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Authoritative: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X08005049   (Publisher's PDF... likely be available here.)

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Abstract

Languages emerge in response to the negotiation of shared meaning in social groups, where transparency of grammar is necessitated by demands of communication with relative strangers needing to consult on a wide range of topics (Ragir 2002). This communal exchange is automated and stabilized through activity-dependent fine-tuning of information-specific neural connections during postnatal growth and social development.

@article{brooks08BBScomments,
  author={Patricia J. Brooks and Sonia Ragir},
  title={Prolonged plasticity: Necessary and sufficient for language-ready brains},
  journal={Behavioral and Brain Sciences},
  year={2008},
  volume={31},
  number={5},
  pages={514-515},
  doi={10.1017/S0140525X08005049},
  url={http://www.isrl.uiuc.edu/~amag/langev/paper/brooks08BBScomments.html}
}