How Language Began offers the reader an original, sweeping history of language as a human invention—from the origins of our species to the emergence of more than 7,000 modern languages. The author challenges Noam Chomsky's popular theory of an innate language instinct in our species. According to Everett, historically speech developed gradually through the process of communication. The book talks about language from an interdisciplinary perspective, focusing on the interaction between language and culture on the one hand, and on the features of the brain that allow humans to speak on the other. Although fossil hunters and linguists have brought us closer to understanding how language came to be, Everett's discoveries have revolutionized modern linguistic world, making waves far beyond academic circles. While conducting field research in the Amazon rainforest, he came across the ancient language of a hunter-gatherer tribe. Challenging traditional theories about the origins of language, Everett concluded that language was not a feature of our species. To understand this requires a broad interdisciplinary approach that takes into account both the cultural context and the peculiarities of our biology. This book tells us what we know, what we hope to know, and what we will never know about how humans got from simple communication to language.