Deacon, Terrence W.
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: W.W. Norton 1997
Copies Available at Woodmere
1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 153.6 DEASummary: Was there a "big bang" in human language and cognitive development, or did speech and abstract thought evolve slowly-perhaps across 200,000 years or so? Surveying prehistoric burial sites and other archaeological finds, including what might be the world's oldest work of art, this program attempts to locate the junction of creativity and communication at which human intelligence was born....
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
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Fischer, Julia
Summary: Monkey see, monkey do—or does she? Can the behavior of non-human primates—their sociality, their intelligence, their communication—really be chalked up to simple mimicry? Emphatically, absolutely: no. And as famed primatologist Julia Fischer reveals, the human bias inherent in this oft-uttered adage is our loss, for it is only through the study of our primate brethren that we may begin to...
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Publisher / Publication Date: The University of Chicago Press 2016
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1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 599 FISSummary: In this program, John McWhorter, author of The Power of Babel: A Natural History of Language; Lyle Campbell, of the University of Utah; Brian Joseph, of The Ohio State University; and population geneticist Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza examine factors that contributed to the diversification and spread of languages, including early migration, the introduction of agriculture, and genes. Language...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
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Summary: Synesthesia may be a brain disorder, but those afflicted rarely complain about the symptoms. This program examines the unusual condition, outlines its appearances in medical history, and describes new theories and speculation surrounding it. Identifying well-known artists, writers, and musicians who may have experienced "crossed signals" in their sensory perceptions-including Wassily Kandinsky...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Dennett, D. C. (Daniel Clement)
Summary: A leading philosopher offers a major new account of the origins of the conscious mind that explores the deep interactions of evolution, brains, and human culture, demonstrating the role of culture in installing memes, including language, in the mind.
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Publisher / Publication Date: W.W. Norton & Company 2017
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Place a hold to request this item.Moskowitz, David
Summary: "The story of the southernmost herd of caribou in the world and the inland temperate rainforest, the ecosystem they depend on to survive. David Moskowitz examines all the factors at play: predators, climate change, recreationists, industrial logging, mineral extraction and discusses how we can protect what remains of this rare rainforest ecosystem"--
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Publisher / Publication Date: Braided River 2018
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1 available in Oversize, Call number: OVS 599.65 MOSSummary: This program travels the globe as it surveys a large portion of the world's languages-25 percent of which are spoken by a mere 0.1 percent of the Earth's population. Moving from Africa to Oceania and up to Asia and then west to Europe and across the ocean to the Americas, the program assesses how many languages are spoken in each region, the characteristics they share, and misconceptions about...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
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Summary: What precisely is language, and how did humans acquire it? In an effort to answer those essential questions, this program journeys back to prehistoric times in search of language's origin. But this is not a passive discussion, as Noam Chomsky; Brown University's Philip Lieberman; Johanna Nichols, of U.C. Berkeley; Stanford University's Merritt Ruhlen; professor of anthropology Richard Klein;...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
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Summary: Melvyn Bragg begins the story of English in Holland, finding ancestral echoes in the Frisian dialect. What follows is a chapter on survival as the English language weathers Viking and Norman invasions, vying with and eventually absorbing rival tongues. Lively settings such as village pubs and markets bring home the lasting influence of Anglo-Saxon, Old Norse, and Old French. The connection...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Greenspan, Stanley I.
Contents: Origin of symbols -- Intellectual growth and transformations of emotions during the course of life -- The early stages of emotional regulation, engagement, and signaling : nonhuman primates and the earliest hominids -- Problem-solving collaborations : chimpanzees and early humans -- Symbols, words, and ideas : Archaic H. sapiens and early moderns -- Representation and the beginning of logic...
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: Da Capo Press 2004
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1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 153.7 GRESummary: Approximately 70,000 years ago, humankind began talking, and hasn't stopped since. In this fascinating program, a diverse group of experts-an evolutionary linguist, a neurologist, a geneticist, a neuropsychologist, a developmental cognitive neuroscientist, and an Oxford professor of communication-discuss the birth, development, and transmission of the mysterious phenomenon called language....
