The Singing Neanderthals: The Origins of Music, Language, Mind, and Body

+++++ "The Neanderthals who inhabited Europe and south-west Asia had brains as large as those of modern humans but behaved in a quite different fashion, one that indicates the absence of language...So, what were the Neanderthals doing with such large brains?...Answer: the Neanderthals used their brains for a sophisticated communication system...[that I call] `Hmmmmm'... 'Hmmmmm'...proved remarkably successful: it allowed them to survive for a quarter of a million years through dramatic environmental change in ice-age Europe, and to attain an unprecedented level of cultural achievement. They were 'singing Neanderthals'--although their songs lacked any words." The above quotation comes near the end of this fascinating book (and explains its title) by Dr. Steven Mithen, Professor of Early Prehistory (at the University of Reading, England), archeologist, and leading figure in the development of `cognitive archeology.' What is the aim of this book? Mithen explains: "We can only explain the human propensity to make and listen to music by recognizing that it has been encoded into the human genome during the evolutionary history of our species. How, when, and why are the mysteries that I intend to resolve [in this book]...This book sets out my own ideas about how music and language evolved, and evaluates the proposals of others by exposing them to the archaeological and fossil evidence...The result is a complete account of not only how music and language evolved but how they relate to the evolution of the human mind, body, and society." As one who thoroughly enjoyed this book, I can validate what Mithen says above. He does examine a large array of data and proposals from many others and critically analyzes this information. Be aware that to understand the book's conclusions (one of which is quoted above), you have to carefully read and comprehend all the material presented beforehand. Mithen proved (at least to me) that he was well-adept at sorting through all the neurological, linguistical, psychological, biological, and archeological information (to name just some disciplines he delves into). (Don't worry! Mithen explains everything quite well so you're not expected to be an academic with a Ph.D.) The book itself is divided into two parts. The first part (excluding chapter one which is an introduction) is concerned with what we understand about music and language today. Part two uses those features presented in part one to explain the evolutionary history of language and music. To give the potential reader an idea of the breadth of this book, I will give the sub-title of each chapter: Part I: The Present (2) The similarities and differences between music and language (3) The brain, aphasia (loss of using or understanding words), and musical savants (4) Acquired and congenital amusia (inability to recognize or reproduce musical sounds) (5) Music processing within the brain (6) Brain maturation, language learning, and perfect pitch (7

You can tell the ambitious scope of this book by its subtitle: "the origins of music, language, mind, and body." Wow! Is that all? Actually, the task the author sets out to do isn't as vast as one might at first suppose because they are seen as related in the way early hominids arose and then evolved further. Steven Mithen is less concerned with the origin of music than the way in which the homo sapiens mind differed from its ancestors and the then contemporary hominids. But before I get to my attempt at summarizing what Mithen says about these matters, I want to address something else. The speculative stories that professional anthropologists and archaeologists tell have a very different meaning to them than they end up meaning for the general public and there is some small danger in that difference. Science professionals are all aware of the raw evidence and the context and conjecture surrounding each piece. There are always ambiguities and tentative "conclusions" arrived at by one authority or another and they often conflict. However, to make sense of a broad collection of data a story is created as a kind of summary of what is known at that time. These stories are always fragile as art glass. But they can be a useful way of organizing what is known and if new evidence found fits within the model it is strengthened. However, it is known that any new evidence found might undo a part of the story or overthrow it altogether. The problem is that the general reader doesn't know the evidence and has no idea of its context. Such a reader is unlikely to read broadly enough to gain some sense of the strength of such a story and whether its speculation is more mainstream or something radical. Whether the story is fairly constructed from the evidence, or is highly skewed in its presentation and is in fact untrustworthy cannot be known by the casual reader. Yet the story becomes the way the general reader is likely to discuss the topic, as if the story were fact. This can actually impede understanding rather than help because it freezes things in the reader's mind because work continues in the field and the story may be overthrown rather quickly. The author actually mentions this kind of effect when discussing the Divje Babe I "flute" which is more likely a bone bitten into by a bear than a flute. But in the popular imagination it remains a flute. I am certainly not qualified to judge the evidence presented in this book nor any of the authors speculations or conclusions. What I can say is that the author tells his story well, is quite interesting, and does present the ambiguities of the evidence and various sides on many of the issues he discusses. I think such openness and fair-mindedness is a good sign even while one is advocating for a particular point of view. Mithen's thrust in this book (if I understand it correctly) is that as early hominids developed into upright narrow-hipped creatures certain biological adaptations acc

