Subject: evolution of language conference

( apologies for multiple postings ) * * * * * * * * the evolution of language * * * * * * * * 2nd international conference date : monday 6th - thursday 9th april , 1998 venue : city university , london organised by : prof . jean aitchison ( oxford university ) , prof . james hurford ( university of edinburgh ) and dr . chris knight ( university of east london ) a preliminary programme for this conference is now available . further details and a registration form can be obtained from : joan tremble uel business services duncan house high street london e15 2jb tel . 0181 2150705 fax : 0181 849 3619 email : j . tremble @ uel . ac . uk or from our website at : http : / / www . uel . ac . uk / faculties / socsci / anthro / confreg . htm preliminary programme monday 6th april 2pm - 6pm - plenary session 2pm opening remarks 2 . 10 jean aitchison ' language origins and ( psycho - ) linguistic theories ' 2 . 40 colin renfrew ' small talk , or why was the ` human revolution ' so impressive ' 3 . 10 mark pagel ' the history , rate and pattern of world linguistic evolution ' 3 . 40 tea / coffee break 4 . 10 terrence deacon ' constraints on brain-language co-evolution ' 4 . 40 derek bickerton ' protolanguage to language : the rest of the story ' 5 . 10 robert berwick ' evolution and language acquisition : from ` classical ' to ` modern ' models of evolutionary innovation ' 5 . 40 general discussion tuesday 7th april 9am - 1pm - parallel session room one 9am heidi lyn saffer & e . sue savage-rumbaugh ' observational word learning in bonobos ( pan paniscus ) ' 9 . 25 michael beran , e . sue savage-rumbaugh & karen brakke ' language comprehension in three chimpanzees ( pan troglodytes ) : effect of rearing on level of comprehension ' 9 . 50 robert worden ' words , memes and language evolution ' 10 . 15 paul bloom ' the evolution of words ' 10 . 40 tea / coffee break 11 . 05 william abler ' algebraic syntax ' 11 . 30 ezequiel di paolo ' spatio - temporal and structural constraints in the evolution of communication ' 11 . 55 angelo cangelosi & stevan harnad ' adaptive advantages of ` hearsay ' over direct sensorimotor experiences ' 12 . 20 general discussion tuesday 7th april 9am - 1pm - parallel session room two 9am peter macneilage & barbara davis ' evolution of speech : the relation between ontogeny and phylogeny ' 9 . 25 marilyn may vihman & rory de paolis ' the role of mimesis in infant language development : evidence for phylogeny ? ' 9 . 50 luc steels ' the origins of linguistic categories ' 10 . 15 tea / coffee break 10 . 40 john batali ' the negotiation and acquisition of recursive grammars as a result of competition among exemplars ' 11 . 05 simon kirby ' how compositionality emerges from vocabulary in a population of learners ' 11 . 30 james hurford ' syntax creation from randomness ' 11 . 55 ted briscoe ' how natural is natural language ? human languages as complex adaptive systems ' 12 . 20 general discussion tuesday 7th april 2pm - 5pm - parallel session room one 2pm dean falk ' proto - music and proto-language in australopithecines and beyond ' 2 . 25 james steele ' right - shifted handedness frequencies : a marker of selection for proto-language abilities ? ' 2 . 50 tim crow ' did homo sapiens speciate ( and language originate ) on the y chromosome ? ' 3 . 15 tea / coffee break 3 . 40 myrna gopnik ' language evolution = rules and representations ' 4 . 05 heather k . j . van der lely ' evidence for a grammar specific deficit in children : implications for the biological evolution of language ' 4 . 30 general discussion 5 . 00 poster presentations tuesday 7th april 2pm - 5pm - parallel session room two 2pm peter gardenfors & simon winter ' evolving social constraints on individual conceptual relations ' 2 . 25 alison wray ' holistic utterances : the common link from primates to humans ' 2 . 50 tea / coffee break 3 . 