Washoe, a chimpanzee that became famous for being taught to use American Sign Language (ASL), has died at the age of 42. Washoe was the first chimpanzee to learn sign language, although whether or not Washoe's and many other great apes' communication is actually language is still a subject of
(1)_____.
In the early 1960s,
(2)_____ to teach apes to speak had consistently failed. Allen Gardner and Beatrix Gardner hypothesized that this was due to physical
(3)_____ on the vocal apparati of the the apes rather than a lack of brain power. To test their hypothesis, in 1966 they took the baby Washoe and began to teach her sign language which
(4)_____ to be successful; Washoe learned over 250 symbols from American sign language, and other researchers quickly began to make similar
(5)_____ with other chimpanzees and great apes.
However, later work by Herbert Terrace
(6)_____ that the behaviour of Washoe and others was, to a large
(7)_____, imitating the researchers rather than spontaneous.
(8)_____ Washoe and other chimpanzees never learned how to use grammar or how to construct recursions, two things which many linguists point to as unique
(9)_____ of language. Later attempts to have chimpanzees learn by observation as human infants do have also been successful, but there are still no signs that they have learned grammar. Some linguists such as Noam Chomsky have suggested that humans have specialized areas of the brain
(10)_____ processing language and that we are hardwired to do so. Such hypotheses explain why apparently intelligent apes are unable to form language.