Speech Talk Videos

Mark Pagel – how language transformed humanity

3 January 2015 by David Kinnane Leave a Comment

Mark Pagel is an evolutionary biologist based in the United Kingdom. We’re attracted to his conviction and the humanism on which his theory appears to be based.

Key turns of phrase, ideas and theories we took away from this TED talk include:

speech as “discrete pulses of sound” used to transfer ideas via language from human to human;

language as “genes talking” – e.g. a baby hollering to its mother to communicate hunger seen, from an evolutionary point of view, as a mechanism by which the baby gets food to come to him or her;

language as potentially subversive, as reflected in the story of the Tower of Babel and in laws about censorship, defamation, profanities in public, as well as taboo words;

the shocking reality that people, throughout history, have been imprisoned or even killed over a “puff of air emanating from [their] mouths”;

humans unique ability to learn new skills by watching and copying others, to accumulate knowledge and to benefit from other people’s inventions and ideas – what anthropologists call “social learning”;

social learning as “visual theft”, and the dilemma humans faced as a result, either to:
- retreat into small groups to protect their ideas; or
- co-operate and exchange ideas through language;

about 200,000 years ago, humans elected to co-operate and this triggered an explosion in the spread of humanity across the globe in parallel with the development of languages;

even the simplest acts of exchange require language;

there may be 8,000 active languages on earth. Paradoxically, some of the greatest diversity of languages occur when people are the most packed together, e.g. in Papua New Guinea;

individual languages may have evolved to allow groups to “ring themselves off” from nearby outsiders to defend the group’s intellectual property;

that the European Union spends more than $1 billion on translating the 23 official languages used by the 27 member states;

whether, in the age of Facebook and globalisation, we can afford different languages, and whether a single language is inevitable; and

genes don’t of themselves explain the development of language, although important research into genes like FoxP2 and its potential role in the fine oral motor control needed for speech continues.

Banter Speech & Language

Banter Speech & Language is an independent firm of speech pathologists for adults and children. We help clients in our local area, including Concord, Rhodes, Strathfield and all other suburbs of Sydney’s Inner West.

Banter Speech & Language is owned and managed by David Kinnane, a Hanen- and LSVT LOUD-certified speech-language pathologist with post-graduate training in the Spalding Method for literacy, the Lidcombe and Camperdown Programs for stuttering, and Voicecraft for voice disorders. David is also a Certified PESL Instructor for accent modification.

David holds a Master of Speech Language Pathology from the University of Sydney, where he was a Dean’s Scholar. David is a Practising Member of Speech Pathology Australia and a Certified Practising Speech Pathologist (CPSP).

Speech Talk 5: Alan Siegal – plain English – striving for simplicity

28 April 2014 by David Kinnane Leave a Comment

As a speech pathologist, lawyer, plain English lover and a small business owner, this one is close to my heart!

Official documents don’t need to be complicated. Government forms shouldn’t take an hour – or a PhD – to fill in.

Alan Siegal is a business communication expert specialising in plain English and simplicity. He’s done some fantastic work through his “Simplicity Lab” with legal documents like credit agreements and tax forms. His work helps everyone who uses his documents, but particularly those with language and communication problems.

My key takeaway from Mr Siegal’s talk is that:

simple writing = clarity, transparency + empathy.

In writing reports, forms and other documents, we should all strive for simplicity. We should remember we are writing to people – not machines. We should inject some humanity into the things we write.

Related articles:

Banter Speech & Language

Speech Talk 4: Rupal Patel – Prosthetic Voices for people with severe speech problems

2 April 2014 by David Kinnane Leave a Comment

For a couple of years, I worked in Sydney for a Hong Kong-based business. All my clients were based overseas and I spent most of my day bellowing into my phone. I’m quite the chatterbox and, on an average day, would utter thousands of words (many of them polite).

One day, I woke up without my voice. Although a ‘minor inconvenience’, I assumed I’d be okay with email, instant messaging, texting and all the other wonderful communication tools at my fingertips.

I was wrong. After hours of trying unsuccessfully to persuade, cajole, debate, explain and negotiate without speaking, I went home, deflated and exhausted. Without a voice, I felt as if no-one was listening to me.

My voice – unique as a fingerprint – is a crucial part of who I am. Without it, I struggled to connect with others. More significantly, I didn’t feel like me and lost all confidence in what I was saying. That’s one reason voice disorders – even mild and temporary problems like laryngitis – can be so devastating to your sense of identity.

Now imagine what it’s like for people who have never had a unique voice. People who might have “a voice”, thanks to great apps like Proloquo2go and Sonoflex, but who share it with thousands of other people with disabilities. Imagine a 6 year old girl and a 45 year old man conversing while using the same computer-generated voice.

It’s that scenario that led speech communication and computer science professor Rupal Patel to found VocaliD, an organisation that “extracts acoustic properties from a target talker’s disordered speech (whatever sounds they can still produce) and applies these features to a synthetic voice…created from a surrogate voice donor who is similar in age, size, gender, etc. The result is a synthetic voice that contains as much of the vocal identity of the target talker as possible yet the speech clarity of the surrogate talker..”

