There are many different aspects of language that we discussed in English 175 but lets trace it back to the beginning. What is a language? A language is rule governed, systematic and made up of sounds, words, meaning, and grammar. Every native speaker has a large amount of knowledge that he or she knows about the language that they speak even with limited exposure. For instance, they are good with right adjective word order, understanding the context of statements, their sound system, pragmatics or humor based language, and their lexicon or vocabulary. Most of the time you don’t have to think long and hard about forming a sentence in the correct order. Right adjective word order is something that comes easy to us and sounds funny if not written …show more content…
Something else native speakers understand is the context of statements. We can easily tell when someone is being literal or just trying to make a joke. There are many different characteristics to a language. According to Charles Hockett, a language must consist of communication, mode of communication, semanticity, pragmatic function, interchangeability, arbitrariness, discreteness, displacement, productivity, cultural transmission, prevarication and reflexiveness. To be able to transfer a message from a source to a receiver and how that message is transmitted are all important for a language. Originally, Hockett’s design features only included a vocal-auditory channel but he later added on sounds, visual cues, touch, odor, and electrical signs. This expansion occurred because you have to consider animal communication as well. Both animals and humans have the innate ability to communicate but there are differences between the two systems. Animal communication is confined to a very small set of topics that they discuss which is usually about survival. Humans are able to talk about the present and past, or the immediate environment, known as displacement, and are able to develop concepts and ideas
How can it be that something so uniquely human and commonplace in our everyday existence as language, could transcend the limits of our immediate understanding? We all know how to speak and comprehend at least one language, but defining what we actually know about that language an infinitely more demanding process. How can a child without previous knowledge of the construction and concepts of language be born into the world with an innate ability to apprehend any dialect? Mark Baker, in his book The Atoms of Language, seeks to address these unsettling questions, proposing as a solution, a set of underlying linguistic ingredients, which interact to generate the wide variety of languages we see today.
For example, “ To say ‘John said Pip hit the fence’ you could say the equivalent of ‘Pip say John hit fence’, ‘Fence say John hit Pep’ … or any other of the 120 possible word orders” (Bauer, 78). This show that if there is no grammar, there would be no rule for the word placement and when we say it, the listener wouldn’t know what is our intended. The author proves that this myth is wrong because if there is no grammar, there wouldn’t be rules for word placement, no difference between nouns and verbs, wouldn’t be possible to mark the different of the tune of the sentence and so on. Every language has their own grammar, the only difference is that some might have more grammar than other while some have don’t much as the other such as the ending and word order that is different in each language: Latin makes extensive use of ending, Chinese use word order and English use fixed word order. The main idea of this myth is when we say there is no grammar, we mean there is no grammar book that written all the rules for that particular language. So if we start writing down all the rules, Every language has their own grammar because it exists in the head of the speaker. Even the grammar is different but the language still capable to express the same range of structure
For example, using sarcasm †̃well thatâ€TMs just greatâ€TM most often used in a sarcastic tone but taken literally it would be interpreted as amazing. The language we use can be confusing we must adapt our verbal communication accordingly.
Language is how we express ourselves. There are many different languages in our world. Within those languages there are different dialects. Those dialects are affected by the communities that use them. People add slang or shorten words to make the language their own. This has an immense impact on how authors write. Some authors will attempt to use proper English, but often times will use words common to their community.
Verbal and written language is how people communicate with each other and encourage thoughts, achieve goals, and build relationships. Speaking a single, or multiple languages, and growing up in different setting can seriously alter the way that people speak the same language. This can either encourage diverse communication or make communication all but impossible. For the most part I speak English fluently, it is the only full language that I can speak and I developed this language growing up in a small farm town in the middle of New Jersey.
The way language works, then, is that each person’s brain contains a lexicon of words and the concepts they stand for (a mental dictionary) and a set of rules that combine the words that convey relationships among concepts (a mental grammar) (Pinker 85). Language uses grammar which is a discrete combinational system that has two important consequences
Language is a part of our everyday lives, and we can describe the meaning of language in many ways. As suggested in Gee and Hayes (2011, p.6 ) people can view language as something in our minds or something existing in our world in the form of speech, audio recordings, and writings or we can view language as a way of communicating with a group of people. Language can be used to express our emotions, make sense of our mental and abstract thoughts and assists us in communicating with others around us. Language is of vital importance for children to enable them to succeed in school and everyday life. Everyone uses both oral and written language. Language developed as a common ability amongst human beings with the change
Other animals do not have the capability to communicate the complicated thoughts that humans do. Even though other animals may have some ability to learn basic features of language, the complex and diverse use of language seems to belong strictly to humans.
