What is Language?

What is Language?

What is language? We all know it’s what we use to communicate with others, what we use to inform, how to build a rapport and to entertain others. But what exactly is language? What are the different parts that make up the language that we know? As we may already know, language is built up of Phonology, Morphology, Lexicology and Semantics.

Phonology is the study of sounds. The sounds that we produce are by the speech organs that only belong to humans. The actual sounds that come out of our mouths are called ‘phones’. This can be either vowels or consonants. No language makes use of all the many sounds that the speech organ can produce and no two languages use the same set of sounds. Did you know that American English only uses 38 sounds? Also did you know that because no two languages use the same set of sounds, different speakers of the same language differ, this is because they are using different patterns, this creates ‘accents’.

Morphology is simply the word structure we use in our language. It is the study of how we put together words or the building blocks to our sentences. Lexicology is the collection of words in a language for e.g. nouns, verbs, adjectives etc.

Semantics is the study of how meaning is constructed, interpreted and clarified. It focuses on the relationships between words, phrases, signs and symbols and what they stand for. It is quite important to understand language in social contexts.

We now know the basic information as to how the language is formed and its different parts, but why do we use language, what is it for? We use it in social situations, to communicate our thoughts, tell a story or a joke with friends. We use it to inform others, to give instructions. Language itself is also used to culturally shape us. It is such a fascinating and engaging gift that we often take for granted.

Different Ways That Children Learn Language.

How do humans learn language?

 - When do we start learning language?

 - What are some features of child language?

Different ways that children learn language

-mainly hearing impaired children or children with speaking difficulties.

  
 

Humans start to learn language the second they are born, from their first cry, to their first smile all the way to their first words and beyond.

Humans learn language by observing others and seeing what they do, some things are instinctual such as crying or smiling. The other day I was told by my nieces midwife that when a child smiles for the first few time at 3-4 weeks old they don’t realise what they have done, it is an odd feeling like, “oh, that was weird, what was that?”, sort of thing, until they later realise that it is what happens when they are happy or find something funny.

When they are first born, babies only real way to communicate is through crying, which is instinctual. Whether they are hungry, tired, want to be held or need a nappy change, this is the only way a baby can get his or her message across. As they get older they will develop other ways to communicate, such as hand gestures and writing.

Although it sometimes doesn’t get noticed, children use hand gestures to communicate as soon as they identify their hands and learn how to control them. They may be pointing at something or putting their hand up to their mouth as if they are drinking out of a cup, meaning they are thirsty. Children may use this before they are able to speak or even after. It can be developed by watching people perform the same actions such as pointing something out to somebody else or watching somebody perform the actual action, such as having a drink.

Children that are hearing impaired or have speaking difficulties may use hand gestures as a first language. Two examples of this are my nephew, Elijah and my niece, Jordan. When Elijah was two years old he didn’t use much language, he would say Mum, Dad, Nan and Pop but not much else. My sister and her husband took him to see a speech therapist and were told to start signing to him. Elijah made little signals that would tell us what he needed, when he needed it, which helped us to understand his needs better.

When my niece, Jordan was just three weeks old my sister and her husband along with the rest of the family were shocked to find out that Jordan was partially deaf. After the initial shock we all realised that it doesn’t matter what happens, Jordan just may have a different way of communicating to us, and it doesn’t make her different it is just another way to get a message across to another person. Even if she was completely deaf, it wouldn’t make a difference she would still be able to communicate, she would just get her message across differently. It is just like somebody that speaks English communicating with somebody that speaks Chinese, it is a language that only some learn and understand. Jordan is just five weeks old now but when she is old enough to learn she will learn exactly the same as anybody else will, she will be able to talk, walk, go to school, make friends and follow all her dreams in life. It doesn’t make her weird or different it just makes her special.

When children begin to speak they will commonly repeat words that are easy to say, copying the people around them. As their speaking continues to develop they will start to experiment with words and make different sounds with words. They will later start to learn words at a rapid rate and it will become impossible to keep up with.

No matter what situation a person is put into we all learn language. Starting at birth, from our first cry to the day we die people are always learning new ways to communicate and interact with others.

Sources-

http://iteslj.org/Articles/McGlothlin-ChildLearn.html

How do humans learn language?

