Animal Language

Kainua Chrysler A. Madamba

I. Concepts

Animal language is the modeling of human language in non-human animal systems. While the term is widely
used, researchers agree that animal languages are not as complex or expressive as human language.

Animal language is a form of non-human animal communication that shows similarities to human language.
Humans are different from other animals. One of these differences can be found in the use of language. A
fundamental difference exists in the way information is presented to communicate and the way it is organized
and presented in the expression of language. One way to better understand the apparently unique creative
potential of human language is to contrast it with systems of communication found elsewhere in nature. The
differences between animal and human communication, as we shall see, are profound, but all the differences
seem to derive from a single basic fact: Humans possess a natural, inborn facility to be creative with
symbols; as far as we know, animals do not.

They may not be able to master language, but all animals communicate, or intentionally transmit information
to each other. In fact, the ability to communicate effectively is essential to their survival. This communication
can take on a variety of forms such as:

•Vocalizations, such as a dog growling at another dog to display aggression, or bird calls to maintain territory,
attract a mate, or stay with a group.

•non-vocal noises, such as a dolphin slapping its tail on the water's surface to warn other dolphins of danger,
or a rabbit thumping its hind foot to signal danger.

•Smell, such as a male lion scent marking its territory to tell other male lions to stay away Color, such as a
Humboldt squid flashing bioluminescent colors to send signals to other squids, or an octopus changing color
(and texture!) to indicate irritation or fear.

•Visual displays, such as a peacock displaying its tail feathers and dancing to attract a mate or the
appropriately named peacock spider who also has an elaborate dance and colorful display to impress
females. All systems of communication contain signs, units of form with a specific meaning (words). Human
languages contain sound symbols called words; animal systems use more varied formal media, but each
form is a sign conveying definite meaning.

•Foxes have a system of 20 vocalizations.

•Electric eels have a system of electric pulse signals.

•Spiders have an elaborate system of courtship gestures.

•Scents and smells serve as signals for many other species.

•Birds have two types of sound signals—calls and songs.

•The honeybee system of communication consists of dances performed on the wall of the hive.

Many people think that primates are at a level of development only a few steps below that of humans. In
some parts of Indonesia, people believe that apes don't speak because they know that if they did humans
would put them to work. As it turns out, ape communication is no closer to human language than the systems
of bees and birds—it is a strictly limited, non-creative system.

II. Problems & Issues

The American linguist Charles Hockett theorized that there are sixteen features of human language that
distinguished human communication from that of animals. He called these the design features of language.
The features mentioned below have so far been found in all spoken human languages and at least one is
missing from all other animal communication systems.

• Vocal-auditory channel: sounds emitted from the mouth and perceived by the auditory system. This
applies to many animal communication systems, but there are many exceptions. Ex. An alternative to vocal-
auditory communication is visual communication. An example is cobras extending the ribs behind their heads
to send the message of intimidation or of feeling threatened. In humans, sign languages provide many
examples of fully formed languages that use a visual channel.

• Broadcast transmission and directional reception: this requires that the recipient can tell the direction
that the signal comes from and thus the originator of the signal.

• Rapid fading (transitory nature): Signal lasts a short time. This is true of all systems involving sound. It
does not take into account audio recording technology and is also not true for written language. It tends not
to apply to animal signals involving chemicals and smells which often fade slowly. For example, a skunk's
smell, produced in its glands, lingers to deter a predator from attacking.
• Interchangeability: All utterances that are understood can be produced. This is different from some
communication systems where, for example, males produce one set of behaviors and females another and
they are unable to interchange these messages so that males use the female signal and vice versa. For
example, Heliothine moths have differentiated communication: females are able to send a chemical to
indicate preparedness to mate, while males cannot send the chemical.

•Total feedback: The sender of a message is aware of the message being sent.

• Specialization: The signal produced is intended for communication and is not due to another behavior. For
example, dog panting is a natural reaction to being overheated but is not produced to specifically relay a
particular message.

• Semanticity: There is some fixed relationship between a signal and a meaning.

A problem in animal language would be that it is not as complex as human language. Since it’s not as complex
as human language, it’s potential in growth as a language is not ideal, as opposed to human language which
is far more complex in nature.

Human beings possess a natural, inborn facility to be creative with symbols; as far as we know, animals do
not. Although animals have the ability to use vocalizations, non-vocal noises, smell, color, and visual display
as some form of language, they cannot fully develop their language, unlike humans. It’s because humans
developed something animals haven’t developed yet, and that is the sheer intellect us humans pose. Since
we humans are far more intelligence than the usual animal, the growth in our language skyrocketed, due to
us being far more advanced than animals. Also, some animals are illiterate. So, there’s that. Although some
animals can learn human language, they are simply lacking the nasal and vocal structures to make and form
the same type of sounds. Animals simply cannot speak the human language, due to the fact that they simply
are lacking the nasal and vocal structures to make and form the same type of sounds. Then there are probably
limits on the extent to which they can translate language into something meaningful to them, but they do
learn to heed signals from humans and to communicate in a very simplistic way.

