Argot Navis

I was looking through the July issue of PLoS Biology today (I was originally looking for this article about birds, which I couldn’t find at the time), and I came across this article, “Across the Curious Parallel of Language and Species Evolution” by John Whitfield. I’ve been curious about the similarities between biological and linguistic evolution since I read Bully for Brontosaurus, and this article talks about some interesting linguistics research at the intersection between the two. Here’s a pretty good quote:

Simon Kirby, also at the University of Edinburgh, thinks that the key biological attribute that allows humans to learn language might not be genetically encoded grammar but vocal learning—the ability to remember and reproduce sequences of sound, which is also seen in songbirds and bats. “We could just be a chimp that can sing,” he says.

Most of us aren’t as hairy, either, but you get the idea.