Basic concepts of Linguistics

Lecture 2
 Content

• Functions of Language
• Characteristics of Language
• Sapir Whorf hypothesis
• Language is arbitrary
• Signi er, signi ed, symbol and sign
• How language di ers from other forms of communication
fi
fi
ff
 Language functions
6 main language functions

• Personal. The personal function enables the user of a language to express his innermost thoughts such as love, hatred, sorrow,
desires, etc.

• Interpersonal. The interpersonal function enables him to establish and maintain good social relations with individuals and groups
such as to express praise, sympathy, or joy at another's success, success, to apologize, to invite, etc.
• Directive. The directive function enables humans to control the behavior of others through advice, warnings, orders, persuasion,
etc.
• Referential. The referential function enables him to talk about objects or events in the immediate setting or environment andto
discuss the past, present, and future.

• Metalinguistics. Its function enables humans to talk about language.

For example "what does....mean?.”

• Imaginative. The imaginative function enables humans to use language creatively in composing poetry, writing, or even speaking.
 Language as a subject

•Every physiologically and mentally typical person acquires in childhood the ability to
make use, as both sender and receiver, of a system of communication that comprises a
circumscribed set of symbols (e.g., sounds, gestures, or written or typed characters).
•In spoken language, this symbol set consists of noises resulting from movements of
certain organs within the throat and mouth. In signed languages, these symbols may
be hand or body movements, gestures, or facial expressions. By means of these
symbols, people are able to impart information, to express feelings and emotions, to
in uence the activities of others, and to comport themselves with varying degrees of
friendliness or hostility toward persons who make use of substantially the same set of
symbols.
fl
 Language as a Means of Communication

•Cameron, in applied linguistics over the last decades, it has been common to divide
language into the four skill‟s:Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing, and include
grammar,vocabulary and phonology to them.
•Learning a language means learning the Language skills and components. The four
skill above is the important aspect to increasing student’s ability in using English
uently. The one of language skill is listening,it is the important component in human
life to communicate, because People spend more than 45 percent of their
communication time in listening,which is more than any other communicative activity.
fl
 Language is vocal
Verbal system of communication

•language is vocal because we have been created with organs, such as vocal cords, a
tongue and ears. Obviously, you will need at least two or more people. So this is how
language becomes vocal and it is a natural and basic thing about language; we speak
and listen and to do that there must be sound to accompany the written words.
•
 Productivity of Language

•Productivity is a general term in linguistics referring to the limitless ability to use language— any natural
language—to say new things. It is also known as open-endedness or creativity.The term productivity is also
applied in a narrower sense to particular forms or constructions (such as a xes) that can be used to
produce new instances of the same type. In this sense, productivity is most commonly discussed in
connection with word-formation.
•"The communication systems of other creatures do not appear to have this type of exibility. Cicadas
have four signals to choose from and vervet monkeys have 36 vocal calls. Nor does it seem possible for
creatures to produce new signals to communicate novel experiences or events....
•"This limiting factor of animal communication is described in terms of xed reference. Each signal in the
system is xed as relating to a particular object or occasion. Among the vervet monkey's repertoire, there
is one danger signal CHUTTER, which is used when a snake is around, and another RRAUP, used when an
eagle is spotted nearby. These signals are xed in terms of their reference and cannot be manipulated."
•
fi
fi
fi
ffi
fl
 Language is a form of social behaviour

Human psychological phenomena, either identi ed as an individual experience or as

behaviour, become meaningful only in the context of social life, always occurring as
language and through language. That is why Wittgenstein asserts that “to imagine a
language means to imagine a form of life.”

fi
 Language is Arbitrary

•Why is language arbitrary? Arbitrariness refers to the quality of “being determined by

randomness and not for a speci c reason.” Language consists of signi ers that
represent the signi ed. But the signi er is not the signi ed. A signi er is a form such
as a sound, morpheme, word, phrase, clause, or sign. The signi ed is that to which a
signi er refers such as an object, action, quality, or quantity.
•For example, the English word book refers to the object ?. The Spanish word correr
refers to the action ?. The German word zwei refers to a quantity of two.
•
fi
fi
fi
fi
fi
fi
fi
fi
Language is arbitrary because a language form does not have
an innate or natural relationship with its meaning.

