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If she was very young when she was abandoned, then it's likely her speech center never developed and will never develop.
by AmVess 10y ago
If she was very young when she was abandoned, then it's likely her speech center never developed and will never develop.
- gfody 10y agoIt's worse and somewhat fascinating. Instead of acquiring human language which leads to normal human consciousness, she'll have acquired the language of the apes and presumably developed a sort of ape-like consciousness. In theory she would exhibit visual memory and recall superior to what humans are normally capable of (like the apes in this article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2279528/Memory-chimpanzees-far-BETTER-human-study-reveals.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2279528/Memory-chimp...). Cases like this are so extraordinarily rare that we will probably never really know for certain what the human brain is capable of in these extremes.
- throwanem 10y agoMonkeys, not apes. English is a "language of the apes". And chimpanzees, who are in the same hominin family as we ourselves, are really no more similar or comparable to monkeys than we are.
- codyogden 10y agoHuh? Feral children can acquire language skills, but they will never have a full native fluency. Genie learned to communicate with language. In OP child's case, she'd be learning language like most people learn to speak a second language late in life. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genie_(feral_child) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genie_(feral_child)
- gfody 10y agoCases like this are so rare and so unique that you simply cannot speak in general about "feral children". In the case of Genie she would have acquired some human language from her father in the first 20 months even if she only ever overheard him talking, enough apparently to seed a rudimentary semantic layer in her mind that facilitated her learning more advanced language later on (but nothing approaching full maturity).
- krackers 10y agoDon't people usually learn a second language by bootstrapping on their native language though?
- codyogden 10y agoIn a formal learning environment like a classroom, sure. Native language (or even another second language) is a crutch to associate concepts in the new language. Informal environments without a base language, I'm not sure many (if any?) know how that feral person learns, but we do know it is possible for them to communicate using language. I think a lack of metalinguistic awareness plays a major role in language learning as the learner would have no way to reflect/process on the language. This skill is huge, and it's built in ages 6-8. This is the language skill that lets us discern literal and implied meaning from language (statements vs sarcasm), reflect on non-literal concepts (idioms and "love") and analyze and correct incoming communications that contain incorrect usage in word choice, grammar or pronunciation (e.g. If someone misspoke "He is...to the store...going," we infer the speaker likely means "He is going to the store"). Without a base language and meta linguistic skills, language learning would be done with very concrete utterances and gesturing which is consistent with immersion learning of a second language, but the learner's fluency will likely never progress to the point that a second language learner's fluency could reach.
- valuearb 10y agoI'd be surprised if that's true. My daughter lost most of her speech skills at the age of three, was diagnosed autistic, and after extensive therapy by age 9 was main-streamed and on the honor roll. She speaks fine, though with affectations.
- TomMarius 10y agoBut she was exposed to other people speaking, wasn't she?
- dorfsmay 10y agoThe Daily Mail article pointed out in another comment said she understand everything she's told - so she must have separated from humans after learning basic language.