The Physics of Birdsong

The Physics of Birdsong

Author: Gabriel B. Mindlin

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2005-12-01

Total Pages: 163

ISBN-13: 3540282491

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Detailed report on a topic that has already attracted much popular interest. Provides fascinating reading for physicists, biologists and general readers alike.


Birdsong, Speech, and Language

Birdsong, Speech, and Language

Author: Johan J. Bolhuis

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2013-03-22

Total Pages: 557

ISBN-13: 0262313839

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Prominent scholars consider the cognitive and neural similarities between birdsong and human speech and language. Scholars have long been captivated by the parallels between birdsong and human speech and language. In this book, leading scholars draw on the latest research to explore what birdsong can tell us about the biology of human speech and language and the consequences for evolutionary biology. After outlining the basic issues involved in the study of both language and evolution, the contributors compare birdsong and language in terms of acquisition, recursion, and core structural properties, and then examine the neurobiology of song and speech, genomic factors, and the emergence and evolution of language. Contributors Hermann Ackermann, Gabriël J.L. Beckers, Robert C. Berwick, Johan J. Bolhuis, Noam Chomsky, Frank Eisner, Martin Everaert, Michale S. Fee, Olga Fehér, Simon E. Fisher, W. Tecumseh Fitch, Jonathan B. Fritz, Sharon M.H. Gobes, Riny Huijbregts, Eric Jarvis, Robert Lachlan, Ann Law, Michael A. Long, Gary F. Marcus, Carolyn McGettigan, Daniel Mietchen, Richard Mooney, Sanne Moorman, Kazuo Okanoya, Christophe Pallier, Irene M. Pepperberg, Jonathan F. Prather, Franck Ramus, Eric Reuland, Constance Scharff, Sophie K. Scott, Neil Smith, Ofer Tchernichovski, Carel ten Cate, Christopher K. Thompson, Frank Wijnen, Moira Yip, Wolfram Ziegler, Willem Zuidema


The Backyard Birdsong Guide

The Backyard Birdsong Guide

Author: Donald Kroodsma

Publisher: Chronicle Books

Published: 2008-04-23

Total Pages: 200

ISBN-13: 9780811863421

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Teaches about the habitat, behaviors, appearance, and songs of seventy-five Eastern and Central North American birds, and includes basic birdwatching guidelines and audio samples.


The Sound Book: The Science of the Sonic Wonders of the World

The Sound Book: The Science of the Sonic Wonders of the World

Author: Trevor Cox

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Published: 2014-02-10

Total Pages: 391

ISBN-13: 039324282X

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"A lucid and passionate case for a more mindful way of listening to and engaging with musical, natural, and manmade sounds." —New York Times In this tour of the world’s most unexpected sounds, Trevor Cox—the “David Attenborough of the acoustic realm” (Observer)—discovers the world’s longest echo in a hidden oil cavern in Scotland, unlocks the secret of singing sand dunes in California, and alerts us to the aural gems that exist everywhere in between. Using the world’s most amazing acoustic phenomena to reveal how sound works in everyday life, The Sound Book inspires us to become better listeners in a world dominated by the visual and to open our ears to the glorious cacophony all around us.


The Laboratory Bird

The Laboratory Bird

Author: Douglas K Taylor

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 2015-11-18

Total Pages: 170

ISBN-13: 1466593636

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Laboratory animals, including birds, play an important role in biomedical research. The humane care and management of these animals is an ongoing concern. A new addition to the acclaimed Laboratory Animal Pocket Reference series, The Laboratory Bird is the first publication dedicated to the care and use of avian species in the research setting.Cove


Animal Models of Speech and Language Disorders

Animal Models of Speech and Language Disorders

Author: Santosh A. Helekar

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2013-10-17

Total Pages: 301

ISBN-13: 1461484006

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Basic research over the last decade or two has uncovered similarities between speech, especially its sensori-motor aspects, and vocal communication in several non-human species. The most comprehensive studies so far have been conducted in songbirds. Songbirds offer us a model system to study the interactions between developmental or genetic predispositions and tutor-dependent influences, on the learning of vocal communication. Songbird research has elucidated cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying learning and production of vocal patterns, perception of vocal sounds, vocal motor control and vocal neuromotor plasticity. More recently, the entire genome of the songbird zebra finch has been sequenced. These discoveries, along with the identification of several genes implicated in familial human speech and language disorders, have made it possible to look for analogues of speech and language dysfunction in zebra finches, at least at the perceptual and sensori-motor levels. Two approaches in particular have led us closer to the development of animal models of human speech conditions, namely developmental stuttering and a familial verbal dyspraxia associated with a mutation in the gene for the transcription factor FoxP2. Work on other animals that show developmental sensori-motor learning of vocal sounds used for communication have also shown significant progress, leading to the possibility of development of models of speech and language dysfunction in them. Among mammals, the principal ones include dolphins and whales. In non-human primates, while vocal learning per se is not very prominent, investigations on their communicative abilities have thrown some light on the rudiments of language. These considerations make the publication of a book focused on animal models of speech and language disorders, detailing the overall investigative approach of neurobehavioral studies in animals capable of vocal communication and learned vocalizations, a much-needed and worthwhile project. It would serve as a unifying review of research in this new multidisciplinary frontier, spanning the molecular to the behavioral, for clinicians and researchers, as well as a teaching resource for advanced speech pathology and neuroscience students. This book will also be the first of its kind.


