Meaning and entrainment in language and music

This paper introduces a collection of papers originally presented in the context of three interdisciplinary meetings sponsored by the British Psychological Society (Research Seminar Competition), Middlesex University and the University of Cambridge. Franco & Cross are guest editors of this special double issue Vol 7 [1-2], in which fifteen articles are organized around a series of target papers each with two response papers.
The attempts to describe language and music in terms of their similarities and differences have been numerous and illustrious, spanning from functional to structural aspects. Universally present across human cultures, language and music are complex systems in which communication is based primarily on sound (although other senses, gesture and the motor system are involved) and in which specific brain disorders exist that affect both perception and production as in aphasia and amusia. Both systems involve the development of literacy based on specific alphabets and orthographies, notation systems and scales, which are, in turn, rooted in particular structures grouping subordinate elements according to rules that are largely (but not exclusively) culture-specific. However, scholars do not necessarily agree when debating on the degree to which language and music are to be considered as two specializations derived from the same system, or two distinct systems. This paper introduces two main themes in this debate: meaning and entrainment.