Chimpanzees and language
The idea of raising a chimp and a child together may
seem like a nightmare, but this is basically what was
done in an early attempt to teach a chimpanzee to
use human language. These foster parents spent five
years attempting to get Viki to “say” English words
by trying to shape her mouth as she produced
sounds. Viki eventually managed to produce some
words, rather poorly articulated versions of mama,
papa and cup.