RECENT ARTICLES by Jim Hurford

• 2011 ``Linguistics from an Evolutionary Point of View'', in Handbook of the Philosophy of Science: Linguistics, edited by Ruth Kempson, Tim Fernando and Nicholas Asher, Elsevier Science, pp. 473-498. Polish translation of this article
  
  
• 2009 (with D.Dediu) ``Diversity in Language, Genes and the Language Faculty'', in The Cradle of Language, edited by Rudolf Botha and Chris Knight, Oxford University Press, pp.163-184.
  
  
• in press ``The Evolution of Language'' to appear in Discovering Biology (textbook), by Paul Insel and Don Ross, published by Prentice-Hall.
  
  
• 2009 ``Universals and the diachronic life cycle of languages''. In Language Universals, edited by Morten Christiansen, Christopher Collins and Shimon Edelman; Oxford University Press, pp.40-53. PDF of proofs
  
  
• 2008 ``The evolution of human communication and language'', in Sociobiology of Communication: an interdisciplinary perspective, edited by Patrizia D'Ettorre and David Hughes, Oxford University Press, pp.249-264. PDF of proofs
  
  
• 2007 A performed practice explains a linguistic universal: Counting gives the Packing Strategy. (PDF) Lingua, 117:773-783.
  
  
• 2007 The Origin of Noun Phrases: Reference, Truth, and Communication, Lingua, 117(3):527-542.
  
  
• 2006 ``Origin and Evolution of Language'' In Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, Second Edition, Keith Brown (editor-in-chief), Elsevier, Oxford. Volume 9, pp.91-98.
  
  
• 2006 ``Evolutionary Theories of Language: Current Theories'' In Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, Second Edition, Keith Brown (editor-in-chief), Elsevier, Oxford. Volume 4, pp.361-365.
  
  
• 2006 Recent Developments in the Evolution of Language, Cognitive Systems, 7(1):23-32.
  
  
• 2005 Computer Modelling Widens the Focus of Language Study", section introduction to section IV ``Learnability and Diversity: How did Languages Emerge and Diverge?'' in Language Origins: Perspectives on Evolution, edited by Maggie Tallerman, Oxford, University Press. pp.284-309
  
  
• 2004 ``Human uniqueness, learned symbols and recursive thought''. In European Review, 12(4): 551-565.
  
  
• 2004 ``Language beyond our grasp: what mirror neurons can, and cannot, do for language evolution'', in Evolution of Communication Systems: A Comparative Approach, edited by D. Kimbrough Oller and Ulrike Griebel, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. pp.297-313. Also in PDF format - click here.
  
  
• 2003 (with Catriona Tullo) ``Modelling Zipfian Distributions in Language'' (PDF file), paper presented at the Language Evolution and Computation Workshop/Course at the 15th European Summer School on Logic Language and Information, Vienna, August 2003.
  
  
• 2003 ``Why Synonymy is Rare: Fitness is in the Speaker'' (PDF file). In W. Banzhaf, T. Christaller, P. Dittrich, J. T. Kim, and J. Ziegler, editors, Advances in Artificial Life - Proceedings of the 7th European Conference on Artificial Life (ECAL), Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence, Vol. 2801, pp.442-451, Springer Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg.
  
  
• 2003 ``The Language Mosaic and its Evolution''. In Language Evolution, edited by Morten Christiansen and Simon Kirby, Oxford University Press, pp.38-57..
  
  
• 2003
  • ``The Neural Basis of Predicate-Argument Structure'', target article in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 26(3):261-283.
  • (Other authors' commentaries on this target article.)
  • ``Ventral/dorsal, predicate/argument: the transformation from perception to meaning'', Author's Response to the above commentaries on target article in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 26(3):301-311.
    
    
• 2003 ``The interaction between numerals and nouns'' in F.Plank (ed.) Noun Phrase Structure in the Languages of Europe (one of ten volumes to emerge from the European Science Foundation EUROTYP project) pp. 561-620.
  (The whole thing (76 pages) --- PDF .)
  
  
• 2002 ``The word class `Numeral' ''. In Lexikologie-Lexicology, edited by D A Cruse, F Hundsnurscher, M Job, and P R Lutzeier (Vol.1, pp.628-630), in the series Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin.
  
  
• 2002 ``Expression/induction models of language evolution: dimensions and issues''. In Linguistic Evolution through Language Acquisition: Formal and Computational Models, edited by Ted Briscoe, Cambridge University Press. pp.301-344. See a review of this book, by Simon Edelman and Bo Pedersen, to appear in Journal of Linguistics.
  
  
• 2002 ``The Roles of Expression and Representation in Language Evolution''. In The Transition to Language, edited by Alison Wray,, Oxford University Press. pp.311-334.
  
  
• 2002 (with Simon Kirby) ``The Emergence of Linguistic Structure: an Overview of the Iterated Learning Model''. In Simulating the Evolution of Language, edited by Domenico Parisi and Angelo Cangelosi, Springer Verlag, Berlin. Postscript version.
  
  
• 2001 ``Random Boolean Nets and Features of Language'', IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation, 5(2), Special Issue on Evolutionary Computation and Cognitive Science, pp.111-116.
  
  
• 2001 ``Protothought had no logical names'' In New Essays on the Origin of Language edited by Jürgen Trabant and Sean Ward. Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin. pp.119-132.
  
  
• 2001 ``Numeral Systems'' (PDF version), in International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, edited by N.J.Smelser and P.B.Baltes, Pergamon, Amsterdam. pp.10756-10761.
  
