Language: uniqueness out of the ordinary

Human language is a strong contender for the title of most often named species-specific feature in the literature. But why is that? In this talk, I explore what we could mean by "human language", and how different conceptions of language inevitably lead to different answers about whether it is species-specific. While syntax is a central feature, it is only one of several, and the uniqueness of human language is that it arose from a combination of, perhaps, ordinary ingredients.