No one knows how long the shepherds on the island of La Gomera have used the rare whistled language called the Silbo Gomero, but American and Spanish researchers said on Wednesday that the brain processes it like a spoken language.I'd like to know what other activities cause those regions of the brain to be used. Obviously, the whistling transmits semantic information, but I don't think this study proves that it is a true language. How much variation is possible in a whistled language? Enough for a robust lexicon? What kinds of inflection exist in Siblo Gomero?
Wednesday, January 5, 2005
Whistled language
From Yahoo! News: Oddly Enough:
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2 comments:
Isn't it a "true language" though, if they're able to effectively communicate with it? I would tend to think so, personally.
~Brooke
It depends. What kind of information is being communicated?
Is it the kind of information that soldiers give each other through hand signals? I don't think soldiers' hand signals can be considered a true language.
Or is there enough variation in whistling to allow for diverse units of meaning? In other words, can you say "I see a bear" in several different ways using the whistled language?
It's probably controversial, the point at which something stops being code and starts being language, but I believe that an important factor is the ability to communicate abstract ideas. Can the whistling do that?
Those are the questions I have.
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