GRACE MISSION COLLEGE

Katiningan, Socorro, Oriental Mindoro

INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS
EL100

Topic: The Nature, Origin and Characteristics of Language

Course Content: understand the complexity of language as a communication system.
Objectives: After the lesson, the learners will be able to:
1. Understand the meaning of linguistics.
2. Show understanding of the common features and principles of linguistics.
3. Discuss the nature, origin and characteristics of language.
4. Demonstrate understanding the processes of language change and variation.
5. Illustrate the difference between language and dialects.

Discussion:
What is Linguistics?
Linguistics is the scientific study of language. Human language, understood as a systematic use of
speech sounds, signs and written symbols for communication among people, is a very complicated system,
which can be analyzed on different levels and from various points of view.

Branches of Linguistics
 General or theoretical linguistics tries to determine universal principles for studying languages and to
describe the general features of language.
 Contrastive linguistics concentrates upon the differences between languages. It is often applied in the
context of language teaching.
 Comparative linguistics studies different languages looking for similar characteristics.
 Historical linguistics analyses the development of language in time, registering the changes that have
taken place in it.
 Applied linguistics is concerned with the application of linguistic theories and their findings in solving
various language problem, mostly in the teaching of foreign languages, studying language disorders,
in translation, lexicography, and stylistics.
 Sociolinguistics studies the relationship between language and society, taking into consideration
standard and non-standard forms of language, regional and social varieties with reference to such
concepts as ethnicity, social status, sex, age, etc.
 Psycholinguistics is a branch of linguistics which studies the relationship between linguistic behavior
and the mental processes. It is interested in how mental processes influence the production and
perception of speech.
 Computational linguistics uses computer techniques and applies them in automatic translation and
speech analysis using corpora for large-scale statistical investigation and computational processing of
spoken and written texts.
 Developmental linguistics is concerned with the study of the acquisition of language by children,
describing the stages and patterns of development and explaining the typical features and variations.
 Anthropological linguistics studies language variation and usage in relation to culture. Emphasis is
often placed on the analysis of the so-called western language.

COMMON FEATURES TO ALL LANGUAGES

The several features that all natural human languages share. Acc. To an American linguist Charles Hockett he
has pointed out a number of such properties:
a) all languages have vowels and consonants
b) all languages have words
c) all languages can create new words when required and modify their meanings
d) all languages are open-ended in the sense that they can produce totally new utterances
which are understood by the users of the language.
e) all languages can form questions
 f) in all languages it is possible to talk about the things and situations that are removed from
the immediate situation of the speaker (called displacement)
g) in all languages we can use hypothetical, unreal, and fictional utterance

All natural languages are creative, because they allow innovation in response to new experiences,
situations, and scientific discoveries. Creativity is a very important feature of all natural human languages. The
human creativity ability in language use is not just what we choose to say at a particular moment in a
particular situation but also includes our understanding of a new sentence that we have never heard before.
Natural language are also often redundant, that is, the same meaning may be signaled more than
once.
All languages are systematic. They consist of pattern, which recur in various combinations, and rules
which produce these patterns.
All languages change. The may change in different ways depending on social, political and other
circumstances.

PRINCIPLES OF MODERN LINGUISTICS:

 Structuralism is a term use in linguistics referring to a theoretical approach to the analysis of language
that describes linguistics items in terms of structures.
a. Linguistic s is descriptive, not prescriptive. It means that linguists describes the rules and facts of
language exactly as they find them without making judgments. They do not impose norms of
correctness and do no try to change the actual usage of the language of the native speakers.
b. Priority of the spoken language. Spoken language is more basic that the written language. There
are great variations both in grammar and vocabulary choices which the written language does not
reflect.
c. Synchronic and diachronic description of language. Diachronic linguistics is the study of languages
from the viewpoint of their historical development. Synchronic linguistics studies languages at a s
single point of time. It may be the present-day situation or any given period in the history of language
development. Both ways of describing languages are important.
d. All languages are equal. All languages serve as data for objective study.
e. Paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations of linguistic units. A linguistic unit enters into a
syntagmatic relations with the other elements of the same level with which it occurs and which make
its context. Syntagmatic relations for the phrase a glass of milk would be between glass and a, of,
and milk.
* Functionalism
In linguistics, functionalism is best seen as a movement continuing the tradition of Saussurean
structuralism. The main claim of this approach is that language is a system of functionally related
units. The phonological, grammatical, and semantic structures of a language are determined by the
functions that they have to perform. The main function of language is communicative one. Language
is used by people to communicate. Language also has the expressive function- to convey the
speaker’s feelings and attitudes.
 Generativism (Generative Grammar)
The term is used to refer to the theory of language developed by Noam Chomsky. His language theory
revolutionized linguistics in 1957, when his book Syntactic Structures was published. A speaker’s
linguistic competence is that a part of his knowledge of the native language system which enables him
to make an infinite number of sentences. Performance is linguistic behavior which is determined both
by speaker’s linguistic competence and various non-linguistic factors, such as social conventions,
emotional attitudes. Chomsky claims that human language is innate: a child is born with a biological
predisposition to learn language. This feature is species-specific, that is, it discriminates humans and
other living creatures.at how rapidly a little child acquires language. He emphasized the role of
language as a basic means to investigate the human mind.

