Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Hominin Language Development: A New Method of Archaeological Assessment

  • Published:
Biosemiotics Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The question of language development and origin is a subject that is vital to our understanding of what it means to be human. This is reflected in the large range of academic disciplines that are dedicated to the subject. Language development has in particular been related to studies in cognitive capacity and the ability for mind reading, often termed a theory of mind. The Social Brain Hypothesis has been the only attempt to correlate a cognitive scale of complexity incorporating a theory of mind and intentionality orders to the archaeological record and hominin phylogeny. However, a method is still lacking that allows a correlation of the orders of intentionality (and by inference a theory of mind and language development) to the archaeological signatures that represent the physical expression of hominin behaviour. This paper is primarily concerned with introducing a new theoretical perspective – termed the identity model – which facilitates such a correlation between a scale of cognitive acuity, hominin behaviour through the archaeological record and subsequently language development within an evolutionary context.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Aiello, L. C., & Dunbar, R. I. M. (1993). Neocortex size, group size and the evolution of language. Current Anthropology, 34(2), 184–193.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ambrose, S. H. (2001). Paleolithic technology and human evolution. Science, 291, 1748–1753.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Andersen, S. M., & Chen, S. (2002). The relational self: an interpersonal social-cognitive theory. Psychological Review, 109(4), 619–645.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Anderson, M. L. (2003). Embodied cognition: a field guide. Artificial Intelligence, 149, 91–130.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Banaji, M. R., & Prentice, D. A. (1994). The self in social contexts. Annual Review of Psychology, 45, 297–332.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Barbieri, M. (2010). On the origin of language: A bridge between biolinguistics and biosemiotics. Biosemiotics, 3, 201–223.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Barham, L. (2002). Systematic pigment use in the Middle Pleistocene of south central Africa. Current Anthropology, 43, 181–190.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Barham, L. (2010). A technological fix for Dunbar’s Dilemma? In R. Dunbar, C. Gamble, & J. Gowlett (Eds.), Social brain, distributed mind. Proceedings of the British academy 158 (pp. 367–389). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Baron-Cohen, S. (2001). Theory of mind in normal development and autism. Prisme, 34, 174–183.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berwick, R.C., Hauser, M.D. & Tattersal, I. (2013). Neanderthal language? Just-so stories take center stage. Frontiers in Psychology 4: article 671, doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00671.

  • Breckler, S. J., & Greenwald, A. G. (1986). Motivational facets of the self. In E. T. Higgins & R. Sorrentino (Eds.), Handbook of motivation and cognition (Vol. 1, pp. 145–164). New York: Guildford Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brewer, M. B., & Gardner, W. (1996). Who is the “we”? Levels of collective identity and self representations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71(1), 83–93.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Byrne, R. W., & Corp, N. (2004). Neocortex size predicts deception rate in primates. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 271, 1693–1699.

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Carruthers, P., & Chamberlain, A. (Eds.). (2000). Evolution and the human mind: Modularity. Language and meta-cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chase, P. G. (1991). Symbols and Paleolithic artifacts: Style, standardization, and the imposition of arbitrary form. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, 10, 193–214.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chen, S., Boucher, H. C., & Tapias, M. P. (2006). The relational self revealed: intergrative conceptualization and implications for interpersonal life. Psychological Bulletin, 132(2), 151–179.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Clark, G. (1969). World Prehistory: a new outline (2nd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cole, J.N. (2011). Hominin cognitive and behavioural complexity in the Pleistocene: Assessment through identity, intentionality and visual display. PhD thesis, University of Southampton.

  • Cole, J. N. (2012). The Identity Model: a method to access visual display within the Palaeolithic. Human Origins, 1, 24–40.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cole, J.N. (In press). Handaxe symmetry in the Lower and Middle Palaeolithic: implications for the Acheulean gaze. In F. Wenban-Smith, F. Coward, R. Hosfield and M. Pope (Eds), Settlement, Society and Cognition in Human Evolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

  • Conard, N. J. (2003). Palaeolithic ivory sculptures from southwestern Germany and the origins of figurative art. Nature, 426, 830–832.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Cooley, C. H. (1902). Human nature and social order. New York: Scribner.

