title: The precedence of syntax in the rapid emergence of human language in evolution as defined by the integration hypothesis.
abstract: Our core hypothesis is that the emergence of human language arose very rapidly from the linking of two pre-adapted systems found elsewhere in the animal world-an expression system, found, for example, in birdsong, and a lexical system, suggestively found in non-human primate calls (Miyagawa et al., 2013, 2014). We challenge the view that language has undergone a series of gradual changes-or a single preliminary protolinguistic stage-before achieving its full character. We argue that a full-fledged combinatorial operation Merge triggered the integration of these two pre-adapted systems, giving rise to a fully developed language. This goes against the gradualist view that there existed a structureless, protolinguistic stage, in which a rudimentary proto-Merge operation generated internally flat words. It is argued that compounds in present-day language are a fossilized form of this prior stage, a point which we will question.
authors: Department of Linguistics, University of São Paulo São Paulo, Brazil.
authors: Vitor A
authors: VA
authors: Nóbrega
authors: Department of Linguistics and Philosophy, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Cambridge, MA, USA ; Center for Research and Development of Higher Education, University of Tokyo Tokyo, Japan.
authors: Shigeru
authors: S
authors: Miyagawa
keywords: biolinguistics; compounding; emergent view of language evolution; language evolution; linguistics; word formation