Experiments in Cultural Language Evolution
Editor
Luc Steels | ICREA, Institute for Evolutionary Biology (UPF-CSIC), Barcelona and Sony Computer Science Laboratory Paris
The fascinating question of the origins and evolution of language has been drawing a lot of attention recently, not only from linguists, but also from anthropologists, evolutionary biologists, and brain scientists. This groundbreaking book explores the cultural side of language evolution. It proposes a new overarching framework based on linguistic selection and self-organization and explores it in depth through sophisticated computer simulations and robotic experiments. Each case study investigates how a particular type of language system can emerge in a population of language game playing agents and how it can continue to evolve in order to cope with changes in ecological conditions. Case studies cover on the one hand the emergence of concepts and words for proper names, color terms, names for bodily actions, spatial terms and multi-dimensional words. The second set of experiments focuses on the emergence of grammar, specifically case grammar for expressing argument structure, functional grammar for expressing different uses of spatial relations, internal agreement systems for marking constituent structure, morphological expression of aspect, and quantifiers expressed as articles. The book is ideally suited as study material for an advanced course on language evolution and it will be of interest to anyone who wonders how human languages may have originated.
[Advances in Interaction Studies, 3] 2012. xii, 306 pp.
Publishing status: Available
Published online on 2 February 2012
Published online on 2 February 2012
© John Benjamins Publishing Company
Table of Contents
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ForewordLuc Steels | pp. vii–xii
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Introduction. Self-organization and selection in cultural language evolutionLuc Steels | pp. 1–37
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Part I. Emergence of perceptually grounded vocabularies
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The Grounded Naming GameLuc Steels and Martin Loetzsch | pp. 41–59
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Language strategies for colorJoris Bleys | pp. 61–85
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Emergent mirror systems for body languageLuc Steels and Michael Spranger | pp. 87–109
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The co-evolution of basic spatial terms and categoriesMichael Spranger | pp. 111–141
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Multi-dimensional meanings in lexicon formationPieter Wellens and Martin Loetzsch | pp. 143–166
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Part II. Emergence of grammatical systems
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The evolution of case systems for marking event structureRemi van Trijp | pp. 169–205
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Emergent functional grammar for spaceMichael Spranger and Luc Steels | pp. 207–232
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The emergence of internal agreement systemsKatrien Beuls, Luc Steels and Sebastian Höfer | pp. 233–256
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A language strategy for aspect: Encoding Aktionsarten through morphologyKateryna Gerasymova, Michael Spranger and Katrien Beuls | pp. 257–276
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The emergence of quantifiersSimon Pauw and Joseph Hilferty | pp. 277–304
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Index | pp. 305–306
“[...] this volume should be of value to anyone interested in language evolution, in the application of natural languages to robotic agents, and in general linguistic theory.”
Nick Moore, Sheffield Hallam University, on Linguist List 24.98, dated 09/01/2013, http://linguistlist.org/issues/24/24-98.html
Cited by (57)
Cited by 57 other publications
Sánchez-Puig, Fernanda, Rogelio Lozano-Aranda, Dante Pérez-Méndez, Ewan Colman, Alfredo J. Morales-Guzmán, Pedro Juan Rivera Torres, Carlos Pineda & Carlos Gershenson
Zhang, Yu, Chen Diao & Ning Cai
Ahlers, Timo, Cassandra Bumann, Ralph Kölle & Milica Lazović
de Keulenaar, Emillie, Marc Tuters, Cassian Osborne-Carey, Daniel Jurg & Ivan Kisjes
Helbing, Dirk & Javier Argota Sanchez-Vaquerizo
Lipowska, Dorota & Adam Lipowski
Lipowska, Dorota & Adam Lipowski
Van Eecke, Paul, Katrien Beuls, Jérôme Botoko Ekila & Roxana Rădulescu
van Trijp, Remi, Katrien Beuls, Paul Van Eecke & Andrew Kehler
Barham, Lawrence & Daniel Everett
Ribeiro, Andre F.
Roesler, Oliver & Elahe Bagheri
Douven, Igor & Peter Gärdenfors
Euzenat, Jérôme, Pascal Hitzler & Krzysztof Janowicz
McDonough, Terry
Chen, Guanrong & Yang Lou
Hawkins, Robert X.D., Noah D. Goodman & Robert L. Goldstone
Pustejovsky, James
2018. From actions to events. Interaction Studies. Social Behaviour and Communication in Biological and Artificial Systems 19:1-2 ► pp. 289 ff. 
Pustejovsky, James
2020. From actions to events. In How the Brain Got Language – Towards a New Road Map [Benjamins Current Topics, 112], ► pp. 289 ff. 
Steels, Luc & Ramon Lopez de Mantaras
Van Eecke, Paul & Katrien Beuls
Li, Doujie, Zhongyan Fan, Wallace K. S. Tang & Yongxiang Xia
Mufwene, Salikoko S., Christophe Coupé & François Pellegrino
Oudeyer, Pierre‐Yves
Sproat, Richard
2017. A computational model of the discovery of writing. Written Language & Literacy 20:2 ► pp. 194 ff. 
Steels, Luc & Katrien Beuls
Baillie, Jean-Christophe
Beuls, Katrien & Remi van Trijp
2016. Computational construction grammar and constructional change. Belgian Journal of Linguistics 30 ► pp. 1 ff. 
Gong, Tao, Yau W. Lam & Lan Shuai
Gong, Tao & Lan Shuai
Noël, Dirk
2016. For a radically usage-based diachronic construction grammar. Belgian Journal of Linguistics 30 ► pp. 39 ff. 
Cangelosi, Angelo, Josh Bongard, Martin H. Fischer & Stefano Nolfi
de Paula, Suelen M. & Ricardo R. Gudwin
Levshina, Natalia
WINTERS, JAMES, SIMON KIRBY & KENNY SMITH
Aguilar, Wendy, Guillermo SantamarÃa-Bonfil, Tom Froese & Carlos Gershenson
Bagasheva, Alexandra
2014. Compound verbs in English and Bulgarian and the relativity debate. In Multilingual Cognition and Language Use [Human Cognitive Processing, 44], ► pp. 97 ff. 
Borghi, Anna M. & Angelo Cangelosi
Eyre, Henrietta & Jonathan Lawry
Gong, Tao, Lan Shuai & Menghan Zhang
Mioduszewska, Marzenna
Richie, Russell, Charles Yang & Marie Coppola
Smith, Andrew D.M.
Spranger, Michael & Luc Steels
Mingo, Jack Mario, Darío Maravall & Javier de Lope
Schneider, Nathan & Reut Tsarfaty
2013. Design Patterns in Fluid Construction Grammar Luc Steels (editor) Universitat Pompeu Fabra and Sony Computer Science Laboratory, Paris Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company (Constructional Approaches to Language series, edited by Mirjam Fried and Jan-Ola Östman, volume 11), 2012, xi+332 pp; hardbound, ISBN 978-90-272-0433-2, €99.00, $149.00. Computational Linguistics 39:2 ► pp. 447 ff. 
Schilling, Malte
Steels, Luc
Steels, Luc
Steels, Luc
Steels, Luc
Steels, Luc
2019. Basics of Fluid Construction Grammar. In Case Studies in Fluid Construction Grammar [Benjamins Current Topics, 106], ► pp. 5 ff. 
Steels, Luc
van Trijp, Remi
Paradowski, Michał B.
[no author supplied]
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Subjects
Interaction Studies
Main BIC Subject
CFX: Computational linguistics
Main BISAC Subject
LAN009000: LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES / Linguistics / General