Recommended Translation: ‘Essay on the Origin of Languages,’ in Rousseau: The Discourses and other early political writings, ed. and trans. by Victor Gourevitch (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 247-299.
Rousseau’s Essay on the Origin of Languages (Essai sur l’origine des langues) was first published posthumously in 1781. Rousseau wrote that he had originally intended to include this work in the his Second Discourse but that he finally decided to omit it due it length and that he found it would be out of place. In the Essay, Rousseau lays out a narrative of the beginnings of language, including a discussion of the development of humankind. The work should be studied in relation to the account of the origins of the human race offered in the his Second Discourse.