There's an article in this week's Science
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/305/5691/1779which details the continuing development of Nicaraguan Sign Language.
There's something in the neural wiring of human beings which allows a
community of children to construct a human language from nothing in 25
years.
-- rec --
Children Creating Core Properties of Language: Evidence from an Emerging
Sign Language in Nicaragua
Ann Senghas, Sotaro Kita, Asli ?zy?rek
A new sign language has been created by deaf Nicaraguans over the past
25 years, providing an opportunity to observe the inception of universal
hallmarks of language. We found that in their initial creation of the
language, children analyzed complex events into basic elements and
sequenced these elements into hierarchically structured expressions
according to principles not observed in gestures accompanying speech in
the surrounding language. Successive cohorts of learners extended this
procedure, transforming Nicaraguan signing from its early gestural form
into a linguistic system. We propose that this early segmentation and
recombination reflect mechanisms with which children learn, and thereby
perpetuate, language. Thus, children naturally possess learning
abilities capable of giving language its fundamental structure.
Locked
