signals are signal signals.
The second signaling system, i.e. speech is a distraction from reality and allows for generalization.
Theories on the origin of language
1. Introduction
The question of the origin of the language is one of the most complex and not fully resolved in linguistics, because. it is closely connected with the origin of man himself. The languages that exist today on earth (even of the most primitive peoples) are already at a fairly high level of development. Whereas the origin of the language refers to an era with archaic relationships between people. All theories of the origin of the language (both philosophical and philological) are hypothetical to a certain extent, because the emergence of the first language from the most “deep” linguistic reconstruction is separated by tens of millennia (today, linguistic methods allow us to penetrate into the depths of centuries no more than 10 thousand years).
In the existing theories of the origin of the language, two approaches can be conventionally distinguished: 1) the language appeared naturally; 2) language was created artificially by some active creative force. The second point of view was predominant for a long time. Differences were observed only in the question of whether who created language and what material. In ancient linguistics, this question was formulated as follows: was the language created “by establishment” (the theory of “theseus”) or “by the nature of things” (the theory of “fusei”)? If the language was created by establishment, then who established it (God, man or society)? If the language was created by nature, then how do words and properties of things correspond to each other, including the properties of the person himself.
The greatest number of hypotheses was generated by the first question - who created the language, what is the nature of those forces and causes that brought the language to life? The question of the material from which the language was built did not cause much disagreement: these are sounds born by nature or people. Gestures and facial expressions participated in the transition from them to articulate speech.
2. Theories of language
1) Logosic theory (from lat. logos - word, language) existed in the early stages of the development of civilization. In accordance with this theory, the origin of the world was based on the spiritual principle, which was denoted by different words - “God”, “Logos”, “Spirit”, “Word”. Spirit, acting on matter in a chaotic state, created the world. Man was the final act of this creation. Thus, the spiritual principle (or “Logos”) existed before man, controlling inert matter. This divine theory of the origin of language was shared by such major thinkers as Plato (4th century BC), German enlighteners of the 18th century. I. Herder, G. Lessing and others. However, the word, according to this theory, had not only a divine, but also a human origin, because. man, created in the image and likeness of God, received from God the gift of the word. But there was still no trust in man and his mind. The word he created was imperfect, so it had to go through the "court of the elders." Moreover, the word of man dominated him, undermined the strength of his spirit and mind.
The development of science (and above all astronomy, physics, biology) contributed to the establishment of new knowledge about the earth, its biological, physical and social laws. The "creative function" of the divine word - the Logos - did not correspond to the new views. From the point of view of the ethics of the new philosophy, man as a thinking being himself created and transformed the world. Language in this context was seen as a product of his activity. These views were expressed most clearly in the doctrine social contract. This doctrine united different theories explaining the origin of the language in their own way - onomatopoeia, interjection, the theory of labor teams.
2) Onomatopoeic theory . It was defended, in particular, by the ancient Greek materialist philosopher Democritus, the German philosopher G. Leibniz, the American linguist W. Whitney, and others. According to this theory, the first words were an imitation of the sounds of nature and the cries of animals. Of course, in any language there are a number of onomatopoeic words (e.g., coo-coo, woof-woof), but there are very few of these words, and with their help it is impossible to explain the appearance of “voiceless” names of objects ( river, distance, coast).
3) Interjection theory (which was developed by the German scientist J. Grimm, G. Steinthal, the French philosopher and educator J.-J. Rousseau and others) explained the appearance of the first words from involuntary cries (interjections) provoked by the sensory perception of the world. The primary source of words were feelings, inner sensations that prompted a person to use their language abilities, i.e. supporters of this theory saw the main reason for the emergence of words in the sensory perception of the world, which is the same for all people, which in itself is debatable. Interjection theory does not answer the question of what to do with emotionally uncolored words. In addition, in order to speak, the child must be in an environment of speaking people.
4) The theory of labor commands and labor cries - a variant of the interjection theory. It was put forward by the German scientists L. Noiret and K. Bucher. According to this theory, the interjection cry was stimulated not by feelings, but by the muscular efforts of a person and joint labor activity.
