Linguistic evolution, paleoanthropology and cognitive neuroscience

Abstract

Recent years have witnessed rapid advances in such disciplines as cognitive neuroscience ( brain imaging) and paleoanthropology ( ancient DNA) ． This article is a brief summary of the corresponding development in linguistic evolution based on the achievements in these fields. During the recent decades, fossils of human species unknown before have been unearthed and new methods of extracting DNA from these fossils have been invented． All these advances reveal that the human evolution process and linguistic evolution process are much more complicated than we think． Today, we can look at language from more diversified perspectives． Language, particularly those less-used ones, is extremely varied in many aspects． Although research in linguistic neuroscience attempts to position the functions of specific languages in human brains, such as the production, understanding, and reading of language, we now believe that language cannot be formed without the joint operation of numerous neural circuits in different parts of the brain. Today, we have already had a relatively thorough understanding of how language is acquired in the early stage of life, and though we are late-comers regarding how language is damaged and disappears in the late stage of life, we have started to learn about this field． 近年來若干學科快速發展,尤其是認知神經科學（腦成像）和古人類學（古DNA）,文章簡單概述了基于這些成果,在語言演化研究領域的相應發展。這幾十年來,不僅出土了前所未知的人種的化石,也發明了從化石中萃取DNA的新方法。這些進步揭示了人類演化和語言演化的過程遠比我們所想的還要復雜。我們現在得以用更多樣化的觀點看待語言,語言在許多方面的變異性極大,特別是那些人口總數少且外在接觸少的語言。雖然語言神經科學的研究,始于試圖為個別的語言功能在大腦里定位,如言語產生、理解、閱讀等,但現在我們相信,要靠大腦里不同部位的海量神經回路共同運作,才能促成語言。在曙光初現的生命階段語言是如何習得的,我們目前已經有了較透徹的理解,而另一方面,盡管起步較晚,但對于在人生的暮年,語言如何受損并消失,我們也已開始深入地獲取相關的知識了。