LANGUAGE

What is Language?

a conventional system of sign that allow for the creative communication of meaning

Conventional:

shared by a community

System:

relationships are rule governed

Creative:

new, unbounded

Hockett’s Design Features (About)

• characteristics of all human language

• unique to language

• controversial

Hockett’s Design Features (list)

• Duality of patterning

• displacement

• Arbitrariness

• Cultural Transmission

• Structure Dependancy

Duality of Patterning

Languages having a limited set of meaningless sounds/signs are combined into a vast number of meaningful units

ex. ki = key, ti = tea

(English has 44 sounds)

Displacement

Languages have the ability to refer to event that are non-present

Arbitrariness

lack of connection between form and meaning

Cultural transmission

Aquisition of whatever language we are exposed to

• language may be innate, but ‘a language’ is not

Structure Dependency

highly organized hierarchical structure for forming utterances

What is ‘a language’

no idea how to define it

Language problems (False stuff!!)

• speakers of the same language can understand each other

• dialects can make communication difficult

• speakers of different languages cannot understand each other

• ‘a language’ is a dialect w/ an army and navy

Variety

neutral, non committal, describes language

Dialect

variety used by a group of people (regional/social)

Accent

spoken dialect

Idiolect

Variety spoken by an individual

Register

variety used for a particular purpose or situation

Monolingual

speaks 1 language

Bilingual

2 languages

Multilingual

2+ languages

L1 and L2

L1 - first language

L2 - second language

Continuity Theory

• human language evolved gradually from the primitive means of communication

• humans are at a complex evolutionary stage

Discontinuity Theory

• Humans retain basic set of animal cries that exist alongside language

• language is a distinct departure from animal communication

What arnt we doing when looking at language?

Animal vs Human language

language is not the god/gold standard for all species on earth

Sounds/Signs

New words must fit into our sound system.

English has 44, uber not Ueber

Aspiration

the air that comes out when speaking

Can Primates talk?

because of our open Pharynx it allows us to speak but also choke

Words

Typical English American knows 12,000 words

constantly adding and changing

Problems with words

words translations are not always exact with other languages

Word Building

Imagine

UNimaginABLE

imanginABLE

Structure

not randomly strung together, there is a form of structure

Meaning

If there is structure, it can make sense but needs meaning otherwise communication fails - Noam Conski

Phonetics

Speach sounds

Phonology

Phenomes

Morphology

words

Syntax

Phrases + Structure

Semantics

meanings

Pragmatics

Contex

Animal language includes:

Frequency - hippo

Visual - spider

Smell - ants

Electrical - fish

Ultrasounds vs Infasound

Ultra - higher

Infra - lower

Animal Sounds are:

• innate

• non voluntary

• immediate

innate (animals)

Birdsong; mate attraction, territorial defense

Non voluntary + Immediate (Animals)

• age related

• certain calls for predators (monkeys

Interpretation of animal Communication

Anthropomorphize = animal actions described similar to human’s

Language Acquisition Device

We acquire language rapidly without much early experience

= innate facility to acquire language

A mystery...