Evolutionary Theories Of Language Research Articles

Evolution of language: An empirical study at eBay Big Data Lab.

The evolutionary theory of language predicts that a language will tend towards fewer synonyms for a given object. We subject this and related predictions to empirical tests, using data from the eBay Big Data Lab which let us access all records of the words used by eBay vendors in their item titles, and by consumers in their searches. We find support for the predictions of the evolutionary theory of language. In particular, the mapping from object to words sharpens over time on both sides of the market, i.e. among consumers and among vendors. In addition, the word mappings used on the two sides of the market become more similar over time. Our research contributes to the literature on language evolution by reporting results of a truly unique large-scale empirical study.

An Equation of Language and Spirit: Comparative Philology and the Study of American Indian Religions

Scholars of religion frequently distinguish between the religions practiced by American Indians and non-Natives, raising a question about the role of religion in constructing and preserving notions of human difference. The present article locates key assumptions about the inherent distinction of Indigenous religions in early anthropological and linguistic research on American Indians. I demonstrate that as anthropologists studied Native cultures in the late nineteenth century, they drew on evolutionary theories of language in order to construct racialized cultural classifications. Analysis of language provided a framework and foundation for research on American Indian religions. I focus on the writings produced by the Bureau of American Ethnology (bae), led by the influential anthropologist John Wesley Powell, who directed the Bureau from 1879 to 1902. Drawing on philology, the science of language,baeresearchers outlined a perceived essential difference between spiritual capacities of American Indians and non-Natives.