Babel

Description

A Klingon version of Hamlet, attempts to teach chimps to speak, and mice that have been given the "language gene" are all part of Stephen Fry's exploration of the origins of language in this program. Why are human beings the only species with true linguistic ability? Topics include primate communication (at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology); the Turkana language; the acquisition of language, and feral children (with Steven Pinker); the wug test (with Jean Berko Gleason); why sign language is a true language (at the National Theatre of the Deaf); the Klingon language; and Grimm's law, philology, and the Proto-Indo-European language (with Wolfgang Klein)

Runtime

60 min

Series

Subjects

Genre

Date of Publication

[2013], c2011

Database

Films on Demand

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