Winner of the William James Book Award Magisterial...Makes an impressive argument that most
distinctly human traits are established early in childhood and that the general chronology in
which these traits appear can at least-and at last-be identified. -Wall Street Journal
Theoretically daring and experimentally ingenious Becoming Human squarely tackles the abiding
question of what makes us human. -Susan Gelman University of Michigan Virtually all theories
of how humans have become such a distinctive species focus on evolution. Becoming Human
proposes a complementary theory of human uniqueness focused on development. Building on the
seminal ideas of Vygotsky it explains how those things that make us most human are constructed
during the first years of a child's life. In this groundbreaking work Michael Tomasello draws
from three decades of experimental research with chimpanzees bonobos and children to propose
a new framework for psychological growth between birth and seven years of age. He identifies
eight pathways that differentiate humans from their primate relatives: social cognition
communication cultural learning cooperative thinking collaboration prosociality social
norms and moral identity. In each of these great apes possess rudimentary abilities but the
maturation of humans' evolved capacities for shared intentionality transform these abilities
into uniquely human cognition and sociality.
