FINAL

RESEARCH
PROJECT
Language in Orangutans

Dayanna Vera Cedeo

Yachay Tech
Tyson de Moura
L6-007
July 08, 2016

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Language in Orangutans
Language can be defined as a system of communication based upon words and the
combination of words into sentences (McWhorter, 2012), but also it is the way that humans
express what they are thinking and/or feeling. Communication can be linguistic when it
refers to words, and it is nonlinguistic or nonverbal when it treats with gestures, sounds,
smells, tastes, etc. Humans have many languages to communicate with others, animals have
them too. This research is focused on the language that can develop in orangutans.
Orangutans are animals belonging to the species of apes, which also include humans,
gorillas, chimpanzees and bonobos. They are great apes with red fur which, according to
scientists, possess intellectual qualities very similar to that of humans. Studies based on
orangutans have been increasing over the years. This is because they are considered very
intelligent animals, plus they have a 97% genetic compatibility with humans (Animal
Planet, 2015.); which through research, allows progress in medicine, science, and
communication. The researches about orangutans language show that they can
communicate with humans using gestures and signals instead of sounds. Moreover, they
can learn new gestures, signs and figures to communicate their needs to people. The
research about this kind of language could be beneficial because orangutans may help
people improve the development of communication. Orangutans, like other animals, have a
specific language to communicate with others; in fact, they use the language of gestures.
Orangutans, intelligent animals
Orangutans are great red headed mammals which belong to the family of apes. Just
as chimpanzees, gorillas, and bonobos, they have large bodies and brains, make nest, their
diet is based on fruits, and live long and slow lives (Russon, 2009). Orangutans are

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considered intelligent animals, they are capable of solving problems like getting their food
only making up techniques or building tools that help to obtain food that is hard to get.
Also, they combine many abilities to develop complex tasks. Anne Russon says that
Orangutans have shown they can match and sometimes surpass African great apes'
intellect. They are the mechanical geniuses of the great apes. In addition, orangutans have
many similarities with humans. They share most of their genetic sequence with humans
(Animal Planet, 2015.), some scientists even compare them with humans due to their
intellectual capability. According to Russon (2009) Orangutans nonetheless share
significant similarities: equally large brains, high intelligence and slow lives, reliance on
technology and culture, hunting, meat-eating, and language capacity.
The language of gestures
What is the origin of gestures in orangutans language? This is a very common
question among researchers that deal with the intellectual development of orangutans. The
most appropriate explication of this is that orangutans, including humans, belong to the
family of apes, and obviously they share similar characteristics. But humans have
developed their communication, they pronounce words to express their thinking; however,
humans ancestors did not use that kind of communication. David Leavens states that if we
want to understand the communicative capabilities of our ancestors before the development
of language, it is sensible to study the communication of living apes and their nearrelatives, he makes reference to the importance of learning about the language apes, in this
case, orangutans (Leavens, 2007).
However, orangutans use some gestures to communicate with others. In order to
better understand what does a gesture mean, here is a definition from (Kendon, 2004): a

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gesture is a kind of nonverbal communication in which the message is expressed by body

movements. David Derbyshire (2010) published some gestures used by orangutans when
they tried to say or tell what they were thinking and needing, and there are at least 26
gestures to say that they want to play. For example, when an orangutan wants to play with
somebody, it smacks on the side of this individual, or pinches the arm of the other; or also,
they make a back roll, a somersault, a yank of their hair or bite of the air. In orangutans
language, to carry the hand to mouth begging for food means that they want to share the
food. When an orangutan embraces or pulls someone, it means that it wants to walk with
that person. To say move away, they make a nudge or a shoo gesture with the hand. To
say stop it they make a gentle tap of the hand or pull away. To advertise his arrival, a male
orangutan produces a long and noisy sound, scientists call it the "long call". (Derbyshire,
2010)
Orangutans can modify their gestures
Orangutans use gestures to communicate their needs, but when any of these signs is
not understood by humans they elaborate new signals which interlocutors can understand.
In order to determine whether orangutans could alter their communicative strategy when
their attempts at communication fail, Erica Cartmill and Richard Byrne (2007) present
captive orangutans with situations where they would need human help. They state that
orangutans are able to evaluate their own level of success in communication and modify
their subsequent attempts. In addition, they restate that orangutans have a particular way to
communicate, and orangutans show that when they are less attracted by food, so they just
stop repeating certain gestures (Cartmil & Bayrne, 2007).