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Summary: The average person will speak approximately 370 million words in his or her lifetime-a simple fact. And yet the underlying structures-sociological, anatomical, developmental, intellectual-have proved to be some of science's most impenetrable mysteries. This program spotlights researchers who are unlocking the deepest secrets of speech: Deb Roy and the Human Speechome Project; Tecumseh Fitch and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
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Summary: It is predicted that within a century more than half of the world's languages will become extinct, but as languages are lost, new ones emerge naturally or are constructed. In this program, Noam Chomsky; Esperantist Thomas Eccard; endangered languages researcher Peter Ladefoged, who has since passed away; and others provide insights into the language life cycle. Topics include constructed...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
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Nadeau, Jean-Benoît.
Summary: Explores the origins and evolution of the French language, from the first extant document written in French in the mid-ninth century and the purging of Latin from the French courts to the obsession of French speakers to protect the purity of the language.
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: St. Martin's Press 2006
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1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 440 NADSummary: Evolutionary biologist Mark Pagel has an intriguing theory about why humans developed such a complex system of language. In this TEDTalk, Pagel suggests that language functions as a kind of technology that allowed early tribes to share ideas in cooperative efforts. And with the help of language, Pagel further asserts, "social learning" led to "cumulative cultural adaptation" - which means that...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
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Hrytsak, Yaroslav
Summary: "When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, the world witnessed the creative, freewheeling, darkly humorous, and deeply resilient society that is contemporary Ukraine. In this timely and original history, a bestseller in Ukraine, the historian Yaroslav Hrytsak tells the sweeping story of his nation through a meticulous examination of the major events, conflicts, and developments that have shaped it...
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: PublicAffairs 2024
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Place a hold to request this item.Summary: In this program, Dr. Jonathan Miller investigates both the predictable and the unexpected effects of damage to Broca's and Wernicke's areas on patients' abilities to communicate verbally and through sign language. In his efforts to expose the physiological roots of language expression, Dr. Miller traces the evolution of brain research, from the scientific blind alley of phrenology to the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
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Ostler, Nicholas.
Summary: A study of the Latin language examines its role in the evolution of Western culture and civilization; its relationship with ancient Greek language, science, and philosophy; its place in the Catholic Church; and its function as an ancestor of modern-day languages.
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: Walker & Co 2008
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1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 470.9 OSTDeutscher, Guy
Summary: "Language is mankind's greatest invention--except, of course, that it was never invented." So begins linguist Deutscher's investigation into the genesis and evolution of language. If we started off with rudimentary utterances on the level of "man throw spear," how did we end up with sophisticated grammars, enormous vocabularies, and intricately nuanced degrees of meaning? Drawing on recent...
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: Metropolitan Books 2005
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1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 401 DEUGrace, Catherine O'Neill
Summary: A recreation of the first Thanksgiving reveals the actual events during the three days that the Wampanoag people and the colonists came together.
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: National Geographic Society 2001
Copies Available at East Bay
1 available in Seasonal Juvenile Collection, Call number: J 394.2649 GRACopies Available at Interlochen
1 available in JT Non-Fiction, Call number: JT US Hist GraceGlass, Lillian.
Contents: Introduction -- Encountering the liar : who lies, and why?. What is a lie? ; The price of a lie ; The evolution of a liar : why animals (yes, animals!), children, and young people lie ; The seven reasons adults lie ; Cyber liars -- Human lie detection. Instincts and context ; The body language of a liar ; The facial language of a liar ; The voice of a liar : pitch, volume, tone, and pacing ;...
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: 2014
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1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 153.69 GLASiegfried, Tom
Summary: John Nash won the 1994 Nobel Prize in economics for research published in the 1950s on a new branch of mathematics known as game theory. At the time of Nash's early work, game theory was briefly popular among mathematicians and Cold War analysts, but it remained obscure until the 1970s when evolutionary biologists began applying it to their work. In the 1980s economists began to embrace it....
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Publisher / Publication Date: Joseph Henry Press 2006
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1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 519.3 SIEJebara, Mohamad
Summary: Based on extensive scholarship, an innovative biography of the central text of Islam Over a billion copies of the Qur`an exist, yet it remains an enigma. Its classical Arabic language resists simple translation, and its non-linear style of abstract musings defies categorization. Moreover, those who champion its sanctity and compete to claim its mantle offer widely diverging interpretations of...
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: St. Martin's Essentials 2024