What does language mean?
Language is a system for combining symbols (such as words) so that it is possible to create an infinite number of meaningful phrases to communicate with others. Language enables individuals not only to interact with each other, but also to represent their own inner mental activity. Language is, in other words, a very significant part of how people think.
LANGUAGE LEVELS
1) Phonemes This is the basic unit of sound. Here, one must distinguish between the set of possible human sounds which constitute the proper area of phonetics and the set of system sounds that constitute the area of phonology used in the human language in question. Phonology is concerned with the classification of language sounds and how the subset used in a particular language is used, such as what differences can be made in meaning based on what sounds.
2) Morphemes This is, to put it in simplified terms, the basic unit of meaning. This is what one usually understands through grammar (along with syntax). The term morphology refers to the analysis in the language of minimal forms that are, however, themselves made up of sounds and used to construct words that have either a grammatical or a lexical function.
From a formal point of view, lexicology is concerned with the study of the lexicon and is thus closely linked to (derivational) morphology.
3) SYNTAX This is the sentence level. To form phrases or sentences, it is concerned with the meanings of words in combination with each other. In particular, differences in meaning resulting from changes in word order, the addition or subtraction of words from phrases, or changes in the form of phrases are involved. In addition, it deals with the connection of different types of sentences and with the analysis of ambiguous sentences.
Language typology tries to classify languages according to morphology and syntax principles of a high order and to generalize sets across different languages regardless of their genetic affiliations, i.e. to what language family they belong to.
4) Semantics This is the meaning field. It may be thought that the areas of morphology and syntax cover semantics, but it is quickly seen that this level must be studied on its own in order to have a proper perspective on meaning in language. However, here one touches on practically every other level of language as there is lexical, grammatical, the meaning of phrase and utterance.
5) Pragmatics The problem here is the use of language in particular situations. In abstract form and in practical use, the meaning of sentences need not be the same. One speaks of the meaning of an utterance in the latter situation. The field of pragmatics relies heavily on the notion of speech act, which is concerned with the actual language performance, for its analyses. This includes the concept of the proposition and the intent and effect of an utterance, roughly the content of a sentence.
6) Grammar The system of rules governing language structure and use.
DEVICE FOR LANGUAGE ACQUISITION
Noam Chomsky proposed the Language Acquisition Device (LAD) to explain how children can learn it within only a few years after birth when exposed to any human language. Chomsky argued that with the knowledge of what makes a human language, all humans are born. Details of significant features of all the languages of the world must be included in this innate knowledge. In describing the knowledge contained in the LAD, the term universal grammar has been used. The language development process is conceived as one in which the child finds out which grammar rules in universal grammar apply to the language the child is learning.
LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT
In the cognitive development of a child, the development of language is a very important milestone because language allows children to think in words rather than just images, to ask questions, to communicate their needs and wants to others, and to form concepts. Childhood language growth is influenced by the language they hear, a style of speech known as child-directed speech (the way adults and older children talk to infants and very young children, with higher-pitched, repetitious, sing-song speech patterns). This kind of speech is more closely attended by infants and toddlers, creating a learning opportunity in the dialogue between caregiver and infant. Other investigators are looking at the use of gestures and signs by the infant. Infants, a phenomenon is known as receptive-productive lag, also seem to understand far more than they can produce. They may be capable of producing only one or two words, but their parents and others understand much longer sentences.
Language Development Stages
- Cooing: Babies begin to make vowel-like sounds at around 2 months of age.
- Babbling: Infants add consonant sounds to the vowels at about 6 months to make a babbling sound, which can almost sound like a real speech at times. After 6 months, deaf kids actually reduce their babbling while increasing their use of primitive hand signs and gestures.
- One-word speech: Most kids start to say real words somewhere just before or around age 1. Typically, these words are nouns and may seem to represent a whole phrase of significance. For that reason, they are called holophrases (entire phrases in one word). For example, a child might say “Milk! “Meaning, “I want some milk! “or “I’ve got my milk drunk! ”
- Telegraphic speech: toddlers begin to string words together at about a year and a half to form short, simple sentences using nouns, verbs, and adjectives. Examples of telegraphic speech are “baby eat,” “Mommy go,” and “Doggie go bye-bye.” It uses only the words that carry the meaning of the sentence.
- Complete sentences: As children move through the preschool years, they learn to use grammatical terms and increase the number of words in their sentences, until they are almost as fluent as an adult by the age of 6 or so, although the number of words they know is still limited compared to adult vocabulary.
LANGUAGE Theories
Piaget: Assimilation and Lodging
The theory of the development of language by Jean Piaget indicates that children use both assimilation and accommodation to learn language. Assimilation is the process of changing one’s environment to put data into an existing schema (or idea). The process of changing one’s scheme to adapt to the new environment is accommodation. Before language acquisition can occur, Piaget believed children need to first develop mentally. Children first create mental structures within the mind (schemas), according to him, and language development occurs from these schemas.
Vygotsky: The Proximal Development Zone
The theory of language development by Lev Vygotsky concentrated on social learning and the proximal development zone (ZPD). The ZPD is a level of growth achieved when children engage in social interactions with others; it is the gap between the learning potential of a child and the actual learning that takes place. The theory of Vygotsky also showed that the significance of social interactions in language development was underestimated by Piaget.
The Hypothesis of Sapir-Whorf (LANGUAGE INFLUENCES THOUGHT)
The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis states that a person’s language’s grammatical structure influences the way he or she perceives the world. Linguists have criticized the hypothesis because it has found very limited experimental support at best, and it does not hold much significance in psychology. Studies have not shown, for example, that speakers of languages lacking a subjunctive mood (such as Chinese) experience hypothetical problems with difficulty. The weaker version of this theory does have some advantage, however. In different languages, for example, different words mean different things; not every word in each language has an exact one-to-one translation in a different language. Using the wrong word in a specific language (because you believe it means something else) can have dire consequences because of these small but significant differences.
STUDIES ON ANIMALS
Can the use of symbols that are abstract be taught to animals? There were attempts to teach animals (primates and dolphins) how to use sign language (as animals lack the vocal structure to form spoken words), but many of these attempts were simply not “good science.” With Kanzi, a bonobo chimpanzee trained to press abstract symbols on a computer keyboard, the most successful of these experiments (which is not without its critics as well) was. In fact, Kanzi was not the original subject of the research; the chimp being trained was his mother, Matata. She did not learn many of the symbols, but through that observation, Kanzi watched his mother use the keyboard and appeared to learn how to use the symbols. Kanzi could understand about 150 spoken English words, one estimate suggested. In his opinion, trainers who speak to him are not, so he does not respond to physical indications or symbols. He was able to correctly follow complex instructions up to the level of a 2-year-old child.
By- Purva Singh