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Furthermore, E.C. and R.B. join some captive orangutans to evaluate their behavior.
First, they presented to the apes two groups of food, desirable and undesirable food. The
experiment consisted in check the orangutans out during 30 seconds before and after they
receive the food, classifying the situations as whole goal when their gestures are
understood, part goal for partially understanding, and non-goal when the experimenter
did not understand the signals. Then, the result was that when orangutans wanted the
desirable food, and their gestures were understandable, they repeated the same gestures in
the next cases. In some cases, the experimenters pretended not to understand the gestures,
so the orangutans opted to use a new gesture similar to the previous. On the other hand, the
undesirable food did not provoke any reaction with their behavior (Cartmil & Bayrne,
2007).
Notwithstanding this, Dorothy Cheney, who is a professor of biology at the
University of Pennsylvania, together with Robert Seyfarth, in their article Why Animals
Dont Have Language?, propose that animal and human communication is very different
because animals do not have the ability to create words as humans. They stablish that
nonhuman animals lacks three features that are abundantly present in the earliest words of
young children: a rudimentary theory of mind, the ability to generate new words, and
syntax (Cheney & Seyfarth, 1997). They try to say that apes are not able to recognize the
intentions of others, and consequently, they will not learn new things, like behaviors or
customs from others.
The previous argument is worth thinking about, but the doubt about what
orangutans can develop their way to communicate with humans has been tested and proven.

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According to (Cartmil & Bayrne, 2007), orangutans use gestures to manifest their feelings
and needs, and they modify their gestures each time they fail.
Although the communication sequences of the orangutans are perhaps not as
sophisticated, they nonetheless accomplish the same objectives. By maximizing
efficiency at searching for an understood signal and homing in on those that
achieve partial success, orangutans are able to overcome misunderstandings (p. 6).
Eventually, although orangutans are less capable than humans in things like
reasoning and communication, they learn new things as fast as a child; indeed, they are
slowly improving their gestures to be better understood.
Conclusion
To conclude this argument, orangutans have a particular language to communicate
with their gaggle and other living beings, such as humans. They communicate their needs to
humans who take care of them using gestures acquired in their surroundings or invented by
themselves. As an interesting side fact, they are compatible up to 97% of their genetic
material with humans, which makes us consider them very intelligent animals. Studies
based on language in apes show that captive orangutans are better learning new things than
chimpanzees or gorillas; for example, they modify their behavior, their ways to
communicate with their herd and caregivers, and their methods to get over issues.
Eventually, the results about communication in orangutans were as expected. Orangutans
keep on doing the same signals when they realize that those could earn their wanted food;
moreover, when they received undesirable food, immediately, they opt to look for new
signals instead of those used before; also, they avoid repeating the wrong signals (Cartmil

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& Bayrne, 2007). Some researchers think that animals cannot have language because they
cannot articulate words, but gestures are considered a kind communication too; in fact,
gestures belong to nonverbal communication. Language is associated with the individuals
capacity to reason and transmit ideas and thoughts. The development of the language would
bring more comprehension between living beings. The deeper study of primitive
communication of orangutans will improve the interaction among species.

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References
Animal Planet, U. (Director). (2015. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=GPHMxNCVOOg). 10 Facts You Didn't Know About: Orangutans [Motion
Picture].
Cartmil, E. A., & Bayrne, R. W. (2007). Orangutans modify their gestural signaling
according to their audience's comprehension. Current Biology, 17(15), 1345.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2007.06.069.
Cheney, D. L., & Seyfarth, R. M. (1997). Why Animals Dont Have Language. Pensylvania:
Cambridge University.
Derbyshire, D. (2010). The ape dictionary: How our cousins use 40 gestures to
communicate. MailOnline. Retreived from
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1287374/Orangutans-speak-usinglanguage-gestures.html.
Kendon, A. (2004). Gesture: Visible action. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.,
Retrieved from http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/367/1585/118#ref-3.
Leavens, D. (2007). Animal Cognition: Multimodal Tactics of Orangutan Communication.
Current Biology, 17 (17). R762R764. DOI:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2007.07.010.
McWhorter, J. (2012). What is Language? In J. McWhorter, What Language Is? (p. 21).
Russon, A. (2009). Orangutans. Current Biology, 19(20). pR925R927. DOI:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2009.08.009.

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