Protolanguage in ontogeny and phylogeny: Combining deixis and representation

Patricia M. Greenfield | University of California, Los Angeles

Heidi Lyn | University of St. Andrews

E. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh | Great Ape Trust of Iowa

We approach the issue of holophrasis versus compositionality in the emergence of protolanguage by analyzing the earliest combinatorial constructions in child, bonobo, and chimpanzee: messages consisting of one symbol combined with one gesture. Based on evidence from apes learning an interspecies visual communication system and children acquiring a first language, we conclude that the potential to combine two different kinds of semiotic element — deictic and representational — was fundamental to the protolanguage forming the foundation for the earliest human language. This is a form of compositionality, in that each communicative element stands for a single semantic element. The conclusion that human protolanguage was exclusively holophrastic — containing a proposition in a single word — emerges only if one considers the symbol alone, without taking into account the gesture as a second element comprising the total message.

Published online: 03 September 2010
https://doi.org/10.1075/bct.24.03gre