It’s a simple – and brilliant – idea which Professor Patel explains here:

Professor Patel’s research changes people’s lives. And we can all contribute. Are you willing to donate 2-3 hours of speech to give someone access to their own voice?

Banter Speech & Language

Speech Talk 3: Raising Awareness of Language Learning Impairments (RALLI)

4 March 2014 by David Kinnane Leave a Comment

How common are language impairments? What does a language impairment actually look like in conversation? How do language impairments affect children and adults at school and at work? Where can people get help to find a diagnosis and treatment? What are some practical strategies and tips teachers and parents can employ to help kids with a language delay to reach their potential?

All excellent questions, especially from parents who are worried something might be wrong with their child’s language development.

In 2013, a group of UK-based speech-language pathologists, academics, teachers and – most importantly – children with language impairments and their families, collaborated to create the fantastic RALLI YouTube Channel. The channel is stocked with great videos answering these – and many other – questions.

I suggest starting here with Professor Dorothy Bishop’s excellent overview.

A full list of videos appears here.

The videos are short, informative and practical. They tackle the hard realities of language impairments head-on. They debunk myths and prejudices, demonstrating, for example, that children with language disorders are not lazy, stupid or disobedient. And they shine a bright light on a “hidden disability” that is more common the autism spectrum disorder and dyslexia.

What I love most about the videos is the opportunity to hear from the children themselves. Watching Stephanie, Seb and the other children tell their stories – of the obstacles they’ve faced and the progress they’ve made with the right help – is immensely inspiring.

Banter Speech & Language

Speech Talk 2: Patricia Kuhl – the linguistic genius of babies

21 February 2014 by David Kinnane Leave a Comment

Dr Patricia Kuhl has more accolades and titles than Queen Victoria. Among her many achievements and roles, she is a co-director at the Institute for Brain and Learning Sciences at Washington University.

Dr Kuhl studies early brain and language development – and by early, we mean really early. Her research tells us a lot about language – and not just about the development of language in infants. Watch her talk here:

Here are some of the key ideas we took away from Dr Kuhl’s talk:

To preserve a language, you need to speak it to babies, not adults. (This comment reminded us of Dr Pinker’s statement that linguists know a language is dead when it is spoken only by adults.)
A critical period exists for humans to acquire a new language efficiently – after 7 years of age, our ability to do so declines systematically.
Babies younger than 12 months old are “citizens of the world”: they can discriminate all the sounds in every language. Adults can’t do that. We’re “language-bound” to our mother tongue (or mother tongues for bilingual children).
As babies listen to their parents, they are (unconsciously) taking statistics on the speech sounds used by their parents. At around 1 year of age, babies gradually lose their ability to discriminate all speech sounds in all languages and zero in on the speech sounds used in their home language(s).
By exposing US-born babies to Mandarin spoken by a Mandarin-speaking therapist for short periods during the first year of birth, babies of English-speaking parents maintained their ability to discriminate speech sounds native to Mandarin speakers.
Interestingly, results were not as favourable when the children were exposed to an audio recording in Mandarin or by watching TV. It seems the presence of a real human being is required – food for thought in these days of iPads and Nickelodeon.

Banter Speech & Language

Speech Talk 1: Steven Pinker – on language

19 February 2014 by David Kinnane Leave a Comment

Steven Pinker is one of our favourite language scientists. Although he has his critics, he doesn’t mask his thoughts with academic jargon and impenetrable prose. You know where he stands, even if you disagree with some of his more “hard line” views on things like Universal Grammar and innateness. He’s also not afraid to change his mind when persuasive evidence emerges to challenge his original position.

We first came across Dr Pinker’s work in his popular science book, The Language Instinct. His writing is crisp – at times irreverent – and he tackles complex, controversial topics in a highly readable and entertaining way. In particular, Dr Pinker’s colourful use of metaphor allows him to make very abstract concepts concrete. It’s no surprise that he’s considered a good friend of students. His books are a great introduction to linguistics, language and speech. You can read more about him here.

Here’s a talk Dr Pinker did for TED back in September 2007. In parts, it’s a little more dry and technical than some of his mainstream writing. But it’s about a fascinating topic: the relationship of language to thought, and what language can reveal about human nature.

Key ideas and images we took away from this talk include:

language as a window to understanding human nature;
the verb as a chassis of the sentence;
the sentence as a container of thought;
the distinction between language (including an individual language like English) and “mentalese” (the stuff of thought);
the importance of the verbs “to go” and “to have”;
intelligence as a repertoire of concepts and a process of metaphorical abstraction, enabling people to go from using language to talk about rocks, tools and animals in plain sight to abstractions like space, time, force, science and law; and
using Alan Fiske’s work on four different uses of language in relationships as a framework for interpreting human behaviour, and for explaining the awkwardness we feel when there is a mismatch.

Banter Speech & Language

Speech Talk Videos

Footer

Join the conversation