  
• 2000 ``The Emergence of Syntax'' (editorial introduction to section on syntax in The Evolutionary Emergence of Language: Social function and the origins of linguistic form, edited by C. Knight, M. Studdert-Kennedy and J. Hurford, Cambridge University Press. Pp.219-230.).
  
  
• 2000 ``Social Transmission Favours Linguistic Generalization'', in The Evolutionary Emergence of Language: Social function and the origins of linguistic form, edited by C. Knight, M. Studdert-Kennedy and J. Hurford, Cambridge University Press. Pp.324-352.
  
  
• 1999 ``Language Learning from Fragmentary Input'' In Proceedings of the AISB'99 Symposium on Imitation in Animals and Artifacts. (Artificial Intelligence and Simulation of Behaviour). pp.121-129 (PDF version.)
  
  
• 1999 ``The Evolution of Language and Languages''. In Robin Dunbar, Chris Knight and Camilla Power (eds) The Evolution of Culture, Edinburgh University Press. pp.173-193.
  
  
• 1999 (with Simon Kirby) ``Co-Evolution of Language Size and the Critical Period'' In David Birdsong (ed.) Second Language Acquisition and the Critical Period Hypothesis, Lawrence Erlbaum. pp.39-63. (PDF version)
  
  
• 1999 ``Artificially growing a numeral system'' In Jadranka Gvozdanovic (ed.) Numeral Types and Changes Worldwide, Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin. pp.7-41.
  
  
• 1999 ``Functional Innateness: explaining the critical period for language acquisition'', In Functionalism and Formalism in Linguistics, Volume II: Case Studies, edited by Michael Darnell, Edith Moravscik, Frederick Newmeyer, Michael Noonan and Kathleen Wheatley. (Studies in Language Companion Series, Vol.42) John Benjamins, Amsterdam. pp.341-363.
  Abstract
  The whole thing (without figures) (31 pages) --- PDF version.)
  
  
• 1998 (with Simon Kirby) "The evolution of incremental learning", in Antonella Sorace, Caroline Heycock and Richard Shillcock (eds.) Proceedings of the GALA '97 Conference on Language Acquisition HCRC, Edinburgh University.
  
  
• 1997 (with Simon Kirby) "Learning, Culture and Evolution in the Origin of Linguistic Constraints", In Phil Husbands and Inman Harvey (Eds) Fourth European Conference on Artificial Life, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA: 493-502.. Postscript copy. Compressed postscript copy.
  
  
• 1996 ``From `Ugg' to an exchange of ideas'' (not my title -- article on origins of language) Times Higher Education Supplement, April 19th:16-17.
• 1995a ``Language evolution: A gap still unbridged'' (Review article on Horst M Mueller's Sprache und Evolution: Grundlagen der Evolution und Ansaetze einer evolutionstheoretischen Sprachwissenschaft, Berlin, Walter de Gruyter, 1990), Semiotica, 104,3/4:365-370.
• 1995b (with Moray Nairn) ``The effect of context on the transcription of vowel quality'', in J. Windsor Lewis (ed.) Studies in General and English Phonetics: Essays in honour of Professor J D O'Connor, Routledge, London: 96-120.
• 1994a ``Linguistics and Evolution: A Background Briefing for Non-Linguists'' (PDF) , Discussions in Neuroscience, X, 1/2:149-157. (Special issue on `Evolution and Neurology of Language'.)
• 1994b ``Evolutionary Modelling of Language (Appendix)'', Discussions in Neuroscience, X, 1/2:158-168. (Special issue on `Evolution and Neurology of Language'.)
• 1994c ``Redundancy'', in R.E.Asher (ed.) Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, Vol.7:3481-3482, Pergamon Press.
• 1994d ``The Study of Language Systems'', Quantitative Linguistics, 1/1:43-55. (This is a section, slightly adapted, from Language and Number, reprinted in the first issue of this journal at the editor's request.)
• 1992a ``Bedeutung und private Regelbefolgung'', Peer commentary on Rudi Keller's ``Zeichenmetamorphosen und Bedeutungswandel'', Zeitschrift fuer Semiotik, 14/4:367-372.
• 1992b ``An Approach to the Phylogeny of the Language Faculty'', in Hawkins, John A. and Murray Gell-Mann (Eds.) The Evolution of Human Languages, Santa Fe Institute Studies in the Sciences of Complexity, Proceedings, Vol XI, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA. 273-303.
• 1991a ``The Evolution of the Critical Period for Language Acquisition'' (PDF) , Cognition, 40,3:159-201.
• 1991b ``Linguistics'', in Mary Maxwell (ed.) The Sociobiological Imagination, State University of New York Press, 283-301.
• 1991c ``Nativist and Functional Explanations in Language Acquisition'' (PDF file), in I. Roca (ed) Logical Issues in Language Acquisition, Foris Publications, Dordrecht,Holland. 85-136.
• 1991d ``Meaning: Properties and Relationships'' in W. Bright (ed) International Encyclopaedia of Linguistics, Oxford University Press, Vol.2:406-408.
• 1991e ``Numerals'' in W. Bright (ed) International Encyclopaedia of Linguistics, Oxford University Press, Vol.3:131-132.
• 1990 ``Beyond the Roadblock in Linguistic Evolution Studies'' (open peer commentary on S.Pinker and P.Bloom's ``Natural Language and Natural Selection''), Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 13,4:736-737.
• 1989 ``Biological Evolution of the Saussurean Sign as a Component of the Language Acquisition Device'' (PDF), Lingua, 77,2:187-222.