Research in Language - Essay Example

Communication in human beings is facilitated through the use of specific languages that in contrast to animals are learned and not biologically inherited. Language is defined as the primary way whereby individuals communicate. According to Edward Sapir (1921), “Language is a purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions, and desires using voluntarily produced symbols”. This definition highlights that the user of the language voluntarily communicates with his recipient. The understanding of language is further enhanced by the definition given by G. Trager (1949) which emphasizes the relation of language to the total culture of society. He states that language should be understood from the point of view of the total culture of the community using it. Another more recent definition of language is given by Michael Holiday. According to him: “Language is a range of possibilities, an open-ended set of options in behaviour that are available to the individual in his existence as a social man. The context of culture is the environment of any particular selection that is made from within them ... The context of culture defines the potential, the range of open possibilities.  The actual choice among these possibilities takes place within a given context of situation”.

This definition is much more encompassing as it highlights that language is not just through the use of vocal or oral symbols but a range of possibilities. Man communicates through speech, writing, and still other means introduced in this digital age. A human also engages in non-verbal communication through his actions and entire behaviour. Holiday also asserts that language can only be fully understood in the context of the culture of the speaker or his lexicon.

Lexicon is defined as the “knowledge that the speaker has about a language”. This includes information about the form and meaning of the words and phrases, lexical categorization, the appropriate usage of words, the relationship between words and phrases, and categories of words and phrases.

An understanding of language can be acquired by evaluating its key features (Design Features of Language, 2007):

- Duality of patterning is a basic principle in human language. This feature of language provides an economic way for human beings to create an infinite set of linguistic units. It should be noted that the individual sounds comprising language are meaningless in themselves. Yet, these sounds can be combined in other to become produce an infinite number of “meaningful utterances”.

- Displacement refers to the unique sense of time in human beings. As opposed to animals, humans can separate the past from the future and can talk about these time spheres.

- Open-mindedness describes the ability of humans to add new words to the current set of words. This is illustrated by the words which are coined according to our new experiences and innovations which augment, enhance, and even modify our language.

- Arbitrariness refers to the lack of a “natural or essential relationship” between to the words and the objects they refer to. This also highlights that the meaning of the words is constructed through social conventions.

- Vocal-auditory channel is the feature of human language which sets it apart from animals. Human communication is through the ears and the mouth and not through other channels like the nose or eyes.

There are four levels of language structure and processing namely, grammar, logic, semantics, and general semantics. Grammar relations refer to the words ' relationship within a sentence without considering the relation of each sentence to another. Logic takes a step further by looking at the statement-to-statement relationships by evaluating subjects and predicates in an argument. A logician considers each sentence as an assertion and is interested in the relationship and validity among these assertions. Semantics goes further by looking at the relationship between words to referents in indications: “To him, words and assertions have meaning only if they are related operationally to referents. The semanticist defines not only validity (as the logician does) but also truth” (Kenyon, 1997). General semantics goes furthest by taking into account the words, validity, and meaning but also human behaviour. The general semanticist talks about how people in general and individuals, in particular, react or respond to words, arguments, things, other people, events, etc, in terms of making sense of their experiences (Kenyon, 2007).

Cognitive psychology is the branch of science that examines the internal mental processes including the processing of language. It should be noted that language processing is an internal mental process which goes through the stages discussed in the previous section. Language processing thus, questions what happens to our mind when we process language. Illustrating how people intellectually process language becomes significant not only because it gives a glimpse into mental processes but on how human being acquire and learn behaviour.