    Google Scholar 

  • Coss, R. G., McCowan, B., & Ramakrishnan, U. (2007). Threat-related acoustical differences in alarm calls by wild bonnet macaques (Macaca radiata) elicited by python and leopard models. Ethology, 113, 352–367.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Crockford, C., Wittig, R. M., Mundry, R., & Zuberbühler, K. (2012). Wild Chimpanzees inform ignorant group members of danger. Current Biology, 22, 142–146.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • d’Errico, F., Henshilwood, C., Vanhaeren, M., & van Niekerk, K. (2005). Nassarius kraussianus shell beads from Blombos Cave: evidence for symbolic behaviour in the Middle Stone Age. Journal of Human Evolution, 48, 3–24.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Davidson, I., & Noble, W. (1989). The Archaeology of perception: Traces of depiction and language. Current Anthropology, 30, 125–155.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • de Saussure, F. (1916). Cours de linguistique générale. Paris: Payot.

    Google Scholar 

  • De Veer, M. W., & Van Den Bos, R. (1999). A critical review of methodology and interpretation of mirror self-recognition research in nonhuman primates. Animal Behaviour, 58, 459–468.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Deacon, T. (1997). The symbolic species: The co-evolution of language and the brain. New York: Norton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dediu, D. & Levinson, S.C. 2013. On the antiquity of language: the reinterpretation of Neanderthal linguistic capacities and its consequences. Frontiers in Psychology, 4, article 397.

    Google Scholar 

  • Devos, T., & Banaji, M. R. (2003). Implicit self and identity. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1001, 177–211.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M. (1992). Neocortex size as a constraint on group size in primates. Journal of Human Evolution 20, 469–493.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M. (1996). Grooming, gossip and the evolution of language. London: Faber and Faber.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M. (1998a). The social brain hypothesis. Evolutionary Anthropology, 6, 178–190.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M. (1998b). Theory of mind and the evolution of language. In J. R. Hurford, M. Studdert-Kennedy, & C. Knight (Eds.), Approaches to the evolution of language (pp. 92–110). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M. (2003). The social brain: mind, language, and society in evolutionary perspective. Annual Review of Anthropology, 32, 163–181.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M. (2004). The human story: a new history of mankind’s evolution. London: Faber and Faber.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M. (2007). The social brain and the cultural explosion of the human revolution. In P. Mellars, K. Boyle, O. Bar-Yosef, & C. Stringer (Eds.), Rethinking the human revolution (pp. 91–98). Cambridge: McDonald Institute Monographs.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M., & Shultz, S. (2007a). Evolution in the social brain. Science, 317, 1344–1347.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Dunbar, R. I. M., & Shultz, S. (2007b). Understanding primate brain evolution. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 362, 649–658.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Eliot, T. S. (1974). Collected Poems 1909–1962. London: Faber and Faber.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foley, R., & Gamble, C. (2009). The ecology of social transitions in human evolution. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 364, 3267–3279.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Foley, R., & Lahr, M. (2003). On stony ground: lithic technology, human evolution, and the emergence of culture. Evolutionary Anthropology, 12, 109–122.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gamble, C. (2007). Origins and revolutions: human identity in earliest prehistory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Greenwald, A. G., & Breckler, S. J. (1985). To whom is the self presented? In B. R. Schlenker (Ed.), The self and social life (pp. 126–145). New York: McGraw-Hill.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heyes, C. M. (1998). Theory of mind in nonhuman primates. Behavioural and Brain Sciences, 21, 101–148.

