Developments in cognitive science indicate that human and nonhuman primates share a range of behavioral and physiological characteristics that speak to the issue of language origins. Three major themes: First, it is argued that scientists in animal behavior and anthropology need to move beyond theoretical debate to a more empirically focused and comparative approach to language. Second, those empirical and comparative methods are described, revealing underpinnings of language, some of which are shared by humans and other primates and others of which are unique to humans. Third, evolutionary challenges that led to adaptive changes in communication over time are considered with an eye toward understanding various constraints that channeled the process.

This book serves as a single, unifying reference source for those interested in speech motor effects evident in the acoustic record, reaction times, speech communication strategies, and perceptual judgments. Written by a linguist and a psychologist, the book provides an analytic orientation toward speech and alcohol with an emphasis on laboratory-based research in acoustic-phonetics and speech science. It is a comprehensive review of the effects of alcohol on speech and compares the various theoretical concerns which form this research.

Brain, Mind and the Signifying Body is an exploration of a multimodal theory of cognitive science. Using linguistic theories first developed by Saussure and more latterly by M. A. K. Halliday, Paul Thibault analyses how social and biological systems interact to produce meaning. This fascinating study will be of interest to undergraduates and academics researching cognitive linguistics and advanced semiotics. The book engages with the current dialogue between the human and life sciences to ask questions about the relationship between the physical, biological aspects of a human being, and the sociocultural framework in which a human being exists.

Ellipsis is the non-expression of one or more sentence elements whose meaning can be reconstructed either from the context or from a person's knowledge of the world. In speech and writing, ellipsis is pervasive, contributing in various ways to the economy, speed, and style of communication. Resolving ellipsis is a particularly challenging issue in natural language processing, since not only must meaning be gleaned from missing elements but the fact that something meaningful is missing must be detected in the first place.