Re: Musilanguage hypothesis - Becky-Jo

I think the musilanguage hypothesis is valid, even if it is only treated as a theory. It would make sense that our predecessors, when attempting to develop a language, would want to communicate both the literal and the emotive. Why would they not? There's a definite connection to how the emotional content of a word and the emotional content of a musical phrase would have originated; as we said, there are no words for that which music describes to us (hence the point why music is communicative but not a language). I'd like to take the idea one step further and offer my thoughts on this, however, which is that singing words often strikes us so profoundly because it is the embodiment of both; it is the language music is lacking and the indescribable emotions that there are no words for melded together, each making up for the others shortcomings. Also, that we often create instruments with the intention of replicating the sound of the human voice, and that music does in fact seem to exist as an offshoot of language because of something language could not do.