Birdsong

Birdsong

Author: Don Stap

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2007-11-01

Total Pages: 274

ISBN-13: 1416590412

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Following one of the world's experts on birdsong from the woods of Martha's Vineyard to the tropical forests of Central America, Don Stap brings to life the quest to unravel an ancient mystery: Why do birds sing and what do their songs mean? We quickly discover that one question leads to another. Why does the chestnut-sided warbler sing one song before dawn and another after sunrise? Why does the brown thrasher have a repertoire of two thousand songs when the chipping sparrow has only one? And how is the hermit thrush able to sing a duet with itself, producing two sounds simultaneously to create its beautiful, flutelike melody? Stap's lucid prose distills the complexities of the study of birdsong and unveils a remarkable discovery that sheds light on the mystery of mysteries: why young birds in the suborder oscines -- the "true songbirds" -- learn their songs but the closely related suboscines are born with their songs genetically encoded. As the story unfolds, Stap contemplates our enduring fascination with birdsong, from ancient pictographs and early Greek soothsayers, who knew that bird calls represented the voices of the gods, to the story of Mozart's pet starling. In a modern, noisy world, it is increasingly difficult to hear those voices of the gods. Exploring birdsong takes us to that rare place -- in danger of disappearing forever -- where one hears only the planet's oldest music.


Behavioral Ecology of Neotropical Birds

Behavioral Ecology of Neotropical Birds

Author: Juan Carlos Reboreda

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2019-04-24

Total Pages: 225

ISBN-13: 3030142809

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This book covers central aspects of behavioral ecology, including sexual selection, social and genetic mating systems, cooperative breeding, brood parasitism, brood reduction, migration, personalities and communication. Over the past several years, Neotropical bird species from temperate to tropical latitudes of South America have been extensively studied, yielding valuable insights into the evolutionary mechanisms that drive their behavioral traits. In this book, international experts provide a general overview of main behavioral aspects. They also present the main findings of their work, including experimental approaches to testing the most accepted behavioral theory in their model systems. In closing, they propose new theoretical frameworks and future research directions. As such, the book provides a comprehensive and updated guide for all researchers, students and professionals whose work involves the study and management of birds across the Neotropical region.


Animal Musicalities

Animal Musicalities

Author: Rachel Mundy

Publisher: Wesleyan University Press

Published: 2018-06-05

Total Pages: 281

ISBN-13: 0819578088

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Over the past century and a half, the voices and bodies of animals have been used by scientists and music experts as a benchmark for measures of natural difference. Animal Musicalities traces music's taxonomies from Darwin to digital bird guides to show how animal song has become the starting point for enduring evaluations of species, races, and cultures. By examining the influential efforts made by a small group of men and women to define human diversity in relation to animal voices, this book raises profound questions about the creation of modern human identity, and the foundations of modern humanism.


Vertebrate Sound Production and Acoustic Communication

Vertebrate Sound Production and Acoustic Communication

Author: Roderick A. Suthers

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2016-04-27

Total Pages: 338

ISBN-13: 3319277219

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Although the fundamental principles of vocal production are well-understood, and are being increasingly applied by specialists to specific animal taxa, they stem originally from engineering research on the human voice. These origins create a double barrier to entry for biologists interested in understanding acoustic communication in their study species. The proposed volume aims to fill this gap, providing easy-to-understand overviews of the various relevant theories and techniques, and showing how these principles can be implemented in the study of all main vertebrate groups. The volume will have eleven chapters assembled from the world's leading researchers, at a level intelligible to a wide audience of biologists with no background in engineering or human voice science. Some will cover sound production in a particular vertebrate group; others will address a particular issue, such as vocal learning, across vertebrate taxa. The book will highlight what is known and how to implement useful techniques and methodologies, but will also summarize current gaps in the knowledge. It will serve both as a tutorial introduction for newcomers and a springboard for further research for all scientists interested in understanding animal acoustic signals.