Kyoto Lectures in Evolinguistics 2019
Abstracts

Network-based approaches to vocal learning
Stephanie White
Socially-learned

vocal

communication

signals

areoftenbest

acquired

duringdevelopmental critical periods. A great deal of progress has been made toward
understanding the molecular basis for critical periods underlying cortical processing ofprimary sensory information. Whether these processes extend to sensorimotor integrationand how sub-cortical regions such as the basal ganglia may contribute is unknown.
Thanks to decades of neuroethological study, birdsong is the leading model for humanspeech development, having established numerous key parallels to human vocal learning.
These include shared critical periods and reliance on cortico-basal ganglia circuitry. A great
experimental attribute of the songbird model is that within cortex, basal ganglia andthalamus, sub-regions dedicated to vocal learning are visibly clustered, forming tractabletargets for linking brain and behavior. We have leveraged this organization to identify
spatio-temporal profiles of the song-dedicated transcriptome in the basal ganglia. Ourfindings suggest a new model whereby the intersection of learning related gene
co-expression modules intersect with song related modules to provide a permissive nexus
for vocal learning.

How learning and interaction create and destroy linguistic structure
Kenny Smith
Human languages are culturally-transmitted systems, which persist in populations via a
repeated cycle of learning and use, where learners learn from linguistic data which
represents the communicative behaviour of other individuals who learnt their language inthe same way. Languages evolve as a result of this cycle of learning and use, and are
therefore the product of a potentially complex interplay between the biases of humanlanguage learners, the communicative functions which language serves, and the ways inwhich languages are transmitted in populations. In this talk I will present a series ofexperiments, based around artificial language learning, dyadic interaction and iterated
learning paradigms, which allow us to explore the relationship between learning and use
in shaping linguistic structure. I’ll summarise some of our older work showing how andwhen linguistic structure is created through this process, then present some recent work

using these techniques to test hypotheses about the mechanisms linking population
demographics and linguistic complexity, in particular exploring why it might be the casethat languages spoken in larger populations are relatively simple.

Syntax in the light of evolution:
Intermediate stepping stones toward hierarchy, Move, and recursion
Ljiljana Progovac
It is often stated that the nature of human language cannot be fully understood without
reference to its evolution. If so, then not only should theories of language evolution begrounded in linguistic analysis, but, also, linguistic theories should accommodate what isalready known or hypothesized about language evolution. In this lecture I consider how
one such (theoretically grounded) decomposition of syntax leads to a deeper
understanding of attested syntactic phenomena, both those well-supported in syntactic
theory (e.g. the small clause foundation of sentences), and those which remain largely
unresolved (e.g. islandhood). The proposal is that proto-syntax started flat, intransitive,
non-recursive, and static (without Move), and that these rigid but robust beginnings still
pervade the fabric of modern syntax, producing some intricate effects and echoes of thepast. Here I explore the fluidity/overlaps of structure found in e.g. (i) parataxiscoordination-subordination progressions, as well as (ii) intransitive-middle-transitiveprogressions. Both of these continuums are of relevance to the gradual emergence of the(delicate and decomposable) hallmarks of modern syntax, which include hierarchy, Move,and recursion. The discussion will also point to how evolutionary proposals of this kindcan be tested, communicating the results of an fMRI experiment.