Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Nat. of Language
Nat. of Language
Nat. of Language
Unit I
What do you understand by Language?
A language is a method of communication. Human spoken and written
languages can be described as a system of symbols (sometimes known as
lexemes) and the grammars (rules) by which the symbols are manipulated.
The word "language" is also used to refer to common properties of
languages.
It is a mode of communication.
It is an expression of feelings, ideas and thoughts into words.
It is a means of achieving an end to ones want through the expression of words,
or putting thoughts and ideas into action.
One of the most basic human urges is to communicate.
Purposes of Language
I - For Inter-Personal Communication:
II For Learning
Gaining tolerance through experiencing a wide range of new and different view
points.
Transforming abstract concept into concrete reality.
Speculating about possibilities.
Trying ideas on for size and thinking them through.
Revising and reshaping personal ideas and attitudes based on the responses of
other persons.
Devising and asking questions of the other person.
Initiating activities about personal work and the work of others.
Nature of Language
Page 1
Displacement:
Human language can be used to refer to any dimension of space and time. We can use
language to refer to the past, the present and the future. It can also be used to refer to any
place here or elsewhere. In neither case does the language user have to move from his or
her place to refer to time and place
(OR)
In contrast to other animals, humans have a sense of the past and the future. A gorilla, for
example, cannot tell his fellows about his parents, his adventures in the jungle, or his
experience of the past. The use of language to talk about things other than "the here and
now is a characteristic of humans. Displacement is thus our ability to convey a meaning
that transcends the immediately perceptible sphere of space and time
Open-endedness:
The sounds, words and sentences in a language may be finite or limited, but the
combinations and constructions are infinite or unlimited. This creative or productive
potential of language enables its user to manipulate and make an infinite variety of
constructions to express himself or herself. (OR).
The ability to say things that have never been said before, including the possibility to
express invented things or lies, is also a peculiar feature of human language
Arbitrariness:
Human language is an arbitrary (illogical) phenomenon. There is no natural connection or
relationship between a word and its meaning. The signifier and the signified are brought
together arbitrarily.
Why a table is called "table"? Obviously, the thing never told us its name. And tables do
not produce a sound similar to the word. The same applies to most of the words of our
language. Hence, words and their meanings have no a priori connection. We cannot tell
from the sound structure which meaning is behind it. Language is not motivated, as we
can also put it.
Cultural Transmission:
Human beings may be born with innate predispositions to acquire language, but they are
not born with the ability to produce utterances in a specific language. Language is not
genetically transmitted. It is culturally transmitted and has to be consciously learned.
Nature of Language
Page 2
UNIT II
Language (Reference)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nature of Language
Page 3
* What is Etymology?
The Etymology of a word refers to its origin and the historical roots of the term as a
linguistic form. Etymology, in general, is the theory and study of the origins
and history of linguistic form. A dictionary etymology tells us what is known
of an English word before it became the word entered in that dictionary. If the
word was created in English, the etymology shows, to whatever extent is not
already obvious from the shape of the word, what materials were used to form
it. If the word was borrowed into English, the etymology traces the borrowing
process backward from the point at which the word entered English to the
earliest records of the ancestral language. Where it is relevant, an etymology
notes words from other languages that are related (akin) to the word in the
dictionary entry, but that are not in direct line of borrowing.
* Where do new words come from? How do you figure out their histories?
Borrowing: A majority of the words used in English today are of foreign origin. English
still derives much of its vocabulary from Latin and Greek, but we have also
borrowed words from nearly all of the languages in Europe. In the modern
period of linguistic acquisitiveness, English has found vocabulary
opportunities ever farther a field. From the period of the renaissance voyages
through the days when the sun never set upon the British Empire, the language
to match the new objects and experiences, English speakers have encountered
Nature of Language
Page 4
Blends: A blend is a word made by combining other words or parts of words in such a
way that they over-lap or one is infixed into the other. The term blend is also
sometimes used to describe words like brunch, from breakfast plus lunch, in
which pieces of the word are joined but there is no actual overlap.
