Mind and brain in apes: a methodology for phonemic analysis of vocalizations of language competent bonobos

Abstract

Many different things happen at the same time in human language. In the science of linguistics these are traditionally treated in analytically separate subdisciplines, for example phonetics, phonology, morphology, lexical semantics, and syntax. Our method for examining the vocalizations of language competent bonobos is more integrated; the tradition of Systemic Functional Linguistics regards language as a whole which must be analyzed as relations between the different systems in five strata: context, semantics, lexicogrammar, phonology, and phonetics. Because the essence of this approach is the relationships, the wholeness of language is emphasized, but at the same time the systems discovered in each stratum display the discriminations which make language’s creation of information possible. Language as a whole offers literally billions of choices—a seemingly infinite chaos. We focus on the process of discrimination through choices within systems at all strata, but in particular those systems related to sound which make it possible for an English speaking human interpreter to recognize English words in the distinctly non-human sounds emitted by a language competent bonobo engaged in discourse with the human.