How do humans learn language?

 - When do we start learning language?

 - What are some features of child language?

Human language is a skill that we as humans learn over time. We start learning language from the day we are born. Children learn from the people around them and people that are speaking to them and from that children just gain the skill to communicate with others, and then we start learning language in schools with English classes looking at grammar and vocabulary. The first signs of language from a baby are crying, after a while once there a bit older it moves onto vowel sounds like ahh, ee, and ohh. Parents and other adults around the child are a major part in teaching the child language just by talking to them, children that are never spoken to will not acquire language. 

We also use our senses to understand and use language it starts from a young age from when are parents are talking to and trying to get us to speak till when we are older speaking our own words, even body language contributes in language which is another way children can pick up language so easily by watching the movements and hand gesture someone is making while talking.

Regularly, language starts off as a memory of simple words without a related meaning, but as children grow, words gain meaning, with connections between words being formed. As a person gets older, new meanings and new relations are created and vocabulary increases as more words are learned.

Some say that it’s so easy for a young child to learn to speak because their brains are already programmed to learn language, and when a baby is born he or she already automatically know a lot about language, language is like walking, walking is a genetic and children develop the skill to walk whether or not they are taught by someone in the same way children develop the ability to talk without be sat down and taught they can just listen to what everyone else is saying. For this reason many linguist say that the ability to speak language is genetic.

Bibliography

http://www.lsadc.org/info/ling-faqs-lang_acq.cfm

http://www.zompist.com.html

-          How do we decipher ancient languages that have been lost?

-          What is the oldest surviving language?

In researching this topic, there were not a lot of resources explaining exactly how archaeologists and linguists decipher ancient unknown languages. I did conclude however that once an ancient language is found which is not recognizable from the languages we know today, linguists can look for similarities in other languages, and use that to decipher and discover the origin of the language. For example, Mayan and Linear B (ancient Mycenaean Greek) syllabic scripts were recently deciphered from stone tablets. Using computer programs, and comparing elements in the ancient scripts with similar languages, this was able to happen.

Controversy surrounds the mystery of the oldest surviving language. There are many different opinions on the topic, but one of the more popular beliefs is that the oldest surviving spoken language is either: Greek, Mayan or Albanian. Albanian (which is spoken in Northern Greece) wasn’t recorded or written down until roughly the 15^th century AD, however Greek astronomer and geologist Ptolemy had apparently cited something about the Albanian language in his work from the first century BCE (Before Common Era). This however is all just rumour and legend, as the factual answer is not known.

The candidates for the oldest written language are: Egyptian, Chinese or possibly even Hebrew or Arabic. Chinese was first written down in approximately 1500 BCE. Another contender for the oldest written language, (although this is not a surviving language, as they don’t still use it) is Linear B. This is an early form of Greek, used in Mycenae. This was first written in roughly 1500 BCE. As you can tell, all these dates and languages are very unspecific, and there is little solid, scientific fact which supports one definite oldest language out of the many possibilities.   

What is Language?

Language; what is language?

Language is something that we as humans use to communicate with one another; so do animals but they communicate differently. Language is something that plays a main part in everyone’s life. Language is used in many modes, such as spoken, written, and sign. Body language supports these modes when we communicate with one another. Language is made up of one or more sounds that are combined into a specific meaning called language. Example; some – someone; which are to different words that are formed together to create a different meaning. From the moment were born we have language and have the skills to gain on over time.

There are 8 main categories of words. A verb which is an action word; noun which is a thing or person; an adjective which describes a noun; Adverb, which describes a verb or adverb or an adjective; pronoun which replaces a noun; preposition which links another noun to a word; a conjunction which joins sentences and words. All of us use these word categories on a day-to-day basis.

Why; why do we use language and how?
Language is something that plays a vital role in everyone’s life. We use language so we have the ability to communicate and interact with one another. There are many reasons that we use language, for example, to express our feelings, ask questions, to socialize, inform if needed and there are many more reasons. 

Language can be verbal and non-verbal.

Paralinguistic cues such as body language; hand gestures and eye contact are non-verbal and help to better get across one’s point when speaking.

Do animals have their own languages?

