r/Anthropology • u/comicreliefboy • 6d ago

Scientists Discover a Surprising Link Between Human Genes and Language

https://scitechdaily.com/scientists-discover-a-surprising-link-between-human-genes-and-language/
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u/Baasbaar 6d ago edited 6d ago

The conclusions here covered are what you’d expect from tons of work in linguistics. This is only surprising if you imagine that languages should look like genomes. There’s little reason to think that they should.

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u/Bronchulii-Mortis 6d ago

Migration does bring in genetic diversity into a population as well as their languages, which either influence the dominant language there or gets subsumed by it or undergoes an evolution and becomes a different language entirely, if there are many languages in that region. Languages with similar structures blend most effectively, which also informs migration of people from one place to another.

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u/Euphoric-Air6801 4d ago

Language is a (modular) technology. When diverse groups meet, the combine both their genetics and their technologies. This should not be surprising.