Kanzi's Speaking Bonobo: The Animal Language

Animals have been on earth for about 540 million years and humans have been on the earth for about two hundred thousand years. That means than animals have been on earth for 539,800,000 more years than humans have. Over this amount of time, animals are sure to have developed a language. Imagine you are an animal not knowing what others are saying to you. Animals can learn and have a language to communicate with. Animals Learning

Learning helps humans get information and animals can do that too. When animals learn something it can help them become better at survival. A bonobo named Kanzi could learn new things like symbols, letters, and words. In the passage, “Speaking Bonobo”, it says, “First Kanzi used six symbols, then 18 symbols, finally

Animals use signals, noises, and other gestures to communicate as well as a language. Imagine you and everyone you know communicates by just only using signals, noises, and other gestures, it would be weird and awkward. Besides, animals mostly use body language to communicate with each other. Each and every animal is different for example elephants show affection by entwining their trunks and kangaroos thump their hind legs to warn each other of danger. Animals have their own way of a language like not everyone’s voice sounds the same. The Washoe project, a study in the University of Nevada, began in 1967. They tried to teach the chimpanzee, Washoe, to speak English, but that didn’t work. Then, the Washoe project started on a different goal, to teach Washoe sign language. The chimp started to understand it and how it worked. By the end of the project, Washoe mastered the skill of sign language. He even started to communicate with others. Animals use language, which will be unique to them, to communicate and help other

The four steps to language are communication, conversation, collaboration, and co-creation. Communication is a message that goes one direction. Conversation is a message that goes two ways. Collaboration is taking part in thinking, planning, and deciding. Co-creation is taking part in doing and making. Another reason, a study done by Dr. Con Slobodchikoff, a professor and biologist, studied prairie dogs. When he conducted his experiment he saw that the prairie dogs used all four steps of a language. In the graphic feature, “What is Language?” it says, “Language is more than talking and hearing. It is what we share when we do things together. It is how we create common ground. It is how we collect shared meanings.” For Instance, language is how we share ideas and act upon them. Just think that you see a cat in a tree and it can’t get down. Then, you go and tell a figure in charge and everyone helps get the cat down. When there is trouble or some important information that you need to tell someone you need to use all four steps of language to get what is needed to be