Radiolab's Words: The Evolution Of Sign Language

Throughout the many years, communication has developed and evolved into such a wonderful thing. With just sounds coming out of our mouths, lines written down, hand motions, etc. we can express what is going through our minds to someone else so that they can understand. Communication using words inevitably means language which is sounds or symbols used to exchange information. Radiolab's “Words” podcast went into depth on how words or symbols used to communicate.
There was a research that was conducted with rats and put into a rectangular room to find something in the corner. it could be anything that was in the corner but the rats were always confused. Then they made one of the walls blue so that it can be used as a reference point such as …show more content…
They had to explain what they felt about a short video they saw. It turned out the the older generation of people using sign language was using full body movements and only described actions but younger generations used movements with just the wrist and described thinking. This fascinated me on how sign language has changed and been developed into a more sophisticated way to communicate with each other. I would've thought that it was the other way around with the older generation describing with more thought compared to the new generation dimming it down. My friend’s mom said that while she was growing up and went to school, she said English class was much harder compared to now because of how strict and precise everything had to be. I can see how now it became more relaxed during my freshman year of English when I had a lot of free …show more content…
It happened to be that the older generation and kids below the age of 6 couldn't comprehend what the guy was thinking about logically but the younger generation of kids using sign could. To me, this all made me think about the rat experiment and how they haven't found a certain label for things and to create the connections between the two. These islands of ideas one day clicked for all people yet some more than others. What amazes me is that language is so closely correlated to knowledge and thinking yet I never really thought about it in that way. It was always learning new words to broaden my vocabulary and to express or describe what I'm thinking, which is just amplified when learning sign language when you’re