Introduction to Linguistics Dr. Sherine Abd El-Gelil

What is language?

Sapir, 1921, p. 2 Language is a primarily human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and desire by means of a system of voluntarily produced symbols

Sweet, 1993, p. 2 Language may be defined as the expression of thought by means of speech sounds

Noam Chomsky (1957) A language is a set (finite or infinite) of sentences, each finite in length and constructed out of a finite set of elements.

Hall (1969) Language is the institution whereby humans communicate and interact with each other by means of habitually used oral-auditory arbitrary symbols.

Wardaugh (1972) A language is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols used for human communication.

Bloch and Trager (1942) A language is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols by means of which a social group cooperates.

Characteristics of language Language is a Means of Communication We use language to communicate our ideas, emotions, beliefs, feelings, etc. Is Language the only means of communication ?

No there are many other means of communication used by humans such as gestures, nods, winks, flags, smiles, horns, braille alphabet, sirens, sketches, maps, acting, dancing,

All these systems of communication are extremely limited or they too, in turn, depend language only. They are not so flexible, comprehensive, perfect and extensive as language is.

2. Language is Arbitrary There is no inherent relation between the words of a language and their meanings or the ideas conveyed by them. There is no reason why a female adult human being be called a woman in English or امرأة in Arabic.

Selection of these words in the languages mentioned here is purely arbitrary. The choice of a word selected to mean a particular thing or idea is purely arbitrary

Exception Onomatopoeic words: words whose sound echoes the sounds of objects or activities e.g. crash, hush, etc. But, Onomatopoeic words are relatively rare in human language

3. Language is a System of Systems Language is not an amorphous (formless, shapeless, unstructured) disorganized or chaotic combination of sounds. Sounds are arranged in certain fixed or established, systematic order to form meaningful units or words.

Similarly, words are also arranged in a particular system to frame acceptable meaningful sentences.

These systems operate at two levels: phonological and syntactical.

At the phonological level The sounds of a language appear only in some fixed combinations. There is no word, for example, that starts with bz–, lr– or zl– combination.

There are several English words having an initial consonant cluster with three consonants (e.g. spring/string), there are no initial tetraphonemic consonant clusters (a string of four consonants in the same syllable) in English.

At the syntactic level Words combine to form sentences according to certain conventions (i.e. grammatical or structural rules) of the language.

The sentence “The hunter shot the tiger with a gun” is acceptable but the sentence “hunter the tiger a shot gun with the” is not acceptable as the word order in the latter sentence does not conform to the established language conventions.

Language is thus called a system of systems as it operates at the two levels discussed above. This property of language is also termed duality by some linguists. This makes language a very complex phenomenon.

3. Language is Primarily Vocal Language is primarily made up of vocal sounds only, produced by a physiological articulatory mechanism in the human body. In the beginning, it must have appeared as vocal sounds only.

Writing, the graphic representation of the sounds, came later. The letters k or q represent only the /k/ sound.

Some languages today are only spoken. They do not have a written form. A child learns to speak first; writing comes much later.

Writing Speech Composed of sounds Composed of letters/signs Uses intonation, pitch, rhythm Uses punctuation Produced without effort Produced with effort Transitory Permanent Perceived by ear Perceived by eye Addressee present Addressee absent Immediate feedback Delayed feedback