ABSTRACT
From birth onward, we draw on the non-verbal register of song-and-dance as a primordial form of communication. Infants respond to the musical elements of human speech with dance-like movements that keep time with the music. This interaction recruits them into the human linguistic community, and sets the stage for the later acquisition of verbal speech, which is layered over this foundation of non-verbal, musical communication. Not long after birth, this register of communication is joined by a visual one involving the face and eyes: infants need the faces within their field of view to be responsive to them if they are not to fall into a state of isolated despair and inertia. These discoveries permit a perspective from which verbal communication is a late development that rests on an earlier foundation of music, rhythmic movement and facial expression, acting as a kind of multi-band baby-talk. We postulate that non-verbal modes of communication, operating outside of consciousness, form a direct link between the (non-verbal) unconscious of one mind and that of another, entering conscious life if at all only as a “vibe”, a term that reveals its roots in the musical register.
