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who asked the first question? - International Research Center For ...

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356<strong>the</strong> proponents of <strong>the</strong> “recent African <strong>the</strong>ory” were also criticized (Templeton, 1993,1994).(2) According to <strong>the</strong> “multiregional evolution model” most contemporary humanpopulations are connected to <strong>the</strong> local populations of archaic Homo sapiens. According to<strong>the</strong> proponents of <strong>the</strong> “multiregional model” <strong>the</strong> common ancestor of all humans cameout of Africa about two million years ago, and after reaching several regions of <strong>the</strong> world(East Asia, South-East Asia, West Asia, Australia, Europe) <strong>the</strong>y continued evolution indifferent ecological conditions.Currently available data on choral polyphony in different human societiesstrongly support <strong>the</strong> “multiregional model”. That’s why all our above-mentioneddiscussions were based on <strong>the</strong> publications of <strong>the</strong> proponents of <strong>the</strong> “multiregionalmodel”, and particularly <strong>the</strong> works of Milford Wolpoff.Here I must note that <strong>the</strong> “recent African model” also leaves room for our model,because at least some of <strong>the</strong> supporters of this model claim that spoken language was nottaken along by <strong>the</strong> <strong>first</strong> anatomically modern humans that left Africa about 100 kya. <strong>For</strong>example, D. Klark, favoring a late Middle Pleistocene African origin for modern humans,still supports <strong>the</strong> idea of <strong>the</strong> late (50-40 kya) development of syntactic language (seeStringer, 1992:602). But it is obvious that <strong>the</strong> “multiregional model” has many morepoints of contact with <strong>the</strong> data of contemporary distribution of human vocal polyphony.Tone languages and <strong>the</strong>asynchronous model of speech originWe have already discussed <strong>the</strong> importance of tone languages in <strong>the</strong> evolution ofhuman languages as <strong>the</strong> descendant of <strong>the</strong> primordial pitch language. In this section I amgoing to discuss tone languages from <strong>the</strong> standpoint of <strong>the</strong> suggested non-synchronousmodel of <strong>the</strong> origin of articulated speech.Tone languages are mostly distributed in East Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. Ihope readers remember that according to our model, <strong>the</strong>se two regions are <strong>the</strong> twochronological poles of <strong>the</strong> transformation of primordial pitch language into articulatedspeech: East Asia - <strong>the</strong> earliest, and sub-Saharan Africa - <strong>the</strong> latest. This “polarity”provides a good chance that <strong>the</strong> tone languages of <strong>the</strong>se two regions might haveinteresting peculiarities. As a consequence of <strong>the</strong> much longer use of pitch language as asystem of communication, development of African tone languages are supposed tocontain <strong>the</strong> primordial pitch system for a much longer period than East Asian tonelanguages. As a result, <strong>the</strong> longer use of <strong>the</strong> pitch system in <strong>the</strong> evolution of language inAfrica must have generated more tonal functions in African tone languages than in EastAsia where <strong>the</strong> earlier shift to articulated communication must have resulted in a morelimited functional use of tones. The new language categories and functions must havebeen realized in East Asia by means of articulation (Jordania, 1994a).The following is a brief outline of <strong>the</strong> tone languages of East Asia and Africafrom <strong>the</strong> non-synchronous model standpoint.One of <strong>the</strong> well-known distinctions between <strong>the</strong> tone languages of East Asia andsub-Saharan Africa is that in East Asia <strong>the</strong> tone element is mostly limited by its lexical

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