•English uses the words turkey and dog to refer to. But the signi ed 1 does not possess
“turkeyness” and the signi ed2 does not possess “dogness.” I•then German would not
use the words Truthahn or Pute and Hund and Spanish could not use the words pavo
and perro.
•If the a xation of an -s or -es su x possessed inherent plurality, then Italian would
not change the su x of gatto meaning “cat” to gatti meaning “cats.” Sotho could not
use loti meaning “singular money, currency” and maloti meaning “plural money,
currency.”
•
ffi
ffi
fi
ffi
fi
 Language Vs Animal Communication

•Communication in both animals and humans consists of signals. Signals are sounds or
gestures that have some meaning to those using them. The meaning is often self-evident based
on context: for example, many animals roar, growl, or groan in response to threats of danger;
similarly, humans may wave their arms or scream in the event of something dangerous. These
signals in these situations are designed to let others in the species know that something is
wrong and the animal or human needs help.
•Human communication consists of both signals and symbols. Symbols are sounds or gestures
that have a speci c meaning to a group of people. This meaning could be cultural, group-
related, or even related between two speci c people. For example, two people may create a
“secret” handshake, or a group may develop a passcode that only members are aware of.
Symbols, unlike signals, must be taught and learned; they are not instinctual or self-evident.
•
fi
fi
What about nonhuman primates, who share many similarities with humans?

•humans use a larger repertoire of symbols, and these symbols are substantially more complex.
•nonhuman primates (and other animals who communicate with one another) have what is known as a
closed vocal system: this means di erent sounds cannot be combined together to produce new symbols
with di erent meanings
•Humans, by contrast, have open vocal systems, which allow for combinations of symbols to create new
symbols with a totally new meaning and therefore allows for an in nite number of ideas to be expressed.
•Human language is also the only kind that is modality-independent; that is, it can be used across
multiple channels. Verbal language is auditory, but other forms of language—writing and sign language
(visual), Braille (tactile)—are possible in more complex human language systems.
•Koko the gorilla is famous for having learned over a thousand signs of “Gorilla Sign Language,” a simple
sign language developed to try to teach nonhuman primates complex language. Koko can respond in
GSL to about two thousand words of spoken English. However, it is generally accepted that she does not
use syntax or grammar, and that her use of language does not exceed that of a young human child.
ff
ff
fi
 Ferdinand de Saussure - Swiss Linguist, semiotician and philosopher.
His course in General Linguistics was published posthumously in 1915 after
having been collected by his students. Founder of semiology, structuralism
 The Language / Parole distinction
•Saussure approaches the theory of language from two different perspectives.
On the one hand, language is a system of signs. That is, a semiotic system; or
a semiological system as he calls it. On the other hand, a language is also a
social phenomenon: a product of the language community.
•Langue represents the “work of a collective intelligence,” which is both
internal to each individual and collective, in so far as it is beyond the will of
any individual to change.
•Parole, on the other hand, designates individual acts, statements and
utterances, events of language use manifesting each time a speaker’s
ephemeral individual will through his combination of concepts and his
“phonation”—the formal aspects of the utterance.
 The Language / Parole distinction

• Langue and parole has been translated by alternative semiotic categories like
system and process (A J Greimas) or code and message (Roman Jakobson),
which interpret Saussure’s distinction in speci c ways.
• The main assumptions of structuralism and semiology (or semiotics) would be
that for every process (an utterance for instance) there is a system of underlying
laws that govern it; and that the system arises contingently (there are no natural or
necessary reasons for the relations within it to be as they are).
• Saussure contended that language must be considered as a social phenomenon, a
structured system that can be viewed synchronically (as it exists at any particular
time) and diachronically (as it changes over time)
fi
 Diachronic and Synchronic Approaches
• Synchronic linguistics is one of the two main temporal dimensions of language study introduced by Saussure in his "Course
in General Linguistics" (1916). The other is diachronic linguistics, which is the study of language through periods of time in
history. The rst looks at a snapshot of a language, and the other studies its evolution (like a frame of lm vs. a movie).
• For example, analyzing the word order in a sentence in Old English only would be a study in synchronistic linguistics. If you
looked at how word order changed in a sentence from Old English to Middle English and now to modern English, that
would be a diachronic study.
• Say you need to analyze how historical events a ected a language. If you look at when the Normans conquered England in
1066 and brought with them a lot of new words to be injected into English, a diachronic look could analyze what new
words were adopted, which ones fell out of use, and how long that process took for select words. A synchronic study might
look at the language at di erent points before the Normans or after. Note how you need a longer time period for the
diachronic study than the synchronic one.
• Synchronic linguistics is descriptive linguistics, such as the study of how parts of a language (morphs or morphemes)
combine to form words and phrases and how proper syntax gives a sentence meaning. In the 20th century the search for a
universal grammar, that which is instinctive in humans and gives them the ability to pick up their native language as an
infant, is a synchronic area of study.
• Studies of "dead" languages can be synchronic, as by de nition they are no longer spoken (no native or uent speakers) nor
evolving and are frozen in time.
fi
ff
ff
fi
fi
fl
 Language is Symbol System

