Meaning & Nature of Language

Introduction Language is the heart of our world. We create our concept of the world by thinking and naming things. Using words helps us communicate effectively in different situations. Without language, we would not be able to communicate at all. Verbal communication is one of life's naturally occurring communication systems. Communication is essential for human beings.
Language is the primary way in which adults pass ways of thinking and conversing on to their children. Language is an accumulation of knowledge because we learned everything by somebody through language. Society would have to recreate itself every generation if it could not pass its knowledge on through language.
Language is one of the most powerful tools in human communication. Words are meant to establish and maintain friendly contact. Through words, people shape their identities. People can express their feelings, attitudes, and experiences to each other through words. By speaking, information can be give to others about oneself and the world around him/her.
In Christine Leong's essay Being A Chink, she describes the power of language. She said, "It gives us identity, personality, social status, and it also creates communities, defining both insiders and outsiders. Language has the ability to heal or to harm, to praise or belittle, to promote peace or even to glorify hate." I believe this is what language is all about. Language has two purposes. Depending on what is said, and how others perceive what has been said, language can be helpful to the soul or destroy one's self-confidence. Words are intended to inform others so they can understand us. Words are not intended to establish superiority; if they are, people get hurt in the process.
Language is a uniquely human trait, and questions of how and why it evolved have been intriguing scientists for years. Nonhuman primates are our closest living relatives, and their behavior can be used to estimate the capacities of our extinct ancestors. As humans and many primate species rely on vocalizations as their primary mode of communication, the vocal behavior of primates has been an obvious target for studies investigating the evolutionary roots of human speech and language.

By studying the similarities and differences between human and primate vocalizations, comparative research has the potential to clarify the evolutionary processes that shaped human speech and language.
Meaning and Nature of Language as a Communication Tool
The Oxford Dictionary defines language as 'The method of human communication, either spoken or written, consisting of the use of words in a structured and conventional way.' We are aware that language is, today, an inseparable part of human society and human civilization has been possible only through language. It is through language only that humanity has come out of the stone age and has developed science, art and technology in a big way. Language is a means of communication, it is arbitrary, it is a system of systems.
Language enables individuals to give expression to their feelings, ideas and concerns. As they mature, it is through language that they will communicate their personal needs and claim their rightful place in society. Through naming, describing, classifying and modifying things and ideas, knowledge is extended and the command of language developed. In this way, language subsumes experience. Words become the bank in which a growing fund of knowledge and concepts is stored. Thus, language is the medium through which new learning is assimilated and defined.
Any language speaker knows something about his/her language, but it is difficult for a language speaker to tell us what language is. This make it evident that the access to the inner knowledge about language is not an easy task despite our competence in language(s) and its importance to our mental and social life. Such a task requires following certain systems in order to discover, describe and analyze the underlying rules that control any language. This led to the emergence of language theory or model which is likely to be tested like any other theory.
The interactional view of language sees language primarily as the means for establishing and maintaining interpersonal relationships and for performing social transactions between individuals.
The world ‘language’ involves many aspects of human and animal communication (such as the language of bees, body language etc.).
Verbal communication: It describes language as a mechanism for conveying meaning which operates independently of other means of human communication (e.g. gesture) and differ from animal communication.
Non-verbal communication: It includes body movement, facial expression and other non-verbal phenomena are part of the complex progress of human communication.
Language is sound based
Sound is perhaps the most elementary and yet common communication vehicle used by humans and animals alike. This statement point out the primacy of the languages sounds over the other representations in writing which are regarded as secondary phenomenon of speech. For instance, all traditional orthographies and letters used in common alphabets, such as the familiar Roman alphabet, represents different sounds in different languages.
Such a claim that language is sound, prove the fact that all human beings produce speech sound with the same equipment (by the movement of the speech organs).
Language is systematic
Although language is symbolic, yet its symbols are arranged in a particular system. All languages have their system of arrangements. Every language is a system of systems. All languages have phonological and grammatical systems, and within a system there are several sub-systems. For example, within the grammatical system we have morphological and syntactic systems, and within these two sub-systems we have systems such as those of plural, of mood, of aspect, of tense, etc.
Although stating that language linear which permit a combination of symbols together but not all the possible combinations of symbols (sounds) is possible. This is what makes language systematic, means that is describable in terms of finite number of units that can combine only in a limited number of ways. Due to that, terms such as sound system, grammatical system, etc. emerged as part those terms used in describing and comparing languages.
Language is arbitrary
Language is arbitrary in the sense that 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, aurat in Urdu, Zen in Persian and Femine in French. The choice of a word selected to mean a particular thing or idea is purely arbitrary but once a word is selected for a particular referent, it comes to stay as such. It may be noted that had language not been arbitrary, there would have been only one language in the world.
This refers to the idea that the conditions required for the existence of more than one language: that there be no direct necessary connection between the nature of things or ideas language deal with and the linguistic units and combinations by which these things or ideas are expressed.
A less definable characteristic of human language is its arbitrariness, which takes several forms. First there is no necessary connection between the object and the word that represents it. A rose could be called a sorp and smell as sweet. Different languages indeed call the same object by different names. English rose may indeed be rose in French but it is bara in Japanese and warda in Arabic. The connection between objects and words is largely arbitrary.
Animal languages in a sense have a limited list of ‘words’, like those Konrad Lorenz found in crows. In animal communication, a ‘word’ is an entity of its own. Each of the monkeys’ cries has a distinctive meaning, ‘snake’, ‘eagle’, and so on. They cannot be decomposed into a small set of meaningless components like phonemes. Animals have a dictionary consisting of a limited number of signs but they do not have sound or writing systems.
In human languages the set of words is open-ended, formed from a strictly limited set of components, whether phonemes, gestures, or letters. The fact that these symbols are themselves meaningless and arbitrary allows them to generate a vast stock of words. Though Roman alphabets vary slightly from one language to another, their 26 letters can encode, not only all the words in the Oxford English Dictionary, say, but all the words in the dictionaries of French, Italian, Malaysian, etc, as well, with a handful of additional symbols. Arbitrariness of the actual phonemes or letters is a highly useful characteristic that gives language its infinite flexibility, unlike the total rigidity of animal systems.