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Hodgson, D. (2009). Evolution of the visual cortex and the emergence of symmetry in the Acheulean techno-complex. Comptes Rendus Palevol, 8, 93–97.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jackendoff, R. (1999). Possible stages in the evolution of the language capacity. Trends in Cognitive Science, 3(7), 272–279.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Joyce, R. A. (2005). Archaeology of the body. Annual Review of Anthropology, 34, 139–158.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kohn, M., & Mithen, S. J. (1999). Handaxes: products of sexual selection? Antiquity, 73(281), 518–526.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kudo, H., & Dunbar, R. I. M. (2001). Neocortex size and social network size in primates. Animal Behaviour, 62(4), 711–722.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kull, K. (2009). Vegetative, Animal, and Cultural Semiosis: The semiotic thresholds. Cognitive Semiotics, 4, 8–27.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kus, S. (1992). Toward an archaeology of body and soul. In J. C. Gardin & C. Peebles (Eds.), Representations in Archaeology (pp. 168–177). Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lewis, K. P. (2000). A comparative study of primate play behaviour: implications for the study of cognition. Folia Primatologica, 71(6), 417–421.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Lewis-Williams, D. (2004). The mind in the cave. London: Thames and Hudson.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lindenfors, P. (2005). Neocortex evolution in primates: the ‘social brain’ is for females. Biology Letters, 1(4), 407–410.

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Luuk, E., & Luuk, H. (2014). The evolution of syntax: Signs, concatenation and embedding. Cognitive Systems Research, 27, 1–10.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Markus, H. (1977). Self-schemata and processing information about the self. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35(2), 63–78.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McNabb, J. (2007). The British Lower Palaeolithic. London and New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • McNabb, J. (2012). The Visual Display Hypothesis. Human Origins, 1, 1–23.

    Google Scholar 

  • McNabb, J. (2013). Pole to pole: Archaeology and adaptation in the Middle Pleistocene at opposite ends of the Acheulean world. Oxford Journal of Archaeology, 32(2), 123–146.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McNabb, J., Binyon, F., & Hazelwood, L. (2004). The large cutting tools from the South African Acheulean and the questions of social traditions. Current Anthropology, 45(5), 653–677.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mead, G. H. (1934). Mind, self, and society. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mellars, P. (1989). Major issues in the emergence of modern humans. Current Anthropology, 30, 349–385.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mellars, P. (1991). Cognitive changes and the emergence of modern humans in Europe. Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 1, 63–76.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Monnier, G. F. (2006). Testing retouched flake tool standardisation during the Middle Palaeolithic: Patterns and implications. In E. Hovers & S. L. Kuhn (Eds.), Transitions before the transition: Evolution and stability in the Middle Palaeolithic and the Middle Stone Age (pp. 57–84). New York: Springer Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Nielsen, M., & Dissanayake, C. (2004). Pretend play, mirror self-recognition and imitation: a longitudinal investigation through the second year. Infant Behaviour and Development, 27, 342–365.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Origgi, G., & Sperber, D. (2000). Evolution, communication and the proper function of language. In P. Carruthers & A. Chamberlain (Eds.), Evolution and the human mind: Modularity, language and meta-cognition (pp. 140–169). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Peirce, C. S. (1906). The basis of pragmaticism. In C. Hartshorne & P. Weiss (Eds), The collected papers of Charles Sanders Peirce Vol. I-VI (pp. 1931–1935). Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pettitt, P. (2011). The Palaeolithic Origins of Human Burial. London and New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pinker, S. (2010). The cognitive niche: Coevolution of intelligence, sociality, and language. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 107(2), 8993–8999.

    Article  PubMed Central  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Plotnik, J. M., de Waal, F. B. M., & Reiss, D. (2006). Self-recognition in an Asian Elephant. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 103(45), 17053–17057.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Povinelli, D. J., Gallup, G. G., Eddy, T. J., Bierschwale, D. T., Engstrom, M. C., Perilloux, H. K., & Toxopeus, I. B. (1997). Chimpanzees recognize themselves in mirrors. Animal Behaviour, 53, 1083–1088.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Premack, D., & Woodruff, G. (1978). Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind? The Behavioural and Brain Science, 4, 515–526.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Reader, S. M., & Laland, K. N. (2002). Social intelligence, innovation, and enhanced brain size in primates. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 99(7), 4436–4441.

