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When do we develop the ability for language?
Researchers have combined archaeological data and recent human genome studies to establish 135,000 years ago as the minimum threshold at which this ability must have been available
The article also supports the hypothesis that language may have contributed to the emergence of modern human behavior approximately 100,000 years ago. In the image, Neolithic cave paintings found in the Tassili n'Ajjer region (Abyss Plateau) in the Sahara - Photo: Library of Congress, Public Domain
When exactly language emerged is a question that may never be answered. But scientists have now proposed a more precise date when Homo sapiens’ ability for language developed: 135,000 years ago.
The study, which brought together researchers from the University of São Paulo and institutions in the United States, Switzerland, and Japan, is based on well-established scientific knowledge about when the first human population split occurred. This event took place in Africa and gave rise to two groups: the Khoisan, who remain on the continent, and another lineage that eventually branched out into all other Homo sapiens populations around the world.
“We based ourselves on the premise that all human populations currently have language and that, therefore, in this first division, the ability for language had to already be available,” says Mercedes Okumura, from USP’s Institute of Biosciences (IB) and one of the authors of the article published in Frontiers in Psychology.
The idea is not new and draws on earlier work that combines archaeological data with human genome studies to try to determine this threshold. What sets the current study apart is its use of a larger, more up-to-date body of evidence, particularly genomic data, to refine the estimate for the earliest possible emergence of linguistic ability, 135,000 years ago.
Mercedes Okumura - Photo: Leonor Calasans/IEA-USP
The IB professor explains that various studies of paleogenomes and current population genetics are now available, using different markers. “Some analyse mitochondrial DNA, which is the maternal lineage; others, the Y chromosome, which is the paternal lineage. And then there are those who examine different parts of entire genomes. We compiled a list to arrive not at a date, but at this ‘range of dates’, a minimum date. And we arrived at this number from this simple premise,” she told Jornal da USP.
“The structure that organizes today’s languages seems to be fairly uniform. We use the term linguistic ability because we can’t say to what extent, at that point, there was actually the expression of a language or any organized system following the rules of modern human language. But what served as an ingredient for the manifestation of this linguistic knowledge was likely already available at that time, 135,000 years ago,” adds Vitor Augusto Nóbrega, a professor at USP’s Faculty of Humanities and co-author of the article.
Modern behavior
The article also supports the hypothesis that language must have given rise to the spread of modern human behavior approximately 100,000 years ago. “This is a moment when we begin to notice in the material culture of early modern humans a behavior that seems to be mediated by symbols,” he explains.
“The artifacts found, which were not just for survival, are so peculiar that it seems that, at that point, there was a turning moment in which humans began to behave differently.”
Vitor Augusto Nóbrega - Photo: Department of Linguistics - FFLCH/USP
“Humans began to produce, for example, a series of rock paintings with non-figurative, geometric shapes. They began to paint themselves, embellish themselves, and organize the space differently, suggesting that they began to behave using symbols,” the linguist told Jornal da USP.
These are more recent records, dating back some 85,000 years. But long before there is any evidence in the archaeological record of the use of adornment or graphism, we have evidence of the exchange of raw materials. “Especially rocks – these older folks liked to chip a pebble,” Mercedes Okumura jokes.
Therefore, there would have had to be a long-distance exchange of raw materials – a group living on the coast could exchange with one living further inland. “And for that, we assume that some kind of language was already in place. Not only that, but perhaps these exchanges would be significant for strengthening ties between different groups. Think about our current geopolitics, how complex the negotiations are for a country to sell things to other countries, and how reciprocity is achieved.”
Middle Paleolithic artifacts - Photo: Eleanor M.L. Scerri - Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 2018 (reproduction from the article)
Among the works that support the hypothesis, she cites the article The Revolution That Wasn’t. In it,”’the authors map behaviors that hadn’t previously been considered significant, but which they suggest may indicate the presence of modern, symbolic behavior – long before the more obvious signs, such as art and ornaments, appeared.”
In addition, they draw attention to the fact that the items found that indicate these behaviors do not occur suddenly together, as predicted by another model, called the “human revolution,” but rather in widely separated places in space and time. “This suggests a gradual assembly of the package of modern human behaviors in Africa and its subsequent dispersal to other regions of the Old World,” they write.