Can communication exist without language?

Language is restricted to humans
Chomsky (1968) claimed that language in specific to humans as only humans possess a language acquisition device to acquire language – the universal grammar. It is a hard matter to define what language really is.
According to the layman definition by Cambridge University Press (2008), language is a system of communication that consists of sounds, words and grammar. In the past literature, there have been claims that non-human primates like chimpanzees and bonobos are capable of comprehending human language (Benson et al., 2002; Brakke and Savagerumbaugh, 1995).
However it is doubtful whether comprehension constitutes a comprehensive use of language. In this essay, we would discuss whether non-human animals are capable of commanding the comprehensive use of language by critically evaluating whether they show some of the design-features of human spoken language in their speech documented in Hockett (1960) and whether they are able to acquire syntax and morphology (Laidrem, 2008).

Language is symbolic
Language can be symbolic in several ways:
1) Language is a symbol or testament to one's culture. People think differently in other languages. People have different beliefs. Not everything translates the same. There are words in some languages that do not correspond with any word in another language. Translations really are difficult. Thus, language could be a symbol for culture.
2) Language has symbolism. This is common in literature. A rose is often a symbol for passion in English. Symbols are diverse.

3) Language is symbolic of intellect, from my interpretation. Ever notice that humans are much further ahead than any species? That's because our ability to communicate through language is much more powerful than most creatures. We have abilities that accompany this, but our ability to communicate makes us very special. Suppose you could not convey anything to the rest of the world. You would be alone. There would be no globalization. Another special thing we have about language is the fact that we have so many different ways to communicate. We communicate through math, music, movement, writing, speaking. We communicate in so many different ways. Thus, it is a symbol of our intellect, and if you dare say-superiority.