Nature, Origin and Characteristics of Language of Language

Language is called a social phenomena, because it has relevance only in a social setting. It undergoes
a continuous though unnoticed process of growth and change. Language may be said to be the means of
expression of mental concepts by any living things and communicating them to or receiving them from other
living things.
 1. Language is primarily human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and
desires by means of a system of voluntarily produced symbols. (Sapir).
2. In its widest sense, the sum total of such signs of our thoughts and feelings as are capable of
external perception and as could be produced and repeated at will. (A. Gardiner).
3. Language may also be defined as the expression of thought by means of speech sounds. (Henry
Sweet).
4. It is a system of communication by sound i.e. through the organs of speech and hearing among
human beings of a certain group or community using vocal symbols possessing arbitrary conventional
meanings. (Marlo A. Pei & Frank Gaynor).
5. Language is human, verbal systematic symbolism, a means of transmitting information, a form of
social behavior (with a) high degree of convention. (J. Whatmough).
6. Language (is a) symbol system, based on pure or arbitrary convention infinitely extendable and
modifiable according to the (Bunging needs and conditions of the speakers. (R.H. Robins).
7. Language is a device that establishes sounds meaning correlations, pairing meanings with signals to
enable people to exchange ideas through observable sequences of sounds. (Ronals W. Langacher).
8. A language is audible, articulate human speech as produced by the action of the tongue and
adjacent vocal organs. The body of words and methods of combining words used and understood by a
considerable community, especially, when fixed and elaborated by a long usage. (Webster).

Nature of Language
Language consist of words, idioms, and syntax. It is through language that we think, feel, judge and
express. Hence, Language is the most important and characteristic form of human behavior, we use words and
idioms as tool to perform and share experience among people.
1. Language is a speech. It is distinct from the signs, gestures and sounds produced by animals and
pets to convey a particular feeling or emotion. It restricts itself to recognized expression and communication to
or from human beings by means of speech and hearing. This communication has to be from man to man, from
a person to another person by means of speech and hearing. Speech, therefore is a language.
2. Living language. A language undergoes a continuous and unnoticed change for its refinement and
depth. It responds to the demands and requirements of the group that it represents. As the human utterance
becomes complex and varied, a language to be living must move with the group, must grow with the group
and should be alive for their needs and aspirations. In this process of change and growth, language acquires
new shape, new approach, new significance and new application.
3. Language and society. Language is one of the most important characteristic forms of human
behavior. With widening range of horizon of human thought and action, the language has to keep in step with
its social calling. Since language is a purposeful activity, it must help man to express himself in a variety of new
and different kinds of situation and in a variety of complex contexts.
4. Operation of language. As language has a relevance only in social context, it is necessary for its
operation that a social necessity or scenario exists. There should be a corresponding situation for the language
to operate upon. It is a conventional arrangement between the speaker and the listener.
5. Sounds and signals. Sounds produced by human beings differ from the signal-like sounds and
actions of animals. Acc. To Bloomfield, “in human speech, different sounds have different meanings. “ A study
of language consists in giving meaning to a meaning. The meaning already exists, we have to give it a meaning
to be intelligible to us as a language.

Language Functions
Language Function

The Individual Aspect The Social Aspect

a. aesthetic a. cultural
b. expressive b. expressive or
communicative
1. Social Function. Language is social. It operates in a social setting. It acquires meaning and significance in a
social interaction. It is a means of communication between members of a community or between a community
and a community. It is capable of handling all references and meanings (Sapir) of a given culture. It is a means
of expression.
2. Cultural function. Language is a part of culture of the people, the chief means by which the members of a
society communicate. The content of every culture is express in its language.
3. Individual function. As a symbolic system, language either reports to refer to or substitute for direct
experience. Whatever case maybe, language can not stand apart from or run parallel to direct experience, but
completely interpenetrates with it.
4. Expressive function. Language is a great force of socialization. It is primarily a vocal actualization of the
tendency to see realities symbolically. There can not be a meaningful social interaction without language. The
language binds the people into one large group called nation. The national language socializes the behavior of
the whole nation, whereas, the regional languages help integrate regional groups. Language is the greatest and
most potent force of integration.
5. Aesthetic aspect. Language help store culture experiences in the form of literature and other written
records for posterity. These cultural experiences form the nexus of individual realization. It breathes life into
our poets and dramatists. Short of a language, such as fine arts were not possible. Aesthetic experiences are
the treasure for the posterity to feel proud of it as a national treasure-house.

