Dear BERGers, A quick reminder that this Wednesday (7 April), Dr Stuart Watson (University of Zurich) will be giving a seminar entitled "From meaningful meerkats to pattern-processing primates: cross-species insights to the problem of language evolution". Abstract: Language is a uniquely powerful, and uniquely human, means of communication. However, the narrow historical window of language we have access to makes determining the ‘whens’, ‘whys’ and ‘hows’ of its origins challenging. A broad, cross-species comparative approach is necessary to identify precisely which features of language are indeed unique, and which are shared with our animal cousins, thereby shedding light on their evolutionary history. Towards this end, here I will present findings from two recent studies investigating: (a) the underlying ‘meaning’ of the functionally referential alarm calls in wild meerkats using a 'model predator' experiment and (b) the shared capacity to process syntax-like acoustic structures in monkeys, apes and humans using an ’artificial grammar' experiment. Hope to see you all on Wednesday! The link to the meeting, as well as a list of the forthcoming speakers, are below this email. Best wishes, Pawel Link to the meeting: https://teams.microsoft.com/dl/launcher/launcher.html?url=%2F_%23%2Fl%2Fmee… Forthcoming seminars: Date Time Speaker Affiliation Seminar title 06/04/2022 16:00 Stuart Watson University of Zurich TBC, animal social learning 13/04/2022 16:00 Bruce Rawlings Durham University TBC, cumulative culture 20/04/2022 16:00 Gema Martin-Ordas University of Stirling TBC, reporting p values in primate tool use research 27/04/2022 16:00 André Pereira University of Exeter TBC 04/05/2022 16:00 Laura Lewis Harvard University TBC, bonobo cognition 11/05/2022 16:00 Alexander Weiss University of Edinburgh TBC 18/05/2022 16:00 Sabrina Brando University of Stirling TBC 25/05/2022 16:00 Shelley Culpepper University of Stirling TBC ------------------------------- Dr Pawel Fedurek (he/his) Lecturer in Psychology Behaviour and Evolution Research Group (BERG) Division of Psychology, Faculty of Natural Sciences University of Stirling Stirling, FK9 4LA Scotland, UK Tel: +44 (0)1786 467844<tel:+441786467844> Twitter: @fedurekp<https://twitter.com/fedurekp> @BERG_Stirling​<https://twitter.com/BERG_Stirling> Staff page<https://www.stir.ac.uk/people/1080868> | BERG page<https://www.stir.ac.uk/about/faculties/natural-sciences/our-research/research-groups/behaviour-and-evolution-research-group/> I aim to reply within 3 working days (my working days are between Monday and Friday). ________________________________ The University achieved an overall 5 stars in the QS World University Rankings 2020 UK Sports University of the Year 2020 (Times Higher Good University Guide) The University of Stirling is a charity registered in Scotland, number SC 011159.