A Brain for Speech: A View from Evolutionary Neuroanatomy

by Francisco Aboitiz

This book discusses evolution of the human brain, the origin of speech and language. It covers past and present perspectives on the contentious issue of the acquisition of the language capacity. Divided into two parts, this insightful work covers several characteristics of the human brain including the language-specific network, the size of the human brain, its lateralization of functions and interhemispheric integration, in particular the phonological loop. Aboitiz argues that it is the phonological loop that allowed us to increase our vocal memory capacity and to generate a shared semantic space that gave rise to modern language. The second part examines the neuroanatomy of the monkey brain, vocal learning birds like parrots, emergent evidence of vocal learning capacities in mammals, mirror neurons, and the ecological and social context in which speech evolved in our early ancestors. This book's interdisciplinary topic will appeal to scholars of psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, biology and history.

529 pages, Hardcover

Published July 26, 2017

Reviews

[Jack · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating deep dive into comparative neuroanatomy and evolution, with specific focus on the development of speech and language.
This book goes into great detail on the way the brain develops, on the neural pathways and regions used for speech and everything involved in it. It compares the human brain to those of primates, songbirds, bats and even mice, as it attempts to paint a picture of the way the brain has evolved for speech and language.
This book is very jargon heavy and very academic, so I wouldn't recommend it for the average person, but if you have an interest in the field or experience in it, this is a wonderful read.