Thus, the last three theories proceeded from ideas about the unity of the human psyche, mind and rational knowledge, which entailed the assumption that the same initial sound form appeared in all members of society in the same situation. Therefore, the first, the simplest in terms of informativeness, were onomatopoeic words, interjections and labor cries. Later, by social contract these first sounds-words were assigned to objects and phenomena that were not perceived by the ear.
The progressive role of the doctrine of the social contract was that it proclaimed the material, human source of the origin of language, destroying the construction of the logistic theory. However, in general, this theory did not explain the origin of the language, since in order to imitate onomatopoeia, one must perfectly control the speech apparatus, and the larynx was practically not developed in primitive man. In addition, the interjectional theory could not explain the appearance of words devoid of expressiveness, which were neutral designations for objects and phenomena of the outside world. Finally, this theory did not explain the fact of the agreement about the language in the absence of the language itself. It assumed the existence of consciousness in primitive man before the formation of this consciousness, which develops along with language.
The critical attitude to the doctrine of man has given rise to new theories:
5) evolutionary theory. Representatives of this theory (German scientists W. Humboldt, A. Schleicher, W. Wundt) associated the origin of language with the development of thinking of primitive man, with the need to concretize the expression of his thoughts: thanks to thinking, a person began to speak, thanks to language he learned to think. The emergence of language, therefore, occurred as a result of the development of the senses and the human mind. This point of view found its most striking expression in the works of W. Humboldt. According to his theory, the birth of language was due to the inner need of man. Language is not only a means of communication between people, it is embedded in their very nature and is necessary for the spiritual development of a person. The origin and development of the language, according to Humboldt, is predetermined by the need to develop social relations and the spiritual potential of man. However, this theory did not answer the question about the internal mechanisms of the transition from pre-language to the linguistic state of people.
6) social theory was set forth by F. Engels in his work "The Dialectics of Nature" in the chapter "The Role of Labor in the Process of the Transformation of a Monkey into a Man". Engels associated the emergence of language with the development of society. Language is included in the social experience of mankind. It arises and develops only in human society and is assimilated by each individual through his communication with other people. The main idea of his theory is an inseparable internal connection between the development of the labor activity of a primitive human collective, the development of the consciousness of an emerging person and the development of forms and methods of communication. He developed the following theoretical model of the relationship between language and society: 1) social production based on the division of labor; 2) reproduction of the ethnos as the basis of social production; 3) becoming articulate from inarticulate signals; 4) the emergence of social consciousness on the basis of individual thinking; 5) the formation of culture as the selection and transmission from generation to generation of skills, skills, and material objects that are important for the life of society. Engels writes: “... like consciousness, language arises only from a need, from an urgent need to communicate with other people.<…>The need created its own organ: the undeveloped larynx of the monkey was slowly but steadily transformed by modulations, and the organs of the mouth gradually learned to pronounce one articulate sound after another ”[Marx K., Engels F. Works. T. 20., p. 498]. The emergence of language, therefore, was preceded by a stage of long evolution, first biological, and then biological-social. The main biological prerequisites were the following: the release of the forelimbs for labor, the straightening of the gait, the appearance of the first sound signals. Biological evolution affected, first of all, the lungs and larynx. It required the straightening of the body, walking on two limbs, the release of hands to perform labor functions. In the process of labor activity, the further development of the human brain and organs of articulation took place: the direct image of an object was replaced by its sound symbol (word). “First work,” writes Engels, “and then, along with it, articulate speech, were the two most important stimuli under the influence of which the brain of a monkey gradually turned into a human brain. The development of the brain and the feelings subordinated to it of an increasingly clearing consciousness, the ability to abstract and reason had a reverse effect on labor and language, giving both more and more impetus to further development. The emergence of language, according to Engels, was thus associated with the process of cognition of the external world, and with the process of development of consciousness under the influence of human labor activity. The need for reasonable communication (in which the communicative and cognitive functions of the language were carried out, without which the language cannot be a language) caused its appearance.
