I shall attempt to shift the focus. The premise of this book is that language
is not an instinct, based on genetically transmitted knowledge coded in a discrete
cortical “language organ.” Instead it is a learned skill, based on a functional
language system (FLS) that is distributed over many parts of the human
brain. The FLS regulates the comprehension and production of spoken
language, which alone exists in no other living species. Moreover, the FLS is
overlaid on sensorimotor systems that originally evolved to do other things
and continue to do them now. Although the neural bases of language include
the neocortex, some of the key structures of the FLS are subcortical
basal ganglia—our reptilian brain. It too has evolved from its primeval reptilian
form and, in concert with other structures of the brain, may be the key
to human language and cognition.