Linguist Shigeru Miyagawa, first author of the article on the ability for language, says that there has always been a question about how to think about language in relation to other modern human behaviors, such as body art and tools. “One school of thought considers language to be part of these other behaviors, which emerged together. Another believes that it was language that led to them. Our research suggests that the latter is more plausible,” he told Jornal da USP.
Shigeru Miyagawa - Photo: Melanie Gonick/MIT
“Language has also made it possible to communicate complex ideas, which has boosted innovation,” adds Miyagawa, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a researcher at USP as a member of the Innovations in Human and Non-Human Communities project, supported by Fapesp.
Students of the Khoekhoegowab language course, the indigenous Khoisan language, honored at a graduation ceremony - Photo: University of Cape Town
Bringing science together
For a long time, the symbolic register was the primary criterion for asserting that a given human group likely developed something that had to involve language, and from this, it could be inferred that language was available. “In this work, we are trying to look at something that is a little more robust and can be falsified,” Vítor Nóbrega told Jornal da USP, citing the use of genomic data.
“We sought to bring a little more clarity about when a language ability was available. The furthest point at which we can identify the availability of this ability. We don’t have an answer as to when it emerged, because there is no direct evidence,” he explains.
“There’s this very popular jargon that ‘languages don’t fossilize’, and it’s true. We have to look for other ways of trying to understand when, how, and where this ability for language appears. Writing is much, much later, and many groups don’t have writing,” Mercedes Okumura explains.
“We have some alternatives for looking at the archaeological record, this question of genetics, the first division, and so on, but it’s still a difficult topic to research. It certainly requires an interdisciplinary group thinking about it, people bold enough to try to risk answering questions for which we don’t have much of a clue.”
Vítor Nóbrega hopes that the work can serve as a provocation for different disciplines, “not only for them to come together, but also for them to verticalize and refine the way they read the genomic or inferred record, read the archaeological record and articulate it to language”. By verticalization, he means a refinement of the methods for extracting evidence from the archaeological record that is minimally robust and objective enough to say, “there seems to be language here.”
Innovations in human behavior - Image: adapted from Sally Mcbrearty and Alison S. Brooks - Journal of Human Evolution,2000
“Everything depends on the point of view of the person analyzing it. The analyst is seeing symbols, therefore language. But this is a human analyst, and humans tend to infer symbols from almost everything. From this correlation, which is not substantiated, we begin to speculate on a long history of how language emerged. That's what we should be avoiding,” he explains.
He points out that the individual disciplines have also expanded their research programs.
“We now know a lot more about population genomics and material records from different times. And we also know a lot more about human language. We’re at a point where it seems possible to articulate this knowledge, but we still need to be vigilant so that the stitching is properly aligned.”
Jebel Irhoud's forensic facial approximation (~315,000 BP) - Illustration: Cicero Moraes, 2024/Via fighshare - CC 4.0
Only Homo sapiens developed language?
The debate about the existence of language components in other primates has been reignited in recent days following the publication of a new article in Science. After analyzing several hours of bonobo recordings, the authors suggest that these animals can generate meaning by stringing sounds together in pairs. This is a defining feature of human language – “the combination of elements into larger meaningful structures, a pattern known as compositionality,” they write.
For some experts, this makes the differences in communication between humans and non-human primates less striking than we thought; for others, the discovery says nothing about the evolution of language.
Researchers such as Shigeru Miyagawa even attribute it solely to Homo sapiens among all hominids. Although in other works he argues that an important component of human language can be shared with other primates, he reinforces that human language is unique, combining characteristics to form a highly complex system.
More information: e-mails miyagawa@mit.edu; okumuram@usp.br; and vnobrega@usp.br
English version: Nexus Traduções, edited by Denis Pacheco
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A reprodução de matérias e fotografias é livre mediante a citação do Jornal da USP e do autor. No caso dos arquivos de áudio, deverão constar dos créditos a Rádio USP e, em sendo explicitados, os autores. Para uso de arquivos de vídeo, esses créditos deverão mencionar a TV USP e, caso estejam explicitados, os autores. Fotos devem ser creditadas como USP Imagens e o nome do fotógrafo.
A reprodução de matérias e fotografias é livre mediante a citação do Jornal da USP e do autor. No caso dos arquivos de áudio, deverão constar dos créditos a Rádio USP e, em sendo explicitados, os autores. Para uso de arquivos de vídeo, esses créditos deverão mencionar a TV USP e, caso estejam explicitados, os autores. Fotos devem ser creditadas como USP Imagens e o nome do fotógrafo.