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The trait of human language: lessons from the canal boat children of England

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Abstract

To fully understand human language, an evolved trait that develops in the young without formal instruction, it must be possible to observe language that has not been influenced by instruction. But in modern societies, much of the language that is used, and most of the language that is measured, is confounded by literacy and academic training. This diverts empirical attention from natural habits of speech, causing theorists to miss critical features of linguistic practice. To dramatize this point, I examine data from a special population––the canal boat children of early twentieth century England––whose language developed without academic influence, but was evaluated using instruments designed primarily for academic use. These data, taken together with related research, suggest that formal instruction can convert language from a purely biological trait that was selected, to a talent that was instructed, while altering the users of language themselves. I then review research indicating that formal instruction can also mask or distort inter-sexual differences in the social applications of language, a significant handicap to evolutionary theorizing. I conclude that if biological theories of language are to succeed, they must explain the spontaneous speaking practices of naturally behaving individuals.

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Notes

  1. Many neuropsychologists, as well as educational psychologists, use “language” interchangeably with “verbal behavior,” where the latter was elicited on an anagram or verbal fluency task, both of which require knowledge of letters and word spellings (e.g., Halpern 1986; Hyde and Linn 1988; Maccoby and Jacklin 1974).

  2. The material in this section was supplied by Bowen (2001), Gordon (1923), Hanson (1978), and the Report of the departmental committee (1921).

  3. This is not to say that the boat children were exposed to the same concepts as their more freely ranging peers, who may have been more likely to know the meaning of some words (e.g., bonfire) purely through contact with the relevant actions and objects.

  4. Much the same trend has been observed in children who develop cognitive traits in the context of their everyday lives. In Recife, a city on the northeast coast of Brazil, street-vending children perform mental calculations quickly and accurately while working, but do poorly on decontextualized “story” problems (Carraher et al. 1985). On the shores of Lake Victoria in Kenya, there are children with extensive knowledge of herbal medicines who fail to display comparable cognitive skills on standard measures of academic achievement (Sternberg et al. 2001).

  5. The source, Henton (1992), rests her statements about sexual dimorphism on an article by staff writers that had appeared 11 years earlier in a popular magazine (Newsweek, May 18, 1981). In that article, a discursive treatise on “Just How the Sexes Differ,” there is a suggestion at one point that women “seem better at languages.” Nothing else was said about language, or how this female superiority had been uncovered or documented. Paradoxically, Henton also claimed, in a different part of her review: “Males are expected to speak more in public, to speak with authority and to do so at younger ages than females are.” (p. 45) This, of course, is precisely what one would expect if males’ ability to display verbal skills had been selected.

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  1. Speech-Language-Hearing Sciences, Lehman College, City University of New York, 250 Bedford Park Boulevard West, Bronx, NY, 10468, USA

    John L. Locke

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Locke, J.L. The trait of human language: lessons from the canal boat children of England. Biol Philos 23, 347–361 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-007-9104-8

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