Transfer of personal or place names: Over time, names of people, places, or things
may become generalized vocabulary words. Thus did Forsythia develop from
the name of botanist William Forsyth, Silhouette from the name of Etienne de
Silhouette, a parsimonious French Controller General of Finances, and Denim
from Serge de Nimes (a fabric made in Nimes, France)
Purposes of Language:
I - For Inter-Personal Communication:
Comprehending and internalizing or conveying personal experience.
Expressing judgements.
Constructing, following or expressing reasoned argument.
Defending and challenging ideas, attitudes, feelings and options.
Nature of Language
Page 5
Features of language
Duality patterning:
Human language is organized at two levels or layers simultaneously: at the level
of individual sounds like n, b, t, p, ibut none of these individual, discrete
sounds has any meaning in themselves. Their meaning comes from meaningful
combinations to produce words.
Displacement:
Human language can be used to refer to any dimension of space and time. We can
use language to refer to the past, the present and the future. It can also be used to
refer to any place here or elsewhere. In neither case does the language user have
to move from his or her place to refer to time and place. (OR)
In contrast to other animals, humans have a sense of the past and the future. A
gorilla, for example, cannot tell his fellows about his parents, his adventures in the
jungle, or his experience of the past. The use of language to talk about things
other than "the here and now is a characteristic of humans. Displacement is thus
our ability to convey a meaning that transcends the immediately perceptible
sphere of space and time.
Open-endedness:
The sounds, words and sentences in a language may be finite or limited, but the
combinations and constructions are infinite or unlimited. This creative or
Nature of Language
Page 6
Arbitrariness:
Human language is an arbitrary (illogical) phenomenon. There is no natural
connection or relationship between a word and its meaning. The signifier and the
signified are brought together arbitrarily.
Why a table is called "table"? Obviously, the thing never told us its name. And
tables do not produce a sound similar to the word. The same applies to most of the
words of our language. Hence, words and their meaning have no a priori
connection. We cannot tell from the sound structure which meaning is behind it.
Language is not motivated, as we can also put it.
Cultural Transmission: Human beings may be born with innate
predispositions to acquire language, but they are not born with the ability to
produce utterances in a specific language. Language is not genetically transmitted.
It is culturally transmitted and has to be consciously learned. (Cite Examples)
Meta-Linguistic System: Human language can be used to talk about itself, its
features, varieties and levels of sophistications.
Language is a system: It is a system of systems. Language is not a collection of
sounds and forms at random, but a highly organized system in which each unit
has its place and value. Each sound is related to other sounds, each word is related
to other words to make meaning.
Language is an individual and social phenomenon: Language serves to
express individual needs and urges; it also brings an individual into relationship
with the external world.
Human Language is species-species and species uniform: Language is
specific to human of the species and all human beings are capable of learning the
language in which they are born.
Learning cannot account for the rapid rate at which children acquire language.
Nature of Language
Page 7
Children make errors, such as overregularizing verbs. For example, a child may say
Billy hitted me, incorrectly adding the usual past tense suffix -ed to hit. Errors like
these cant result from imitation, since adults generally use correct verb forms.
Children acquire language skills even though adults do not consistently correct their
syntax.
Rationalistic Theory:
(Biological Influences on Language Acquisition)
The main proponent of the view that biological influences bring about language
development is the well-known linguist Noam Chomsky. Chomsky argues that human
brains have a language acquisition device (LAD), an innate mechanism or process that
allows children to develop language skills. According to this view, all children are born
with a universal grammar, which makes them receptive to the common features of all
languages. Because of this hard-wired background in grammar, children easily pick up a
language when they are exposed to its particular grammar.
Evidence for an innate human capacity to acquire language skills comes from the
following observations:
o
The stages of language development occur at about the same ages in most children,
even though different children experience very different environments.
Deaf children who have not been exposed to a language may make up their own
language. These new languages resemble each other in sentence structure, even when
they are created in different cultures.
Page 8
Nature of Language
Page 9