The age-old debate between the proponents of the gesture-first and speech-first positions has returned to occupy a central place in current language evolution theorizing. The gestural scenarios, suffering from the problem known as “modality transition” (why a gestural system would have changed into a predominantly spoken system), frequently appeal to the gestures of the orofacial area as a platform for this putative transition. Here, we review currently available evidence on the significance of the orofacial area in language evolution. While our review offers some support for orofacial movements as an evolutionary “bridge” between manual gesture and speech, we see the evidence as far more consistent with a multimodal approach. We also suggest that, more generally, the “gestural versus spoken” formulation is limiting and would be better expressed in terms of the relative input and interplay of the visual and vocal-auditory sensory modalities.
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Liebal, Katja
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2017. Language is not isolated from its wider environment: Vocal tract influences on the evolution of speech and language. Language & Communication 54 ► pp. 9 ff.
Wacewicz, Sławomir & Przemyslaw Zywiczynski
2017. The multimodal origins of linguistic communication. Language & Communication 54 ► pp. 1 ff.
2017. An evolutionary approach to low-level conversational cooperation. Language Sciences 63 ► pp. 91 ff.
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2017. Multimodal-first or pantomime-first?. Interaction Studies. Social Behaviour and Communication in Biological and Artificial Systems 18:3 ► pp. 465 ff.
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