Robbins Burling, The talking ape: How language
evolved. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Pp. ix, 286. Hb
$30.00.
Among those who theorize about the evolution of language, there are
several camps, including those who argue that language evolved slowly from
primate gesture-calls, and those who surmise that syntax is so complicated
that it must have come from a single genetic mutation. Robbins Burling
agrees fully with neither and argues that language is a separate system
from gesture-calls, but that language did evolve slowly through natural
and sexual selection. He invites us to look at the social uses of language
and the cultural value of its complicated, embellished nature.