The jungle book was arguably one of my most loved cartoons as a kid. The release of the new live-action movie made me really nostalgic for the good ol days.
As a youngin, I would wonder how truly glorious it would be living with the likes of Baloo, Bagheera (my fav) and of course the one and only Mowgli. There are multiple renditions of Mowgli's adventure and all of them have Mowgli growing up in the jungle alongside anthropomorphic wild animals.
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Another similar character is Tarzan, he too is brought up in the wild by a pack of great Apes and continues to live with them up to Adulthood. We see Jane enter Tarzan's life as a love interest who further facilitates his social development by taking him to the city and trying to civilise him. In multiple adaptation of this story, Tarzan is seen learning new things and trying to become a proper English gentleman. And since he already well versed in English, it's only a matter of manners.
To most of us all of this must seem quite plausible, you know it's quite similar to learning a new culture and a different language, right? Um..well yes in Tarzan's world with his anthropomorphic parents, it will work. But what about the real world, where animals disappointingly enough don't communicate with language similar to ours, what then?
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Mowgli and Tarzan are what we call as Feral children.
A feral child (also called wild child) is a human child who has lived isolated from human contact from a very young age where they have little or no experience of human care, behavior, or, crucially of human language. (via Wikipedia)
Feral children have been a matter of great interest to psychologists and neuroscientists. Due to their isolation from other human beings, their sociological development is quite different. Many feral children who are rescued are, more often than not, left under the care of a psychologist and/or other medical specialists. Who then get a chance to understand them and help them adapt to this environment.
In 1797, Toulouse, France a young boy was spotted in the woods near Saint-Sernin-sur-Rance. Two hunters rescued him and brought him to a nearby village where he was cared for by a widow. However, he soon ran away and was frequently spotted during 1798-99. On January 8, 1800, he emerged from the forests on his own. His origins were unknown and he was presumed to be nearly 12 years of age. He had many scars all over his body and his food preference indicated that he had lived most of his life in the wild.
This young boy displayed animal like behaviour, he walked on all fours, he preferred to not wear any clothes and natural environment, even though extreme, did not bother him. For instance, he was left naked in the snow and he showed no signs of discomfort and was rather enjoying himself. He had no speech skills and did not respond in any form towards language.
Around this time there was a significant debate in the world regarding the differences between Humans and Animals. The popular opinion involved the ability to learn and use language.
A young medical student by the name of Jean-Marc-Gaspard Itard, was of the opinion that the two things that separated Humans from Animals were language and empathy. He effectively adopted the young boy and also gave him the name Victor of Aveyron. He wished to be the first to fully civilize a feral child and attempted, primarily, to teach Victor to speak and show human emotion. He designed an educational plan for Victor:
To interest him in social life
To improve his awareness of external stimuli
To extend the range of his ideas
To teach him to speak
To teach him to communicate by using symbol systems
This program can be regarded as the first Individual Educational Plan (IEP) in special education.
In the initial stages Victor showed significant progress in understanding and reading simple words but that started to slow down and reached a point where Itard decided to abandon the whole project. The only words that Victor properly learned were: lait (milk) and Oh Dieu (oh God).
Even though Itard failed at teaching Victor, he made a significant breakthrough with regards to emotion and behaviourism. Victor lived with Itard and his housekeeper Madame Guérin, One night while the housekeeper was setting the table Victor noticed she was sobbing as she had recently lost her husband. Seeing her cry, Victor made a significant effort to console her, thus exhibiting empathy.
To Itard this was a major breakthrough in his case, proving the wild child was capable of empathy.
Itard worked with Victor for five years, after which he was no longer a 'wild' child but was little more than a quasi-civilized adolescent. Madame Guerin became his state-salaried guardian, paid 150 francs per year to care for him in a house near the institute.In 1828 approximately at the age of forty, Victor died, yet unable to speak, reportedly afraid and still half-wild. There are no records of the cause of death or even where he is buried.
Noam Chomsky, an American linguist and cognitive scientist, In his famous Language Acquisition theory, talks about the process and a critical period. Most researchers agree that if a child is not exposed to language at an early age, they fail to be fluent in any language ever.
Feral children are not just kids who've spent their childhood in the wild, any child who has been isolated from the social environment for a prolonged period of time are called Feral children.
The famous and truly distressing story of Genie, who was locked in a room for over a decade and frequently abused, has also revealed a lot about language acquisition and causes of extreme isolation and abuse on the human brain. If anyone who is interested in learning more about Genie and her predicament please avail the many documentaries and papers about her available on the internet.
So in conclusion, could Tarzan and Jane realistically have a healthy relationship? idk my mamma didn't teach me to poke my nose in other people's business (jk). Even after growing in the wild isolated from humans Tarzan has the capacity to feel emotions, and there have been cases where some children have been able to understand and even learn sign language.
