Sue Savage-Rumbaugh, Stuart G. Shanker, and Talbot J. Taylor
Paperback: 244 pages
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (August 14, 2001)
Language: English
Current primate research has yielded stunning results that not only threaten our underlying assumptions about the cognitive and communicative abilities of nonhuman primates, but also bring into question what it means to be human. At the forefront of this research, Sue Savage-Rumbaugh has achieved a scientific breakthrough of impressive proportions. Her work with Kanzi, a laboratory-reared bonobo, has led to Kanzi’s acquisition of linguistic and cognitive skills similar to those of a 2½-year-old human child.
Apes, Language, and the Human Mind skillfully combines a fascinating narrative of the Kanzi research with incisive critical analysis of the broader linguistic, psychological, and anthropological implications of the research. The first part of the book provides a detailed, personal account of Kanzi’s infancy, youth, and upbringing, while the second part addresses the theoretical, conceptual, and methodological issues raised by the Kanzi research. The authors discuss the challenge to the foundations of modern cognitive science presented by the Kanzi research; the methods by which we represent and evaluate the abilities of both primates and humans; and the implications which ape language research has for the study of the evolution of human language.
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