Do animals talk to each other the way people do? Do they have their own languages? When thinking about the English language these are some of the key questions that always comes to mind. As humans we are attached to the idea that language is the one thing that makes us, as a species, unique. Language is the last boundary standing between us and other animals. In order to answer these questions we first need to look at what language really means. A common definition of language is, ‘the communication of thoughts and feelings through a system of
arbitrary signals, such as voice sounds, gestures, or written symbols’. So the real question is, do animals communicate their thoughts and feelings through a system of signals?

Animals might not be able to speak the way we do or master advanced language techniques, but they certainly have other ways of communicating to each other. Whether through visual, auditory, tactile or chemical means of communication animals are effectively able to express at least their basic thoughts and feelings to each other.

Many animals use auditory communication to express themselves to one another, some examples of this are; whale song, wolves howling, frogs croaking and birds chirping. Another form of animal communication is visual, this includes; fireflies glowing to attract their mates, peacocks showing their elaborate tails during courting rituals and cobras inflating their hoods to scare other creatures. Tactile animal communication can be shown by; dogs licking their pups to bond, baboons using touch to show affection and horses kicking other horses to establish dominance. Many animals also use chemical means of communication, some examples of this are; dogs marking their scent to establish their territory, ants using pheromone trails to follow each other and skunks using smell to deter predators.

Studies have shown that animals are becoming capable of even more advanced language techniques, especially in the cases of the Gunnison’s prairie dog, a species of dog found in the US and Mexico, and chimpanzees.  Research has shown that prairie dog colonies have a communication system that includes nouns, verbs, and adjectives. Scientists also found that prairie dogs aren't born knowing the calls, they have to learn them. This is based on the fact that different prairie dog colonies all have different dialects, meaning that the calls have been created by the individual colonies and passed on from one generation to the next. Another discovery of advanced animal communication was a chimpanzee at a research centre who gossiped, through means of a special keyboard, about a fight between two other chimpanzees. This shows that animals are advancing from just communicating their basic needs and wants to gossiping amongst each other.

All of these examples show that even though animals are not able to communicate the way we do, they do have their own languages of their own where they communicate their thoughts and feelings through a system of signals.

Sources:

http://www.grandin.com/inc/animals.in.translation.ch6.html

http://tuvalu.santafe.edu/~johnson/articles.chimp.html

http://animals.howstuffworks.com/animal-facts/animals-communicate.htm

www.thefreedictionary.com/language

Is it only humans that have language?

Is it only humans that have language?

- Do animals communicate? How? Which ones?

- How does human and animal language differ?

Do animals communicate, well of course they do. They may not speak like humans or be able to write or use sign language but they have their own ways to communicate. A whale has a song, frogs croak and birds tweet. They also have non-verbal ways to communicate like how a dolphin slaps its tail on water, marking of scents, tactile or chemical cues, postural gestures, visual signals and bioluminescence.

Animals from the same species may even sound different depending on where they come from. One study found that the blue whale produces different patterns of pulses, pitches and tones when they come from different places. Birds are another example of this.

Animals can also communicate with different species. An example of this is the Madagascan spiny-tailed Iguana. It has big ears, which means it can hear the warning calls from another species called the Madagascan paradise flycatcher. The only thing these two species have in common is that they have the same predator. The Iguana then knows that if it hears the bird raise the alarm among other birds it usually means that their predator is nearby.

Meerkats are a great example of different ways animals communicate. They purr to show contentment and attachment, they chatter when they are nervous and they squeal when there is danger. When either the dominate male or female wake up and need to go find food, they call for the rest of the gang to come with them. Meerkats are very territorial and clash a lot with other gangs when they meet. Meerkats gangs make their boundaries by emitting a scent to show other gangs their territory. The sound a meerkat makes when it sees a jackal is different to when it sees an eagle or a snake. Meerkats also use body language. When a threat is in the sky, the meerkat on lookout will stare at it to know where it is and the other meerkats will notice this and will be able to be aware of what is coming and from where.

Animals definitely do communicate in very unique ways. Like scent, body language, squeals, croaks, barks or songs. These are impressive ways to communicate with their own or even other species to get the message across.

http://animals.howstuffworks.com/animal-facts/animals-communicate.htm

http://animals.howstuffworks.com/mammals/meerkats-communication1.htm