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April 21, 2008

Words in mind

Faced with pictures of odd clay creatures sporting prominent heads and pointy limbs, students at Carnegie Mellon were asked to identify which “aliens” were friendly and which were not... New York Times.

Posted at 11:02 PM in Common sense, Consciousness, Science |

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BOOK



  • A Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist, The First Word is about the quest for the origins of human language. Although language is a distinctly human gift, it leaves no permanent trace and its evolution has long been a mystery. It is only in the last fifteen years that we have begun to understand how language came into being. The First Word follows two intertwined narratives. The first is an account of how the random and layered processes of evolution wound together to produce a talking animal: us. The second addresses why language evolution was considered a scientific taboo for more than a hundred years and why scientists are at last able to explore the subject.
  • Buy this book (Amazon.com)
  • Buy this book (Amazon.co.uk)
  • Buy this book (Powell's)
  • Buy this book (Barnes & Noble)

REVIEWS

  • from NEUROLOGY TODAY
    "In addition to its astonishing breadth, this book is up to date, educational, and entertaining."
  • from AMERICAN SCIENTIST
    "...a lucid, readable, comprehensive account."
  • from THE FINANCIAL TIMES
    "[An] admirably serious update on the [language evolution] debate."
  • from THE NEW YORKER
    "[An] accessible account... including many provocative findings."
  • from THE BOSTON GLOBE
    "Kenneally's reporting and interpretation of this research, whose implications for the study of language and human nature are immense, occupy center stage in 'The First Word' and generate real excitement on the page."
  • from THE CHARLOTTE OBSERVER
    "...a cogent and often compelling account... As Kenneally dissects each scholar's theory, a wonderful evolution occurs on the pages: She explains, understatedly, what it means to be part of human nature."
  • from SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN
    "...an elegant exposition."
  • from THE NEW YORK TIMES
    [A] lucid survey of this expanding field... covers an enormous expanse of ground as she brings the reader up to date on developments in a wide variety of disciplines touching on language evolution... explains difficult ideas concisely and clearly... scrupulously fair-minded... zeroes in on a host of fascinating experiments.
  • from THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
    "[The] scientists who study the origins of language are a passionate, fractious bunch, and you don’t have to be an egghead to be tantalized by the questions that drive their research: how and when did we learn to speak, and to what extent is language a uniquely human attribute?... Much of what [Kenneally] describes is fascinating."
  • from SLATE
    "The book's wit and sophistication will appeal to anyone interested in talking about talk."

Book list picks

Advance praise

  • Steven Pinker
    "A clear and splendidly written account of a new field of research on a central question about the human species."
  • Steven Johnson
    "'The First Word' is a rare and delightful mix: both a probing exploration of one of the great remaining mysteries of life, and a riveting story of the battles and breakthroughs that drive scientific progress."

New York Times

CHRISTINE KENNEALLY

  • I am a journalist and author who has written for The New Yorker, The New York Times, Slate and New Scientist, as well as other publications. My book, The First Word: The Search for the Origins of Language, was published in hardback by Viking in 2007. The paperback from Penguin is out now. Before becoming a reporter, I received a Ph.D. in linguistics from Cambridge University and a B.A. (Hons) in English and Linguistics from Melbourne University. I was born and raised in Melbourne, Australia, and I now live with my family in Brooklyn (ckenneally at ckenneally dot com).

Readings

  • June 5, 12
    Radio interviews about The First Word, details to come

RECENT JOURNALISM

Slate

New Scientist

  • So you think humans are unique?
    We are not the only species that feels emotions, empathises with others or abides by a moral code. Neither are we the only ones with personalities, cultures and the ability to design and use tools. Yet we have steadfastly clung to the notion that one attribute, at least, makes us unique...
  • Are Animals Musical?
    Do all primates drum? Can fish pick a tune? Are birds merely winged automata making 'beep boop beep' sounds?

The New York Times

Washington Post

The Boston Globe

  • Songs of ourselves:
    We like music that sounds just like us
  • Suicidal tendencies
    High intelligence is often associated with the kind of dramatic unhappiness that leads people to suicide. Think Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, or the notoriously high suicide rates of doctors.
  • Do they know something we don't?
    Animal senses may help them escape disaster
  • The brain solves problems during sleep
    An avalanche of inspirational literature, audiotapes, videos, and seminars promotes the idea that sleep leads to insight. But until recently the evidence for a connection between the two has been entirely anecdotal.

THE NEW YORKER

The Huffington Post

  • When speciesism is good
    Chimpanzees are smarter than humans. Orangutans are smarter than chimpanzees. Humans are smarter than chimpanzees. Which of these statements is true?
  • Alex
    Alex is dead. The 30-year-old African gray parrot was a resident of Irene Pepperberg's lab at Brandeis University, and for decades Pepperberg taught Alex elements of English.
  • Thank you Rod Stewart. Seriously.
    There's an unexplained mystery about the length of women's lives. Once their ability to have children shuts down, there is no obvious reason for their biology to resist all the forces that conspire to take them down. Indeed, according to demographic models, women over 50 should hit a "wall of death." But they don't. Why not?

Discover

  • AIBO as Research Tool
    When a real animal interacts with an animalbot, it's as though the human in control of the bot has donned a correct scale costume and disguised himself as a bird or a dog or even a bee.

Salon

  • Terrorist wannabes
    In the wake of unimaginable devastation, what motivates someone to phone in a bomb threat?

other articles


  • Other articles can be found at The New York Times, Wired News, Salon and Scientific American.

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