There was a study that implicated the evolution of a gene called FOXP2 in the development of human
language. The gene was first linked to language when a mutated version was found in a family with a genetic
language disorder - i.e. the normal human version of the gene is required for normal language skills. Other
species do have quite similar genes, but the human version underwent some changes about 200,000 years
ago (in the same ballpark as when human language is thought to have developed); these changes might be
what allows humans, but not even our closest ape relatives, to have the anatomical (i.e. vocal cords, jaw
structure) and mental ability to form and process language.
III. Researches

Assessing the uniqueness of language: Animal grammatical abilities take center stage

Questions related to the uniqueness of language can only be addressed properly by referring to sound
knowledge of the relevant cognitive abilities of nonhuman animals. A key question concerns the nature
and extent of animal rule-learning abilities. I discuss two approaches used to assess these abilities. One
is comparing the structures of animal vocalizations to linguistic ones, and another is addressing the
grammatical rule- and pattern-learning abilities of animals through experiments using artificial grammars.
Neither of these approaches has so far provided unambiguous evidence of advanced animal abilities.
However, when we consider how animal vocalizations are analyzed, the types of stimuli and tasks that are
used in artificial grammar learning experiments, the limited number of species examined, and the groups
to which these belong, I argue that the currently available evidence is insufficient to arrive at firm
conclusions concerning the limitations of animal grammatical abilities. As a consequence, the gap between
human linguistic rule-learning abilities and those of nonhuman animals may be smaller and less clear than
is currently assumed. This means that it is still an open question whether a difference in the rule -learning
and rule abstraction abilities between animals and humans played a key role in the evolution of language.

Ape language: From conditioned response to symbol.

The pioneering ape-language research of E. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh has received widespread attention
everywhere from scientific journals to television documentaries to the front page of the "New York Times." In
"Ape Language" she tells the intriguing story of her work with two young male chimpanzees, Sherman and
Austin, the first nonhumans to communicate using symbolic language. In concluding chapters, she contrasts
their language learning skills with those of a different species—Kanzi, a young male pygmy chimpanzee. The
book traces Sherman and Austin's acquisition of symbols, starting with those that allowed them to perform
such relatively simple tasks as operating a vending machine to their eventual use of symbols as complex
representational statements about future actions—a process never before documented in a nonhuman
primate. Ape Language presents a systematic account of how these skills were taught to Sherman and
Austin. Savage-Rumbaugh applies the model of symbol acquisition that Sherman and Austin provide to the
many similar difficulties in attempts to teach severely retarded people to talk, and shows this primate model
to be highly effective.
 Combinatorial animal communication with computable syntax: Chick-a-dee calling qualifies as
"language" by structural linguistics.

Suggests that the "chick-a-dee" call system of the black-capped chickadee has a computable syntax and
thereby qualifies as a recursive language under an operational definition of structural linguistics. It is
concluded that the joint occurrence of the 3 elements (combinatorial structure, openness, and computable
syntax) makes chickadee calls far more like human language than any animal system yet described.

Do They Speak Language?

The question: are humans the only animals endowed with language? must be preceded by the
question: what makes language a unique communication system? The American linguist Charles F.
Hockett answers the second question by listing what he considers the criteria that differentiate language
from other communication systems. His ‘design-feature’ approach, first presented in 1958, has become a
popular tool by which the communication systems of non-human animals are guaranteed a priori exclusion
from the notion of language. However, the results of interspecific communication research and the
discovery of language–like qualities in the natural communication systems of non-human animals (as
opposed to the artificial systems devised to further language research) demonstrate that language
capabilities have evolved in parallel in many species. Thus, Hockett’s approach is thoroughly undermined
and in need of revision. The more fundamental question that must be faced by the design-feature approach
is: are its features essential for language as a distinct and vivid phenomenon, or merely applied to language
as an object of linguistic investigation? This paper offers a detailed overview of Hockett’s design -features
and emphasizes the problematic nature of certain characteristics. Following Slobodchikoff and Segerdahl
et al., the paper shows that language cannot be defined as an exclusive quality of a single species.

The Transition from Animal to Linguistic Communication

Darwin’s theory predicts that linguistic behavior gradually evolved out of animal forms of communication
(signaling). However, this prediction is confronted by the conceptual problem that there is an essential
difference between signaling and linguistic behavior: using words is a normative practice. It is argued that
we can resolve this problem if we (1) note that language evolution is the outcome of an evolutionary
transition, and (2) observe that the use of words evolves during ontogenesis out of babbling. It is discussed
that language evolved as the result of an expansion of the vocalizing powers of our ancestors. This involved
an increase in the volitional control of our speech apparatus (leading to the ability to produce new
combinations of vowels and consonants), but also the evolution of socially guided learning. It resulted in
unique human abilities, namely doing things with words and later reasoning and giving reasons.
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