•The system of language similarly works through symbols, the symbols being words. “All
clear, Go” Danger, means stop’’
•Language functions e ectively when the symbols used are known to the speakers and the
listener, the writer and the reader. The symbols of the language are varied and complex.
•Language symbols represent things and are not the things themselves. There is no logical
connection between the symbols and the referent Symbols get their meaning by convention.
•A sign, on the other hand, has a direct relation to the object it signi es. A road sign showing
the gure of a boy with a school bag cautions a vehicle driver that he is approaching a
school. The language uses words essentially as a symbol and not as signs for the concepts
represented by them.
fi
ff
fi
 Sign, signi ier and signi ied
Ferdinand de Saussure

• A sign is comprised of both a mental image (signi er) and an idea (signi ed). Saussure’s
most famous statement concerns how these signs are di erentiated in themselves and
related to each other. “In language,” he says, “there are only di erences without positive
terms.” He distinguishes between meaning and value to get the point across.
• He argued that signs in language (as in visual communication) consist of the relationship
between these two elements. The signi er is the physical appearance of the sign, such as
a word, image or sound, while the signi ed is the concept or meaning associated with the
signi er.
• The signi er is the thing, item, or code that we 'read' – so, a drawing, a word, a photo.
Each signi er has a signi ed, the idea or meaning being expressed by that signi er. Only
together do they form a sign.
fi
fi
fi
f
fi
fi
fi
f
fi
ff
ff
fi
fi
 Descriptive, Comparative and Historical Linguistics

•Descriptive linguistics is concerned with the study of the structure of languages through an analysis of the forms, structures and processes
at all levels of language structure: phonology, morphology, syntax, lexicon, semantics and pragmatics. It is based on data gathered through
eldwork, preferably immersion eldwork for extended periods of time. It draws on ethnographic and linguistic methods. Languages are of
strategic importance in understanding the history and culture of a people and the cognitive capacities of humans, as in Sapir’s idea of
linguistics as a science.
•Linguistic reconstruction and comparative linguistics, aiming at describing and understanding diachronic variation and linguistic
developments across time, as well as synchronic older language stages in all their varieties. The span of research stretches historically from
Proto- Indo-European and Proto-Semitic (4th and 3rd millennia BCE) up to the present day, and geographically from Iceland and the British
Isles to India and Western China in Eurasia, Northern and West Africa, Eastern Indonesia and East Timor, the Andes, Meso-America and the
Guyanas.
•For prehistoric times, the most advanced insights are developed and applied for the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European and Proto-
Semitic and their subsequent stages. Supportive evidence from archaeology and genetics is put to use, and researchers concentrate not only
on internally motivated language changes, but also on external factors such as language contact and substrate e ects.
•For historic times, the research programme is strongly data-oriented: it is based on comprehensive philological study of the sources, on
close reading of texts within their social, cultural and pragmatic contexts, and on corpus linguistics. At the same time, the research is well
informed by the theoretical concepts of modern descriptive and historical linguistics as well as sociolinguistics.
•
fi
fi
ff
 Noam Chomsky
Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, political activist, author, and lecturer.
 Competence vs Performance
• Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American professor and public intellectual known for his
work in linguistics, political activism
• Chomsky separates competence and performance; he describes 'competence' as an idealized capacity that is
located as a psychological or mental property or function and ‘performance’ as the production of actual
utterances.
• In short, competence involves “knowing” the language and performance involves “doing” something with the
language.
• The di culty with this construct is that it is very di cult to assess competence without assessing performance.
Noting the distinction between competence and performance is useful primarily because it allows those studying a
language to di erentiate between a speech error and not knowing something about the language.
• For example, let's say you are a native speaker of English and utter the following: We swimmed in the ocean this
weekend.
• Is this error due to competence or performance? It is most likely that as a native speaker you are aware how to
conjugate irregular verbs in the past but your performance has let you down this time. Linguists use the distinction
between competence and performance to illustrate the intuitive di erence between accidentally saying swimmed
and the fact that a child or non- pro cient speaker of English may not know that the past tense of swim is swam
and say swimmed consistently.
ffi
ff
fi
ffi
ff
 Seminar questions

• What is the di erence between sign and symbol?

• What is signi er?
• What is signi ed?
• Provide 5 example to each
fi
fi
ff