15 jason noble ' the evolution of communication with and without conflicts of interest ; an argument for modelling proto-proto - language ' 3 . 40 edward kako ' reconstructing proto-language from the capacities of language-trained animals ' 4 . 05 gwen hewitt & ann maclarnon ' respiratory adaptations : protolanguage and fission-fusion groups ' 4 . 30 general discussion 5 . 00 poster presentations wednesday 8th april 9am - 1pm - parallel session room one 9am steven mithen ' thought , language and the manufacture of hand-axes ' 9 . 25 alexander marshack ' coevolution of the language and visual capacities : the archaeological and cognitive evidence ' 9 . 50 daniel dor , eva jablonka , shimona ginzberg & geva rechav ' linguistic meaning , linguistic sound , and the mechanism of genetic assimilation : towards an explicit model of the evolution of language ' 10 . 15 tea / coffee break 10 . 40 paul vogt ' the evolution of a lexicon and meaning in robotic agents through self-organizing adaptation ' 11 . 05 mike oliphant ' rethinking the language bottleneck : why do n't animals learn to communicate ? ' 11 . 30 geoffrey miller & peter todd ' evolution of vocabulary size through runaway sexual selection : theory , data and simulations ' 11 . 55 john locke ' rank , reciprocity and relationships in the evolution of language ' 12 . 20 general discussion wednesday 8th april 9am - 1pm - parallel session room two 9am jeffrey laitman , samuel marquez & joy reidenberg ' new insights from neanderthal craniofacial biology and implications for understanding their vocal abilities and speech ' 9 . 25 philip lieberman ' on the functional language system of the human brain ' 9 . 50 lynne schepartz ' the evolution of complex language from a darwinian perspective ' 10 . 15 ian maddieson ' vowel systems and language origin ' 10 . 40 tea / coffee break 11 . 05 michael studdert-kennedy ' implications of the particulate principle for the evolution of language ' 11 . 30 tecumseh fitch ' vocal tract anatomy , formants and the evolution of speech ' 11 . 55 rene carre ' the origin of speech gestures ' 12 . 20 general discussion wednesday 8th april 2pm - 5pm - parallel session room one 2pm jean louis dessalles ' linguistic relevance in hominidae politics 2 . 25 robert kluender ' getting from there to here : the intermediating role of ritual in the evolution of language ' 2 . 50 chris knight ' ritual and the evolution of syntactical speech ' 3 . 15 tea / coffee break 3 . 40 robin dunbar ' the freerider problem and the evolution of language ' 4 . 05 camilla power ' secret language in contexts of female initiation ritual ' 4 . 30 general discussion 5 . 00 poster presentations wednesday 8th april 2pm - 5pm - parallel session room two 2pm april mcmahon ' the evolution of phonological constraints ' 2 . 25 jan anward & bjorn lindblom ' morphogenesis : the systemic growth of linguistic form ' 2 . 50 tea / coffee break 3 . 15 andrew carstairs-mccarthy ' the distinction between sentences and noun phrases : an impediment to language evolution ? ' 3 . 40 bart de boer ' emergence of sound systems through self-organisation ' 4 . 05 daniel livingstone & colin fyfe ' a computational model of language-physiology coevolution ' 4 . 30 ann maclarnon & gwen hewitt ' protolanguage to language : evidence from the evolution of breathing control ' 5 . 00 general discussion thursday 9th april 9am - 1pm - plenary session 9am frederick newmeyer ' on the reconstruction of ' proto-world ' word order ' 9 . 30 david lightfoot ' the maladaptiveness of universal grammar ' 10 . 00 michael fortescue ' linguistic bottlenecks and early population movements ' 10 . 30 tea / coffee break 11 . 00 robbins burling ' comprehension and production in early language ' 11 . 30 luca cavalli-sforza ' a view of the relationships between genetics and linguistics ' 12 . 00 general discussion 12 . 30 concluding remarks ( the organisers reserve the right to make changes to the programme at any time )
