SAINT MICHAEL COLLEGE OF HINDANG LEYTE INC.

A Bonifacio St., Poblacion II, Hindang Leyte

Website: smchindang.edu.ph
E-mail: smchindang@gmail.com

Week 3
Course : Language, Culture and Society
Department : Business Department
School Year : 1st Semester, S.Y. 202o - 2021
Instructor: : Riza Mae B. Fortuna
Topic : LANGUAGE, NATURE AND CHARACTERISTICS

Language

 Most Valuable Position of man

 Difficult to think of a society without a language

Language

A Skill Something we do
‘He speaks well but writes badly’
A knowledge Some we know
‘I don’t know much Italian’
A Possession Something we have / possess
‘I haven’t much French’
A tool Something we use
‘what word can I used to describe her?’
An Event Something which happens
‘I was in the office when the conversation took place’
A Group of Identity Something which transmits culture
‘It is only through our language that we can truly express our identity’
An Object Something we can describe
‘This language has a complex structure’
A Living Organization Something which is born, lives and dies
‘Gradually a new language is born’
‘The 18th century saw a flowering of the language’
‘That’s a dead language’

Definitions

Language is a ‘Symbol System’ (Robins)

– it is based on arbitrary system

Infinitely extendable and modifiable (Robins)

- To changing needs and condition of the speaker

Language is purely human and non-instinctive (Sapir)

- Method of communication
- Human - species ----species, species – uniform
*Non-Instinctive – a child has to learn language of society

Language is a set of sentence (Chomsky)

- Finite of infinite
Each finite in length
- Constructed out of finite set of elements

Characteristics of Language
1. Means of Communication
Common code:
 Ideas Emotion Desire
Feelings Belief
Other means of communication
Gesture Nods Winks
Flags Smile Horns
Short Hand Dance
Language is a carrier
a. It conveys/carries
i. Human thoughts
ii. Philosophy
iii. Culture
iv. Civilization
b. It shapes
i. People’s thought
c. Guides /control
i. activities
Language is a ubiquitous
d. Present everywhere
i. In all activities
e. As important as the air we breathe

Species- specific
 Only humans are blessed with language
 Specific property of humans
 Humans are called talking animals

2. Language is arbitrary
a. No inherent/basic relation between the words of language and their meaning
b. Advantages of arbitrariness
i. Variety of Language
1. There would have been 1 language
ii. Permits change
iii. Its conventionality gives its stability
3. Language is primarily vocal
a. Made of vocal sounds
b. Produced by Physiological articulatory mechanism
c. Speech primary, Writing Secondary
i. A child learns to speak first
1. Writing comes much later
ii. A man speaks much more than he writes
iii. Writing
iv. Total quantum of speech is > TQ written material
v. Primacy of speech over writing
1. Spoken words are powerful
2. Can be preserved
a. Audio cassette
b. Tape recorders
4. Language is a system of sytems / duality
a. An organized combination of elements
i. Small number of meaning elements (Sounds or words) in combination can produce a large
number of meaningful elements
ii. These system operate at two levels
1. Phonological
a. to form meaningful units/words
b. sounds are arranged in certain established systematic order
i. Cat = /k æ t/
ii. Act = /æ k t/
iii. Pat = /P æ t/
iv. Tap = /T æ p/
v. Pat = /P æ t/

2. Syntactical
 a. To frame acceptable meaningful sentences
i. Words are arranged in a particular system
ii. (grammatical / structural rules)
1. ‘The hunter shot the tiger with a gun’
2. ‘the hunter shot a gun with a hunter the’

5. A form of behavior
a. A child picks up the language of social set up and learns to speak community language
b. A Chinese infant placed in an Indian family
i. Will easily learn Indian language

6. Language is a symbol system

a. A concrete event, object or mark
b. Stands for something relatively abstract
c. Word are symbols - stand for object

7. The uniqueness of Human Language

a. Displacement
b. Infinite Communication System
c. Open-endedness
d. Language is flexible / open ended
i. It is modifiable , extendable
ii. It changes , it grows
1. new
iii. Animal system is a closed-system
1. A bee’s distance
2. Cock’s crow
3. As the same as 200 years ago.
e. Discreteness
i. Clear
ii. Distinguishable
iii. Separate
iv. Identifiable symbols
f. Structural Complexity
i. English (RP Variety) has 44 sounds
ii. Millions of sentences
iii. Internal structure of sentence
g. Non-instinctive Language
i. Every human has to learn language
1. From parent / society
ii. Human acquire language

Name : ________________________________ Schedule: ____________________ Score: _____________

Create a powerpoint presentation based on the topic discussed.

Select 5 characteristics of language and discuss it. Provided concrete examples

Warning: Do not download from slideshare, linkedin, scribd, powershow, authorstream, docdroid, hashdoc,
academia, coursehero. I have accounts in these websites.