No expert, dxb; don't know much about mynahs at all, apart from the fact that the origin of the word is from Hindi.
However, I do have some thoughts in response to your questions:
I would make a distinction between speech and language. Any vocalization of sound, I would call speech. Language I would use only for a communicative tool that is the cogent putting together of a set of words and a set of grammatical rules. This complicated process requires the able and efficient coordination of TWO interlinked processes; articulation effected by specific anatomical structures and the brain’s cognitive capacity. Indeed, to talk and converse, we will need perfect coordination between the larynx in the throat and specific areas dealing with speech in the brain, respectively.
From what I have read, song to birds is as important as language to humans. And there is a tremendous amount of similarity between the way children acquire language and birds learn their songs. Both baby birds and baby humans learn the correct patterns of vocalization from the adults; both have a similar pre-talk babble; both have a critical period when the learning is at a peak; both have their language learning centers in the same area of the brain, i.e., in the cerebral cortex. There are many more similarities that I cannot recollect offhand. I think parrots were used for the study.
Contrariwise, chimps do not have a vocal apparatus and they have their learning centers in the brainstem, not the cortex. Effectively, thus, even if chimps can learn words and sign language, their process of learning is not similar to that of humans and is more acquisitive not cognitive. Whilst birds not only possess a high acquisitive capability but also demonstrate similarities of learning as well as functional location in the brain suggesting a possible cognitive capability for language.
anthropoglot: animal with human tongue; animal capable of speech
Maybe an anthropoglot should be defined as any non human creature that is capable of vocalizing human-like speech.