This book presents some interesting and refreshing speculations on how music and language evolved, emphasizing reasons for believing that music was at least as important as language during significant parts of human evolution. It stretches the limits of what we can figure out from the available evidence, so it's likely the some of it is wrong. But his hypotheses appear more likely to help us ask the right questions than to lead us astray. Mithen's knowledge of archeology helps make his book different from most books about the human mind in that he emphasizes very different selective pressures at different stages in human evolution, corresponding to changes in conditions that our ancestors faced. Here are some surprising and informative section titles that will tell you something about the flavor of the book: "The musical implications of bipedalism", and "The sexy hand-axe hypothesis". I was intrigued by his description of how music helps a group cooperate by synchronizing their emotions. But he helps point out the limits of those benefits by noting that the chants at Nazi rallies that helped unite most of the German people.

Starts slow, but soon zooms along. Before you know it, you're in the midst of a fascinating story about monkey calls, baby babbling, opera and rock, and the weird, wired harmonies that cascade through the human nervous system when people engage in speech and song. Then, halfway through the book, using the information of the first half as a lens to bring the second half into focus, the author leads you on a trip from the darkest depths of hominid prehistory to the dawn of homo sapien culture, developing, as he goes, a theory about the origins of oral communication and music. The wonder of the book is not the theory, but the author's protean curiosity and delightful talent for explanation and synthesis. He weaves together strands of thought from all sorts of different disciplines to create an argument so lively and thought provoking that it doesn't matter if it's right. You come away full of ideas that seem to apply to almost everything you see. The book is a lovely, multi-layered intellectual tune, which makes you hummmm with thought as you turn each page.

Fear not, dear reader. I'm not making the sounds of indecision. Nor have I forgotten the words to my local national anthem. Instead, those sets of letters are acronyms. Steven Mithen uses them to typify the foundations of our ability to communicate in our distant past. The letters stand for "Holistic, "multi-modal", "manipulative", and "musical". With the addition of "mimetic", he uses the collective phrase to explain why "music" in this broadly defined sense, preceded the development of language and grammar in our species. He also explains the "how" of this phenomenon, which is what gives this book its real value. Mithen's previous works are a foundation for this one, although he openly admits that the phenomenon of music eluded him in them. He makes up for that oversight with a detailed examination of fossil and genetic information to support his thesis. As humans fluent in the use of speech, with its lexicons and syntax, we've become blinded to our true roots. We rush children through infancy, overlooking the process we use in communicating with those who lack words and their meanings. Mithen says this period is critical - both because its universality among cultures should tell us something about our past, and because a better understanding of the communication process can lead to smarter and healthier children. Who, among the mothers we know, fails to "sing" to their newborn? In Mithen's view, that childhood communication method repeats what our African ancestors did with each other prior to the development of language. Words, in our time, are representative. They "mean" something - an object, an event, a lesson. In those early days, emotions, especially the basic ones of fear, flight, fight or feed, were the only significant topics. Music, he reminds us, is the language of emotion, whether it be lullabies to children or a Mozart aria. Newborns are particularly receptive to music or rhythmic sounds and gestures, especially when they're synchronised [hence "multi-modal"]. Newborns can't understand the words mothers use, but they comprehend the "message" [the "holistic" part]. The author explains how studies in brain activity associated with speech and music have given us great insight to the mind's processing of information. Where and when did these talents emerge? Mithen builds his thesis with careful detail, noting how our gaining a bipedal stature did more than distinguish us from the other apes. A range of body changes modified our method of movement, hand manipulation and breathing. It also impinged on our voices. The Early Humans, as Mithen broadly characterises the Homo genus, developed a range of sounds, with various pitches and volumes. The best way to use these new-found talents was in a musical manner and for a variety of circumstances. Although nearly half the book must be consumed to reach the title's topic, the background is necessary for a full understanding. Homo neanderthalis, with its larger b