"Xenolinguistics brings together biologists, anthropologists, linguists and other experts specialising on language and communication to explore what non-human, non-Earthbound language might look like. The 18 chapters examine what is known about human language and animal communication systems to provide reasonable hypotheses about what we may find if we encounter non-Earth intelligence"--
Xenolinguistics brings together biologists, anthropologists, linguists, and other experts specializing in language and communication to explore what non-human, non-Earthbound language might look like. The 18 chapters examine what is known about human language and animal communication systems to provide reasonable hypotheses about what we may find if we encounter non-Earth intelligence.
Showcasing an interdisciplinary dialogue between a set of highly established scholars, this volume:
- Clarifies what is and is not known about human language and animal communication systems
- Presents speculative arguments as a philosophical exercise to help define the boundaries of what our current science can tell us about non-speculative areas of investigation
- Provides readers with a clearer sense of the how our knowledge about language is better informed through a cross-disciplinary investigation
- Offers a better understanding of future avenues of research on language
This rich interdisciplinary collection will be of interest to researchers and students studying non-human communication, astrobiology, and language invention.
Xenolinguistics brings together biologists, anthropologists, linguists and other experts specialising on language and communication to explore what non-human, non-Earthbound language might look like.
1. Goals of the VolumeJeffrey Punske
2. Many Ways to Say Things: What the Diversity of Animal Communication on
Earth Can Tell Us About the Likely Nature of Alien LanguageArik Kershenbaum
3. Recognizing Intentional Signals and Their Meaning in Non-Human
CommunicationCatherine Hobaiter, Adriano R. Lameira, and Derek Ball
4. Getting Out of Our Skin: What Decoding Interspecies Communication and
Nonhuman Intelligence Can Tell Us About Deciphering Alien LanguagesDenise L.
Herzing
5. Communicative Resources Beyond the Verbal Tier: A View on Xenolinguistics
from Interactional LinguisticsHeike Ortner
6. How Studies of Communication Among Nonhumans and Between Humans and
Nonhumans Can Inform SETIIrene M. Pepperberg
7. Patterns of Communication of Human Complex Societies as a Blueprint for
Alien CommunicationAnamaria Berea
8. Interstellar Competence: Applications of Linguistics and Communicative and
Cultural Competencies to Extraterrestrial CommunicationSumayya K.R. Granger,
Judd Ethan Ruggill, and Ken S. McAllister
9. Why Do We Assume That We Can Decode Alien Languages?Con Slobodchikoff
10. Xenolinguistic FieldworkClaire Bowern
11. Investigating the Foundations of Meaning in a XenolanguageAndrew
McKenzie
12. A Linguistic Perspective on the Drake Equation: Knowns and Unknowns for
Human Languages and Extraterrestrial CommunicationDaniel Ross
13. Cognition, Sensory Input, and Linguistics : A Possible Language for Blind
AliensSheri Wells-Jensen
14.The Design Features of Extraterrestrial Language: A Domain-General
ApproachDarcy Sperlich
15. Universal GrammarIan Roberts, Jeffrey Watumull, and Noam Chomsky
16. Where Does Universal Grammar Fit in the Universe? Human Cognition and the
Strong Minimalist ThesisBridget D. Samuels and Jeffrey Punske
17. Learning and Adaptation of Communication Systems in Biological Life
FormsJessie S. Nixon and Fabian Tomaschek
18. Writing Systems and METI: Off-the-Shelf Encoding of Human Physiology,
Language, Cognition, and CultureDaniel Harbour
Douglas A. Vakoch is Director of METI (Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence), a nonprofit research and educational organization dedicated to transmitting intentional signals to nearby stars. He is the editor of more than a dozen books, including Ecofeminist Science Fiction: International Perspectives on Gender, Ecology, and Literature (2021) and The Routledge Handbook of Ecofeminism and Literature (2022).
Jeffrey Punske is Associate Professor and the director of undergraduate studies in linguistics at Southern Illinois University. He is the editor of Language Invention and Linguistics Pedagogy (2020).
