Sounds Became Words and Vice Versa
July 26, 2024
It is generally believed that language was an obvious progression of early humans’ need to communicate with each other. Like most creations, sounds gave humans a better chance of survival through social interactions. Although you could argue that a sound isn’t really a word, realistically most words used across the global spectrum of languages derived from much simpler sounds.
Linguists studying the evolution of languages have come to some consensus that Sumerian cuneiform, which consists of wedge-shaped glyphs, was most likely the earliest form of a writing system that would have developed around 3500 B.C.E. in the southern region of Mesopotamia. However, glyphs only provide a pictographic form of words, the earliest of which likely represented earth, god, man, or woman.
Obviously with no means of recording or capturing the sounds used by the earliest hominids, it is only speculation and assumption that can be used to argue it “Ah” or “Ow” were the first to be uttered as an important form of signaling from one human to another. What we do know is the evolution of language kept adapting to the needs of its speakers and provided growing benefits to the community as a whole. In this regard, human language is unique among all other forms of communications across the animal kingdom.
And so it was written...
It is argued that the more complex social groups became, the more complex the language needed. Graphemes, the smallest meaningful or emic unit in a writing system, evolved into significantly more sounds (phonemes) as wedge-shaped glyphs began to be replaced by allographs as the earliest form of letters used to represent audible sounds.
This appears to have allowed languages to continually evolve as tribal humans came up with better words that reflected changes in their society and culture. Unlike evolutionary acquired traits, language required the cooperation and consensus of other members of the same tribe. After all, having the ability to speak would have been useless without someone else who could understand you.
Linguistic Evolution and Language Change
Human languages are distinct from all other known living forms of communication in that they are both compositional and referential. Human languages provide endless possibilities when compared to the sign language in Great Apes, or species of dolphins that use sound motifs like clicks to communicate when hunting for sources of food. That doesn’t mean that the first sounds humans uttered were not related to requests for food, like other non-human communications.
Linguistic evolution is quite distinct from biological evolution, which required a survival or reproductive advantage to develop and spread. Changes in language reflect the societal attitudes of how humans created or adopted new words to better express themselves. Since language is transformed as it is transmitted, it is not the result of an evolutionary progression from one generation to the next. Revisions occurred as a gradual process of social assimilation for communicating ideas, which explains how one language likely incorporated elements of another.
Factors that forced language change included social practices, interactional dynamics and ideological frameworks motivated by cultural interactions like migration and trade. The use of a lingua franca allowed speakers from different cultures, who did not share a first language, to communicate effectively. Examples of a language that is distinct from either speakers’ native tongue are numerous. Having existed since antiquity, these make-shift methods of communicating involved loaner words, body language, gestures, and interjections.
Iconic Gestures and Interjections
Some archaeologists say that a late genetic change in human lineage gave rise to language around 40,000 years ago. Because of language, humans developed verbal, written and gestured systems of codes for transmitting detailed information from one generation to the next. Although it is likely words originated from shorter sounds, it is also likely the reverse is true. To some extent, the entire evolutionary process of language as a component of communication has always relied on renewed efficiency.
All languages combine sounds to make words in a similar way. Moreover, the semantic structure of languages around the world also developed in a same way. Universally, languages recognize the past, present and future; and all can be learned by non-native speakers. Studies suggest that both gestures and interjections can share common use to convey messages between interlocutors. If the target person for communication understands the hidden meaning behind a gesture, body language or interjection, then conversation can occur.
A perfect example is the etymon ‘shush’, which is commonly used across different cultures and languages to convey “silence please.” The origin of the word shush and hush was a Middle English word ‘huisst’, which was pronounced ‘wheesht’ during the late Middle Ages. Of cultural interest, the interjection “shhh” has long been used by mothers of different cultures to comfort their newborn. Its repetitive use is helpful in lulling them to sleep. But, ‘shhh’ can be used aggressively as “hushing” someone in a theater or even gestured by swiping a finger across one’s lips for “zip it”.
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The evolution of languages from basic sounds to words and back mirror human development. Since communication obviously preceded historical records, an exact time of transformation from sounds to words and vice versa may never be known. With decades of experience in addressing language hurdles with tailored solutions for businesses and organizations worldwide, the team at ProLingo stand ready to meet all your needs. Contact a language professional today to discuss your interpretation and translation services.
