Mediation of Memory: Towards Transdisciplinary Perspectives in Current Memory Studies. Preface to the Special Issue of Trames

Võsu, Ester; Kõresaar, Ene; Kuutma, Kristin

doi:10.3176/tr.2008.3.01

Cited by 15 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 35 publications

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“…To meet these challenges, an interdisciplinary approach integrating the knowledge and techniques from not only linguistics but also a variety of relevant disciplines, as exemplified in our study and many others (e.g. [ 41 , 87 ]), has been proved to be the most effective [ 2 , 3 , 9 , 16 , 57 , 78 , 88 , 89 ].…”

Section: General Discussion and Conclusionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Modeling Coevolution between Language and Memory Capacity during Language Origin

Gong

Shuai

2015

PLoS ONE

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Memory is essential to many cognitive tasks including language. Apart from empirical studies of memory effects on language acquisition and use, there lack sufficient evolutionary explorations on whether a high level of memory capacity is prerequisite for language and whether language origin could influence memory capacity. In line with evolutionary theories that natural selection refined language-related cognitive abilities, we advocated a coevolution scenario between language and memory capacity, which incorporated the genetic transmission of individual memory capacity, cultural transmission of idiolects, and natural and cultural selections on individual reproduction and language teaching. To illustrate the coevolution dynamics, we adopted a multi-agent computational model simulating the emergence of lexical items and simple syntax through iterated communications. Simulations showed that: along with the origin of a communal language, an initially-low memory capacity for acquired linguistic knowledge was boosted; and such coherent increase in linguistic understandability and memory capacities reflected a language-memory coevolution; and such coevolution stopped till memory capacities became sufficient for language communications. Statistical analyses revealed that the coevolution was realized mainly by natural selection based on individual communicative success in cultural transmissions. This work elaborated the biology-culture parallelism of language evolution, demonstrated the driving force of culturally-constituted factors for natural selection of individual cognitive abilities, and suggested that the degree difference in language-related cognitive abilities between humans and nonhuman animals could result from a coevolution with language.

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Section: General Discussion and Conclusionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Apart from psychological and comparative studies, there have been theoretical discussions highlighting the necessity of memory for language evolution (e.g. [ 57 – 59 ]). However, many of these theories (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modeling Coevolution between Language and Memory Capacity during Language Origin

Gong

Shuai

2015

PLoS ONE

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“…At the same time, they continuously scaffold and develop the skills and knowledge. Sometimes, social memory is studied only from a historical perspective, as information about past social events fixed in the memory of individuals, or in objective, culturally-inherited artefacts (Võsu et al 2008). However, many actual biological and social processes (foraging of ants and bees, bird migration, construction of the Egyptian pyramids or the Great Wall of China, maintenance and navigation of a spacecraft to remote planet) also presuppose active re-constructive memory processes that have a future-directed nature and cannot be reduced to inherited traditions or social practice to preserve and accumulate natural and cultural data of the present or the past.…”

Section: Types Of Memorymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The number of publications on the nature of language, its origin and evolution, and its relation to memory has increased significantly in the last decade (Võsu et al 2008;Boyd and Richerson 2010;Barbieri 2010;Mesoudi et al 2011). At the same time, the meaning of the terms 'language', and 'memory', continues to change.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Why Language Evolution Needs Memory: Systems and Ecological Approaches

Sukhoverkhov

Fowler

2014

Biosemiotics

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The main purpose of this article is to consider the significance of different types of memory and non-genetic ('inclusive', 'extended', 'soft') inheritance and different biosemiotic systems for the origin and evolution of language. It presents language and memory as distributed (objectified, external), heteronomous and system-determined processes implemented in biological and social domains. The article emphasises that language and other sign systems are both (1) ecological and inductive systems that were caused by and always correlate with the environment and (2) deductive systems that are inherited by and depend on the internal development of organisms, individuals, and societies. The article also claims that the origin, reoccurrence and evolution of naturally-emerging sign systems presuppose (1) their retention and accumulation in physical, biological, individual, and social types of memory and (2) reinforcement and maintenance by conventional and deliberate social regulation and accumulation. All of this allows language and other sign systems to be situation-relevant and to be transmitted through generations without their constant reinvention. The novelty of the proposed theory of language origin and evolution is in interdisciplinary integration of biosemiotic studies, systems (ecological, holistic, integrative) approaches to language and studies of inheritance systems presented by 'Extended evolutionary synthesis'.

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“…Muistitutkimuksen intensiivinen kasvu, "muistiboomi" (Võsu, Kõresaar & Kuutma 2008), onkin aiheuttanut myös vastareaktion, jota mediatutkija Marita Sturken luonnehtii monitulkintaisesti sanalla "mini-backlash" (Sturken 2008, 73). Muistitutkimusta on kritisoitu siitä, että muistia käytetään epämääräisesti ja kaikenkattavasti, ja että psykologisesta muistin käsitteestä puhutaan yksioikoisesti kollektiivin ominaisuutena.…”

Section: Muistiboomin Kritiikkiäunclassified

Memory studies - kohti tutkimusalueen vakiintumista

Lehtisalo¹

2011

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Mediation of Memory: Towards Transdisciplinary Perspectives in Current Memory Studies. Preface to the Special Issue of Trames

Cited by 15 publications

References 35 publications

Modeling Coevolution between Language and Memory Capacity during Language Origin

Modeling Coevolution between Language and Memory Capacity during Language Origin

Why Language Evolution Needs Memory: Systems and Ecological Approaches

Memory studies - kohti tutkimusalueen vakiintumista

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