MIT Using Artificial Intelligence to Translate Ancient “Dead” Languages
System developed at MIT CSAIL aims to help linguists decipher languages that have been lost to history. Recent research suggests that most languages that have…
Language News
Monkeys May Have “Self-Domesticated” – Like Humans
It’s not a coincidence that dogs are cuter than wolves, or that goats at a petting zoo have shorter horns and friendlier demeanors than their…
Similar to Humans, Mother Bats Use “Baby Talk” to Communicate With Their Pups
When talking to babies, humans slow down their speech, raise their pitch and change the “color” of their voice. This “baby talk,” as people know…
Chimpanzee Lip-Smacks Help Trace the Evolution of Human Speech Back to Ancient Ancestors
Chimpanzee lip-smacks exhibit a speech-like rhythm, a group of researchers led by the University of Warwick have found. They found chimpanzees produce lip-smacks at a…
Fascinating Research Solves Mystery of Tuvan Throat Singing [Audio/Video]
In Tuvan throat singing, dual tones are produced simultaneously. The unique style of singing originated in central Asia, where Tuvans have been practicing for generations….
Distinctive Primal Acoustics of the Human Scream
Researchers Hone In on What Makes Screams Distinctive Screams are prompted by a variety of emotions — from joyful surprise to abject terror. No matter…
Old World Monkeys Vocalizations May Be More Sophisticated Than Previously Realized
Study shows Old World monkeys combine items in speech — but only two and never more, unlike humans. The utterances of Old World monkeys, some…
The Culturally Co-opted Brain: How Reading Changes the Way We Think
From a research perspective, reading and writing is a fascinating phenomenon. After all, the first writing systems date back less than 6,000 years – the…
Researchers Link Dyslexia Gene Variants to Consonant Use Across Populations
In a new study of languages spoken in 43 different populations worldwide, Yale School of Medicine researchers and their colleagues identified variants of a dyslexia…
New Linguistic Analyses Dates Dravidian Language Family
The origin of the Dravidian language family, consisting of about 80 varieties spoken by 220 million people across southern and central India and surrounding countries,…
Children with Cochlear Implants Learn Words Faster Than Children With Normal Hearing
According to estimates by the Robert Koch Institute, up to two thousand hearing-impaired children are born in Germany each year. For some of them, a…
Body Language Is a Better Indicator of Intense Emotions Than Facial Expressions
Intense emotional experiences are more easily read in body language than in watching facial expressions. Facial clues in most studies rely on a set of…
Brain’s Reading Centers Are Culturally Universal No Matter What Language
The brain scans of French and Mandarin native speakers have shown that people use the same areas in the brain for reading, no matter what…
Disease Mapping Methods Indicate That Indo-European Languages Originated From Anatolia
Diverse languages, from English to Hindi, can trace their roots back 8,000 years to Anatolia (Asia Minor), a region that’s centered around modern-day Turkey. The…
Linguistics Research May Improve Future Internet Search Engines
By translating ten different English texts into various codes, scientists from the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems found a long-range correlation…
Mysterious Gene Mutation Provides Window into the Biology of Language Cognition
David Skuse, a psychiatrist and an expert on language development working at the Institute of Child Health at University College London, encountered a mysterious ailment…
Bottlenose Dolphins Use Signature Whistles to Greet Others
Bottlenose dolphins can understand the meaning and order of words, which can be conveyed through human hand gestures. It appears that now humans are also…
