Babel’s Dawn: Neanderthals Had Language
Is being "symbol minded" (DeLoache, 2004) the same as having symbolic systems? I don’t see the connection from the following blog entry.
Babel’s Dawn: Neanderthals Had Language
Neanderthals had language comparable to that ofHomo sapiens, Bordeaux-based archaeologistFrancisco D’Errico told participants in the Evolang conference in Barcelona this morning (Saturday, March 15, 2008).
… D’Errico based his claim on what he called material “proxies” for symbolic communication, in essence pigments used for body painting and carved materials used for body ornamentation (beads and other decorative wear). His argument that these proxies can be taken as persuasive evidence of language on the basis that
they are symbolic, i.e., used to represent something rather than merely be something. A tool like a hand axe is useful and shaped, but is what it is. A body marking redefines something about the body, changing the brute fact of the body to something else, if you share the understanding of the person who has marked her or his body.
their conventions and manufacture are transmitted, i.e., to understand the symbolism and make the materials, the society has to be able to instruct newcomers (children) into the meanings and methods of the artifacts.
He makes a further “uniformitarian” argument that similar symbolic abilities reflect similar communicative abilities. Thus, if we can find proxies that are symbolic and dependent upon transmission, we have evidence of the a language-using species.