The 5th Darwin Day Symposium – University of Haifa – Program 

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Multi-purpose Building, Safdie Auditorium

PROGRAM

 

08:30 – 09:00 – Registration and refreshments

09:00 – 09:10 – Introduction and opening remarks – Dr. Rami Reshef
09:10 – 09:20 – Remarks in memory of Professor Irit Meir – Prof. Wendy Sandler

 

09:20 – 11:00 – BODY AND MIND IN LANGUAGE EVOLUTION
                          Prof. Nurit Bird-David, chair
09:20 – 10:10 – Prof. Michael Corballis, University of Auckland
                          The Origins of Language: A Darwinian Perspective
10:10 – 11:00 – Prof. Wendy Sandler, University of Haifa
                          The Grammar of the Body and Language Evolution

 

11:00 – 11:30 – Coffee break

 

11:30 – 13:00 – PRIMATE GESTURES, HUMAN SPEECH
                          Prof. Wendy Sandler, Chair
11:30 – 12:15 – Prof. Katja Liebal, Freie Universitat Berlin
                          What Nonhuman Primates’ Gestures Can and Cannot Tell Us about Language Evolution
12:15 – 13:00 – Prof. Bart de Boer, Vrije Universiteit Brussel
                          Evolution of Speech – Behavioral, Comparative and Computational Perspectives

 

13:00 – 14:00 – Lunch break

 

14:00 – 15:30 – BIOLOGICAL EVOLUTION OF SPEECH ABILITIES:  ANATOMY AND GENETICS
                          Dr. Rami Reshef, Chair
14:00 – 14:45 – Prof. Israel Hershkovitz, Tel-Aviv University
                          Anatomy of Speech: An Evolutionary Perspective
14:45 – 15:30 – Prof. Liran Carmel, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
                          Paleo-Epigenetics: Extensive Regulatory Changes in Genes Affecting Vocal and Facial Anatomy Separate Modern from Archaic Humans

 

15:30 – 16:00 – Coffee break

 

16:00 – 18:20 – SOCIAL PREREQUISITES
                          Prof. Dani Nadel, Chair
16:00 – 16:45 – Prof. Daniel Dor, Tel-Aviv University
                          Mind the Gap: Rethinking the Question of Language Evolution
16:45 – 17:30 – Prof. Nurit Bird-David, University of Haifa
                          Community, Scale, Language: Insights from Modern Hunter-Gatherers
17:30 – 18:15 – Prof. Jerome Lewis, University College London
                          Music First: Hunter-Gatherer Ethnography and the Evolution of Language
18:15 – 18:30 – Closing remarks