Language in Paradise
04 July 2018
On the 17th December 2017, Peter Hagoort - managing director of the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics - held a public lecture on humans' unique ability for the use of language in Paradiso, Amsterdam. This lecture can now be viewed online.
Prof. Dr. Peter Hagoort was interviewed by Dr. Jolien Francken in a "Zomergasten"-like setting on the basis of film and tv clips. The lecture titled "Over sprekende auto’s, communicerende marsmannetjes en breintaal" (in English: About talking cars, communicating Martians and brain language) and can be viewed online here.
Various aspects of the unique human capacity for acquiring and using language have been discussed, such as:
- Do animals have a language ability?
- Can we communicate with extraterrestrials?
- How many different languages are there?
- Wouldn't it be better if we all speak the same language?
- How is language anchored in the human brain?
- What goes wrong when the brain is damaged?
- How did Mandela learn Obama to speak?
- What has John Cleese to say about the brain?
- The urge of babies to share information.
- What happened when we tried to let a dolphin speak English?
- The enrichment of language in the poems of Lucebert.
Taal in het Paradijs (Language in Paradise)
The lecture was part of the mini-serie "Taal in het Paradijs" in which linguists discussed language at different levels; structure, brain and communication.
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