To clarify, every language has its order form of producing a sentence or how the words will be structured, whether in a sentence or during a speech. So, many studies have been investigated in order to figure out this issue in this field. On of these studies is the comparative between English and Korean structure. Onnis and Thissen (2013) state that in Korean, the head components come at the end of an expression, while in English the head components of the expression come first. In the English sentence for example, “He saw me go there” has a different order in Korean which is “He me there go saw”. Also, “send me the letter” has a different form in Korean “letter me send”. Moreover, they added, we can see that English is prepositional “at work”, but Korean on the other hand is postpositional “work at”. Therefore, it is clear that transitive and imperatives, which consider the most widespread and frequent in English, have a switched word-arrange in Korean. As a result, the learners of the second language in this investigation have impacted by their previous knowledge of their first language elements. Similarity, Ullman, 2001, cited in Karsten (2006) points out that technical system is supposed to be obtainable to late L2 learners at least to some range, it also has to be assumed to mental lexicon of the second learners.
Language, according to Owens (2012, p. 6), “can be defined as a socially shared code or conventional system for representing concepts through the use of arbitrary symbols and rule-governed combinations of those symbols”. Language is thought to be a complex system; however, it can be broken down into three different components. These three components consist of content, form, and use. Within these three components, language has five main components which includes semantics, morphology, phonology, syntax, and pragmatics (Owens, 2012, p. 18).
One of the first things we learn and obtain as children is language. We are not just simply obtaining language but we are being socialized by it. Language socialization is learning a language in culturally specific ways which then helps one become members of their group (Schiefflin). We are learning meanings of linguistic words and sentences that are not just conveying logical meaning but also indexing social meanings. "In every community, members have available to them linguistic resources for communicating such social meaning at the same time as they are providing other levels of information"(Ochs). So it isn 't just what is being said, but why or when something is being said that holds
To start with, I do not want to narrowly define language as merely verbal communication. Language is far broader than that. In a few seconds a person walking past you on the street could tell you more about themselves with a sincere smile than they could with a few rushed words. Language encompasses all aspects of communication that enhance the level of our interaction. The tone in our voice demonstrating our feelings on a topic or our body language indicating our level of interest are just as important in interaction as verbally communicating content. There for I define language as any act that is involved in the interaction between two or more people.
Syntax is the study of how words are combined to create phrases and causes in the sentences of a specific language (Freeman and Freeman, 2014). Syntax helps us to make clear sentences that “sound right,” where words, phrases, and clauses each serve their function and are correctly ordered to form and communicate a complete sentence with meaning. The rules of syntax combine words into phrases and phrases into sentences. Not only does it focus on the correct word order for a language, but it also helps show the relationship between the meaning of a group of words. Without proper syntax, a sentence can be meaningless. It is key to understand that while every language does have certain syntax, the syntax does vary from language to language. It
This makes it important for the learner to learn a language gradually allowing them to master each word without making major mistakes while using them. This is especially important when considering much language syntax differs from English which making many sentences be forced in the opposite structure. This makes it important 2nd language learners to first take time to learn how to place the words which would then translate to the right meaning. Failing to understand the word and grammar arrangement can lead to major complications and result in the learner having bad experiencing dealing with native speakers which can result in serious complications (Halliday 1970).
Language has oral, written and non-verbal aspects, that can be seen and heard, and which are socially and culturally influenced. Although languages have common features, these social and cultural influences also create great diversity among languages and varieties, often leading to a perception that some varieties have greater value or status. In addition, social and cultural context play a large role in meaning-making. Children develop language as a result of social and cultural interactions, based on a growing awareness of the functions of language, and how language can be used. This understanding of the different types and uses of language increases as children experience language outside of the home. As their understanding of these different roles of language grows, children gain the ability to select and use the appropriate language for a particular context or