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Language as Mechanisms for Interaction: Towards an Evolutionary Tale

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Language, Logic, and Computation (TbiLLC 2018)

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Abstract

In this paper we present a view of natural language (NL) grammars compatible with enactive approaches to cognition. This perspective aims to directly model the group-forming properties of NL interactions. Firstly, NL communication is not taken as underpinned by convergence/common ground but modelled as the employment of flexible procedures enabling creative joint activities without overarching common goals. On this basis, we argue that a common non-individualistic pattern can be discerned across NL learning, individual and institutional NL change, and evolution. At all levels and stages, modelling of change relies on situated iteration leading to joint establishment and modification of practices. NL learning, change, and even NL emergence can all then be seen in gradualistic terms, with the higher-order organisation that incorporates NL grammars constituting an adaptive interactive system in continuity with the definition of living organisms as modelled in enactive approaches.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The detailed justification of this formalism as a grammar formalism is given elsewhere ([8, 9, 37, 56, 58], and others).

  2. 2.

    In [22, 25, 27], this is modelled via a mapping onto a Type Theory with Records formulation, but we suppress these details here: see also [49, 50, 79].

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. King’s College London, London, UK

    Ruth Kempson & Eleni Gregoromichelaki

  2. Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf, Germany

    Eleni Gregoromichelaki

  3. University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

    Christine Howes

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  1. Ruth Kempson
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  2. Eleni Gregoromichelaki
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  3. Christine Howes
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Correspondence to Eleni Gregoromichelaki .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science, University College London, London, UK

    Alexandra Silva

  2. Department of Computer Science, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Sam Staton

  3. Department of Linguistics, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf, Germany

    Peter Sutton

  4. Leibniz-Zentrum Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft, Berlin, Germany

    Carla Umbach

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Kempson, R., Gregoromichelaki, E., Howes, C. (2019). Language as Mechanisms for Interaction: Towards an Evolutionary Tale. In: Silva, A., Staton, S., Sutton, P., Umbach, C. (eds) Language, Logic, and Computation. TbiLLC 2018. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11456. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-59565-7_11

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