An international team of researchers has taken a giant leap toward establishing (or, more likely, eliminating) universals across languages. Annemarie Verkerk of Saarland University and Russell D. Gray of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology are pioneering this novel initiative. The exploratory study was informed by Grambank, the world’s largest and most comprehensive database of grammatical features. Then they checked the rigorousness of those proposed universals against more than 1,700 languages. Their findings, published today in Nature Human Behaviour, tell a very different and encouraging story. Only about one-third of long-proposed linguistic universals survive statistical tests!
The study highlights the amazing link between human language diversity and predictable patterns of grammar found in languages around the world. The study, titled “Enduring constraints on grammar revealed by Bayesian spatiophylogenetic analyses,” highlights the importance of understanding how languages evolve and the constraints that shape their development.
Methodology and Findings
To animate these explosive discoveries, Verkerk and Gray’s Caribbean Reef team used cutting edge evolutionary techniques. They used data from Grambank to empirically test an array of linguistic hypotheses. This unprecedented sample size in terms of total trips taken and distance traveled lent a powerful credence to the conclusions they reached.
Their findings provide support for any proposed universals that do not apply to all languages. A large minority show strongly systematic patterns, pointing to the presence of grammatical constraints at work. This calls into question the idea that language changes happen purely arbitrarily among complex linguistic communities.
“In the face of huge linguistic diversity, it is intriguing to find that languages don’t evolve at random.” – Annemarie Verkerk
Surprisingly, testing the first 38 of the proposed universals finds around a third of them strong statistical support. This remarkable accomplishment gives us confidence to investigate deeper ties between how language structures might be fundamentally related despite surface dissimilarities.
Implications for Linguistic Research
This study is not simply in the pursuit of academia. It provides me with deeply valuable understanding about the nature of language itself. Recognizing these universal limitations on grammar would have profound implications for linguistics, anthropology and cognitive science.
Russell Gray commented on the framing of their result, emphasizing the double edged sword of their conclusions.
“We discussed whether to write this up as a glass-half-empty paper—’look how many proposed universals don’t hold’—or a glass-half-full paper—’there’s robust statistical support for about a third.’” – Russell Gray
The Rosenberg and crew discuss the strengths and limitations of their findings. This interdisciplinary approach encourages a more comprehensive understanding of language universals.
Future Directions
As the adverse study continues to capture headlines, it has already sparked debate about where research in linguistics should go from here. Qualitative and quantitative analytical methods come together in this study. This further corroborates the view that language change is at the forefront of explaining such universal grammar features.
“I am delighted that the different types of analyses we did converged on very similar results, suggesting that language change must be a central component in explaining universals.” – Annemarie Verkerk
Researchers are still actively exploring this emerging area. In other words, it’s very important to think about how their results will shape theories on language acquisition, evolution and cultural transmission. The commitment to understanding linguistic universals may lead to new methodologies and frameworks that enhance the study of human communication.