ABSTRACT
Linguistic research over the past 70 years has produced a body of knowledge that reflects the difficulty linguists have experienced when attempting to explain the evolution and development of speech and language. Disentangling the two driving forces of biological and social need has proved challenging. This chapter provides an overview of the evolution and development of speech and language including the comparison of human and animal language, the primacy of gesture, biological traits, social need, and the role of education. It is necessary to acknowledge that at this time there is no way to measure the relationship between speech and language-as-code. Additionally, traditional linguistic research emphasized the acquisition of the lexicon and grammatical systems yet other factors of maturation such as biological sex, social status, and education play a major role. The discussion concludes that the study of language development might benefit from a new more synergistic approach; one that considers the interaction of both socialization and biologically driven evolution.
