Name: The Story of Human Language
Released: 2004-12-20T00:00:00.000Z
Cast: John Mcwhorter

Available on Prime Video

The development of human language; the story of how a single tongue spoken 300,000 years ago may have evolved into the estimated 7,000 languages used worldwide today; why linguistics has been one of the most exciting fields in the social sciences.

Special Interest · 2004 · 28 min

Starring John Mcwhorter

EPISODE 1

What Is Language?

Exploring two questions; what distinguishes the language ability of humans from the signaling system of animals; when humans manage to first acquire language.

27 min · Dec 20, 2004
EPISODE 2

When Language Began

Examining evidence that language is an innate ability of the human brain; this idea is linked to Noam Chomsky; many linguists and psychologists see language as one facet of cognition rather than as a separate ability.

30 min · Dec 20, 2004
EPISODE 3

How Language Changes-Sound Change

Five lectures on language change; examining how sounds evolve; this is exemplified by the Great Vowel Shift in English and the complex tone system in Chinese.

30 min · Dec 20, 2004
EPISODE 4

How Language Changes-Building New Material

Language change is not just sound erosion and morphing; it is the building of new words and constructions; how such developments lead to novel grammatical features.

30 min · Dec 20, 2004
EPISODE 5

How Language Changes-Meaning and Order

The meaning of a word changes over time; silly means blessed but acquires its current sense through a series of gradual steps; word order also changes; in Old English, the verb usually comes at the end of a sentence.

31 min · Dec 20, 2004
EPISODE 6

How Language Changes-Many Directions

The first language evolves into 6,000 because language change takes place in many directions; Latin splits in this way into the Romance languages as changes proceed differently in each area where the Romans bring Latin.

29 min · Dec 20, 2004

John Mcwhorter

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The Story of Human Language

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