When did man begin to speak? Modern research

When did humans first start speaking, what were the first sounds they made, and how did language evolve from there?

Questions about the origin and evolution of human language have long been the focus of people's attention. These questions are of particular interest in understanding the evolutionary stages of modern man and the search for characteristics that distinguish them from animals.

George Poulos is a renowned linguist who spent most of his academic career researching the phonological and linguistic structures of African languages. He has written several books on language evolution which have received wide acclaim. In his latest book, On the Origins of Human Speech and Language, he presents new research on the origins of language. We have tried to find out from them what conclusions they reached during their research.

When and where did man begin to speak?

Research conducted to find this out shows that the earliest sounds emitted by the human mouth are only about 70 thousand years ago. This refutes the claims that humans have been speaking for millions or millions of years.

Although my research is primarily based on acoustic (speech sounds) and linguistic (language) analyses, it also takes into account other fields, including paleoanthropology (the study of ancient humans), archaeology, (analysis of fossils and other remains), anatomy (study of body structure) and genetics (study of genes).

The transition of Homo sapiens, or modern humans, from a 'dumb' species to a 'talking' species occurred around the same time that our hunter-gatherer ancestors migrated out of Africa.

The most important characteristic of the human race was the ability to produce sounds through the mouth, which was enabled by the creation of a gene related to 'speech' with our adventuring ancestors when they left the African continent. Through this they entered a world where it was not too difficult for them to dominate all other species. Language has greatly helped modern humans to move forward during our evolutionary journey.

Which sounds were played first?

The first sounds produced were not just random involuntary sounds. Rather, there was a whole chain behind them that connected certain parts of the brain with the different parts from which sounds are emitted. Various physiological and environmental factors played an important role in the ability of Homo sapiens to produce sound for the first time.

Another interesting factor was the marked change in the diet of our early ancestors and its possible effects on the human brain. Seafood, primarily rich in omega-3 fatty acids, became part of the human diet when early humans migrated from the interior of the continent to the coastal regions.

The vocal tract developed slowly over a long period of time and the different stages of its development determined the types of sounds. The vocal tract determines which sounds a person can make. At the time of 'Out of Africa', the only part of the vocal tract that was physically ready to produce sound was the oral cavity.

At that time there was only one sound that could be produced entirely in the mouth which was called the 'click' sound or 'click consonant'. Air flow could be controlled inside the mouth. Clicks are the only known human voices to be played in this manner. Clicks are still found in a few African languages today, notably the Khoisan languages spoken in Botswana, Namibia and parts of South Africa.

Less than one percent of the world's languages have clicks. They also exist as isolated examples in some East African and South African languages that adopted clicks due to their connection with Khoisan. An example of clicks outside of the African continent is found in the extinct formal language known as Damin in Australia.

An example of a click speech sound is the so-called 'kiss' click where the lips are brought together and the back of the tongue hits the back of the mouth. The lips are then pressed slightly inward and a clicking sound is produced when they are released back.

My research suggests that the 'kiss' click was probably the first speech sound developed by Homo sapiens. As time went by, different parts of the tongue became more active and it became possible to produce other click sounds in the mouth.

When did other human speech sounds develop?

The study suggests that all other human speech sounds (other consonants and vowels) began to develop about 50,000 years ago. They depended on the gradual development of a well-developed symmetrical vocal tract that included the mouth, the back of the mouth, the nostrils, and most importantly the larynx, including its vocal cords. Three airflow mechanisms evolved for the production of human speech sounds, and their production did not occur suddenly, but rather gradually in successive stages.

Before that, the only sounds humans could make were called 'vocalizations' or vocal calls. They were mere sounds without words that man made by imitating various actions taking place around him. The main role in this was the environment.

They may also have involuntary sounds emitted during yawning or sneezing that express different emotions. This is a separate entity, not to be confused with the highly complex mechanisms involved in the production of conversational sounds and later the basis of the words we recognize today as human language.

How did word-order sentences begin to be used?

As different sounds developed for communication, they formed syllables and words in different ways. In this way, words were combined in different ways to form grammatical sentences and a language was formed which was characteristic of modern languages.

The initial ability was the spark to produce speech sounds that led to the gradual evolution of language. Grammatical language did not develop overnight. There was no magic lamp that suddenly ignited the flame of language.

Research suggests that human language was acquired by Homo sapiens much later in their evolutionary journey. It has been argued in favor of this theory that the form of language that we know today took shape 20,000 years ago.

As we mentioned earlier, the earliest spoken sounds were made by the ancestors of the speakers of the Khoisan languages. In the light of this observation, it seems reasonable to assume that even in the case of early humans who spoke a grammatical language, they had the honor of primacy.

To date there is no very solid phonological or linguistic evidence to suggest that other races such as the Ne-Anderthals could ever have spoken a grammatical language. On the one hand, they did not have the vocal tracts with the help of which they could produce speech sounds. It seems that they never reached this point in the evolutionary stages.

Why is all this important?

The production of communicative sounds about 70,000 years ago was the basic building block upon which later modern humans built the entire structure of language.

Language provided the most decisive means of communication and since then this ability to communicate has played a very important role in the development of human beings. From the earliest known 'written' capital of about five and a half thousand years ago to the most sophisticated technological developments, language has not only been a major contributor to but also a key contributor to its preservation.

This article was previously published on The Conversation and is being translated here with their permission. The author of this article, George Poulos, is Professor Emeritus at the University of South Africa.