4) All language is metaphor. It is a sound or a set of graphic symbols that represents something else. Words don't really take part in the existence of the things referred to. Think of the word Apple, or the word information. What are they? How many meanings could they have? We could as easily call them phlimbara or quinch. (www.answers.com) Retrieved 10/20/14
Language is maturational
The origin of language in the human species has been the topic of scholarly discussions for several centuries. In spite of this, there is no consensus on the ultimate origin or age of human language. One problem makes the topic difficult to study: the lack of direct evidence. Consequently, scholars wishing to study the origins of language must draw inferences from other kinds of evidence such as the fossil record, archaeological evidence, contemporary language diversity, studies of language acquisition, and comparisons between human language and systems of communication existing among other animals (particularly other primates). Many argue that the origins of language probably relate closely to the origins of modern human behavior, but there is little agreement about the implications and directionality of this connection.
This shortage of empirical evidence has led many scholars to regard the entire topic as unsuitable for serious study. In 1866, the Linguistic Society of Paris banned any existing or future debates on the subject, a prohibition which remained influential across much of the western world until late in the twentieth century. Today, there are numerous hypotheses about how, why, when, and where language might have emerged. There is scarcely more agreement today than a hundred years ago, when Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection provoked a rash of armchair speculations on the topic. Since the early 1990s, however, a growing number of professional linguists, archaeologists, psychologists, anthropologists, and others have attempted to address with new methods what some consider "the hardest problem in science.
There is a close connection between the development of thought and the development of language. Language also develops within a social context and depends on social development (Bates, 1976). Various theorists attribute importance to different factors in the development of language. The nativist view (Chomsky, 1976) stresses that children are preprogrammed and have an innate ability to acquire language. The behaviorists focus on the importance of the language environment. The infant and young child need appropriate language models and constant feedback as they attempt to communicate.
Other theorists (Piaget, 1952; Vygotsky, 1962) viewed the development of language as a complex interaction between the child and the environment, which is influenced by both social and cognitive development. Both Piaget and Vygotsky believed that as children develop language, they actively build a symbol system, which helps them to understand the world. They differed in the way in which they viewed how language and thought interact with one another. Piaget believed that cognitive development led to the growth of language whereas Vygotsky viewed language as developing thought.
A child's external speech is the first step in the development of thinking. Vygotsky's theory stresses the importance of communication with others as a major factor in the development of a child's language, which stimulates the development of thought. Vygotsky's theory views the important effect that an adult has on the development of language. His theory describes the importance of the zone of proximal development, which is present in interactions children have with adults. This zone is described as the "distance between the child's actual developmental level determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance." This adult guidance is referred to as scaffolding.
In order for the scaffolding to be effective, it must match the child's developmental level so the child is comfortable enough to use the guidance, which may present enough of a challenge to reach the next level in a particular area. For example, an adult whose goal is to provide an appropriate amount of scaffolding may engage in a conversation with a young child using various strategies. If the child asks a question about a particular topic, the adult may first ask a child, "Well, what do you think about that?" Once the adult knows what the child thinks, he can decide which ideas to confirm and which ones to extend and determine just how much information the child can assimilate during one conversation.
Adults who do not typically provide scaffolding will not ask the child's thoughts on the matter, but will answer the question directly. In doing this, they have not figured out exactly what the child is asking, nor do they know what the child already knows about the particular topic. Even though the child in this situation may be satisfied with the answer, he has not had the opportunity to actively discuss and manipulate ideas in order to construct knowledge. Sometimes adults can ask young children open-ended questions. The children's responses are often filled with information, which adults in the scaffolding role can extend. Consider the various answers these 3- and 4-year-old children gave to a teacher's question, "What do you know about leaves?"
"The leaves fall from the trees and they always roll away."
"They do their jobs. They grow."
"They fall on the ground."
"The wind comes and blows them very fast and they roll across the grass. I can catch one of the leaves."
"Sometimes the leaves get into beautiful colors like a rainbow. They fall to the ground and I catch them, and when they stay up in the tree and they do their jobs and keep growing and growing and growing."
Clearly, these children already have a vast knowledge about leaves. The teacher can then take this information, which is meaningful to the children, and weave it into discussions about seasons, the life cycle of plants, weather, and an appreciation of the beauty of nature. A teacher can say, "You were talking about how the leaves get into beautiful colors like a rainbow. Let's find a book about leaves and find out how they do this."
Conclusion
The belief in the innateness of language is based on several arguments, and one of these is that all human languages obey some rules, which are called universals. It is claimed that the fact that all human languages obey these universals show that the latter are built-in in the human genetic information, because otherwise languages would diverge. However, languages are means for communication between humans, and this put some limits on their divergence. Therefore, any universal which may be a result of these restrictions does not require any innate information to explain it, and only universals which cannot be explained in this way can be used for the argument. Hence, it is important to determined which universals are a result of the fact that languages are means for communication among humans.

References
• Fedurek P, Slocombe KE Hum Biol. (2011 Apr; 83 (2):153-73. Review. Primate vocal communication: a useful tool for understanding human speech and language evolution? Department of Psychology, University of York, YO10 5DD York, United Kingdom. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/

• Naeem, Prof. (2010) Characteristics and features of language. www.profnaeem.com http://grammar.about.com
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