Theories about the origin of language

Seminar paper from the year 1996 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, University of Hannover (English Seminar), course: Topics in Psycholinguistics, language: English, abstract: I. IntroductionThe following paper introduces certain theories about the origin of the human language. These theories will reveal to which degree we can give information about the origin of language and to what extent these information are speculative or not. The first theories deal with the straight line of evolution. According to evolution, things change in the course of time and so the first theories are concerned with the development of language. These theories try to answer the question whether the development followed a straight line or not. The subsequent theories then deal with the religious and philosophical aspects in the theories about when language started. After that, biological theories are presented, before the closing of the essay with a summary and conclusion.[...]