    Article  PubMed Central  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Reiss, D., & Marino, L. (2001). Mirror self-recognition in the bottlenose dolphin: A case of cognitive convergence. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 98(10), 5937–5942.

    Article  PubMed Central  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Ronen, A. (Ed.). (1982). The transition from the Lower to Middle Palaeolithic and the origin of modern human (BAR International Series 151). Oxford: British Archaeological Reports.

    Google Scholar 

  • Saragusti, I., Sharon, I., Katzenelson, O., & Avnir, D. (1998). Quantitative analysis of the symmetry of artefacts: Lower Paleolithic handaxes. Journal of Archaeological Science, 25, 817–25.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Savannah, S. (2013). Mirror self-recognition and symbol-mindedness. Biology and Philosophy, 28(4), 657–673.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schlenker, B. R. (Ed.). (1985a). The self and social life. New York: McGraw-Hill.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schlenker, B. R. (1985b). Introduction: foundations of the self in social life. In B. R. Schlenker (Ed.), The self and social life (pp. 1–28). New York: McGraw-Hill.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schlenker, B. R. (1985c). Identity and self-identification. In B. R. Schlenker (Ed.), The self and social life (pp. 65–99). McGraw-Hill: New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sedikides, C. (1993). Assessment, enhancement, and verification determinants of the self-evaluation process. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 65(2), 317–338.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sedikides, C., & Brewer, M. B. (2000). Individual self, relational self, and collective self: partners, opponents or strangers? In C. Sedikides & M. B. Brewer (Eds.), Individual Self, Relational Self, Collective Self (pp. 1–4). Philadelphia: Psychology Press – Taylor and Francis Group.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stout, D., & Chaminade, T. (2009). Making tools and making sense: complex, intentional behaviour in human evolution. Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 19(1), 85–96.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stryker, S., & Burke, P. J. (2000). The past, present, and future of an identity theory. Social Psychology Quarterly, 63(4), 284–297.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thomas, W. I. (1923). The unadjusted girl. Boston: Little, Brown.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tomasello, M., & Call, J. (1997). Primate social cognition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tomasello, M., & Call, J. (2008). Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind? 30 years later. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 12(5), 187–192.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • van der Vaart, E., & Hemelrijk, C. K. (2012). ‘Theory of mind’ in animals: ways to make progress. Synthese. doi:10.1007/s11229-012-0170-3.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wenban-Smith, F. (2004). Handaxe typology and Lower Palaeolithic cultural development: ficrons, cleavers and two giant handaxes from Cuxton. Lithics, 25, 11–21.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wheeler, M., & Clark, A. (2008). Culture, embodiment and genes: unravelling the triple helix. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 363, 3563–3575.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Whiten, A. (1993). Evolving a theory of mind: the nature of non-verbal mentalism in other primates. In S. Baron-Cohen, H. Tager-Flusberg, & D. J. Cohen (Eds.), Understanding other minds: perspectives from autism (pp. 367–396). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

This paper was written as a result of Ph.D research undertaken as part of the British Academy Centenary Project ‘From Lucy to language: the archaeology of the social brain’ and I would like to thank all members of the project who have contributed to previous discussions on this topic. I would further like to thank John McNabb, Robin Dunbar, Clive Gamble, John Gowlett, Will Davies and the two anonymous reviewers for all of their patience and insightful comments on various aspects and versions of this paper. Any errors remain my own.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Environment and Technology, University of Brighton, Cockcroft Building, Lewes Road, Brighton, BN2 4GJ, UK

    James Cole

Authors
  1. James Cole
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to James Cole.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Cole, J. Hominin Language Development: A New Method of Archaeological Assessment. Biosemiotics 8, 67–90 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-014-9198-8

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-014-9198-8

Keywords

Search

Navigation