Explore the development of understanding through a parallel look at the evolution of language and symbols with linguist Dr. Salikoko S. Mufwene. Following the lecture, visit the exhibition Mother, Father, Please Help Me to gain a better understanding of the use of collage and repeating symbols as modular and adaptive meaning.

Lecture Summary

Languages change because humans continue to evolve and so do their ambient ecologies

Languages started with words, improving over pointing, under pressure to identify entities and activities interlocutors wanted to communicate about; and grammars arose from the patterns emerging from the ways words are used in phrases and longer utterances. In the course of human biological evolution, increased cognition called for larger vocabularies but often this consisted of extending the denotations of current words, thus instantiating meaning change, such as when the English word mouth now denotes not only a specific anatomical organ of animals but also “the point where [a river] flows into a larger body of water” and even the opening at the tip of a bottle where liquids can flow in or out. These changes have been characterized as part of the life of words, which can also die out of use. It’s often easier to extend the application of current words in specific contexts that justify the extension than to coin new ones. This may apply to the arts, which are as creative as languages.

About Dr. Salikoko S. Mufwene

Salikoko S. Mufwene is the Edward Carson Waller Distinguished Service Professor in the Dept. of Linguistics, the Dept. of Race, Diaspora, and Indigeneity, and the College at the University of Chicago. His research area is evolutionary linguistics, focused on the phylogenetic emergence of languages and language speciation, and on language vitality. He has authored and (co-)edited dozens of books and has published hundreds of articles, book chapters, and book reviews. He is a fellow of the Linguistic Society of America, of the American Philosophical Society, and of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He assumed the Chaire Mondes francophones at the Clollège de France for the 2023-24 academic year.