Origin of Languages
Two main hypotheses concerning the origin of language.
I. Divine Creation Hypothesis
A. Many societies throughout history believed that language is the gift of the gods to humans. This belief
predicates that humans were created from the start with an innate capacity to use language.
B. It is impossible to prove that the first anatomically modern humans possessed creative language. It is also
impossible to disprove the hypothesis that primitive languages might have existed at some point in the distant
past of the Homo sapiens development.
II. Nature Evolution Hypothesis
A. Acc. To this, at some point of the evolutionary development, humans acquired a more sophisticated brain
which made language invention learning possible.
B. The simple vocalizations and gestures inherited from our primate ancestors then gave way to a creative
system of language.

Characteristics of language
1. Language is learned. The learning process may be natural or structured.
2. Language is a system. The complexity of the various facets of it are organically inter-related such as
sounds, words and structures is integrated with one another and constitute the complex and organic whole
which is called language.
3. Language is a system of symbols. Its effectiveness consists in its usage when the symbols are
commonly shared and known to all those who are sharing a common experience.
4. The system is arbitrary. There is no logical relation between the words and the objects they stand
for except for the Chinese and the other pictorial language, do have any resemblance with the reality that
they stand for. However, in sound languages, it is necessary that the sounds have a specific meaning.
5. Language symbols are vocal. Language is primarily speech-oriented. Its graphical representation
comes later. In many languages, there is no graphical expression at all. They are only spoken and are
considered adequate as they perform the basic function of communication.
6. Language is relevant. In a social setting and has a meaning in as far as it expresses common
cultural experiences. Languages, therefore, differ because cultures differ.
7. Language is a unique feature of humans.
8. It is the basis on rules of grammar.

Changes in the English Language

Language changes for several reasons.
1. It changes because the needs of its speakers change. New technologies, new products, and new
experiences require new words to refer to them clearly and efficiently. ...
2. Another reason for change is that no two people have had exactly the same language experience.

How did language change over time?

Language is always changing. ... Language also varies across time. Generation by generation,
pronunciations evolve, new words are borrowed or invented, the meaning of old words drifts, and morphology
develops or decays.

How Covid 19 is changing the English language?

Most of the coronavirus-related changes that the editors have noted have to do with older, more
obscure words and phrases being catapulted into common usage, such as reproduction number and social
distancing. They've also documented the creation of new word blends based on previously existing
vocabulary.25 Sep 2020

Who changed the English language?

1. William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare added more than 1700 words
to the English language. When he couldn't find a
word to express something in a play, he would
make a new one, adapting either foreign words or
existing English words. Shakespeare is almost
certainly the most productive person in the history
of the English language.6 Mar 2014
From addiction to zany, his language was never lacklustre. He wrote with swagger and without compromise.
William Shakespeare added more than 1700 words to the English language.
When he couldn’t find a word to express something in a play, he would make a new one, adapting
either foreign words or existing English words. Shakespeare is almost certainly the most productive person in
the history of the English language.

2. Lisa Simpson
The man responsible for the international success
of McDonald’s and therefore the McPrefix: attaching
“Mc” at the start of a word to suggest a kind of mass-
market affordability. Examples include
the McJob, McMansion, and McChurch. This has
spread to other languages too and Germany’s largest
chain of gyms is called McFit.

3. Noah Webster
The “Webster” in the title of American dictionaries, Noah Webster believed that great nations such as the USA
needed a language of its own: American.
Or American English anyway. He is personally responsible for many of the spelling differences between British
and American English, including the single “l” in traveler, the “er” in center and the “or” in flavor.
Webster made these changes in his dictionaries because he wanted English spelling to be more logical and less
influenced by French. Instead, he made it more complicated.

4. Snoop Dogg/Lion
Fo’ shizzle, Bigg Snoop D O Double Gizzle has
added a certain fizzle to English, although anyone
over the age of 20 (except the Doggfather himself)
should use it with caution.
 5. Samuel Johnson

It’s hard to imagine a world without reliable dictionaries, but that is the world in which  Samuel Johnson grew
up. This was becoming a problem by the mid-eighteenth century: despite centuries of mass publication
through the printing press, European languages were anything but organized. English in particular was a mess.
Different countries tackled the problem differently: in France, the 40 “immortals” who made up the Académie
française took 55 years to produce their French Dictionnaire. The Italian equivalent took the Florentine
Accademia della Crusca 30 years.
Johnson, working with six assistants, completed his dictionary in around 8 years!
It wasn’t the first English dictionary, but it was comprehensive and influential. Not all of the phrases are still in
use, which is a shame when they include belly-god, “one who makes a god of his belly”.

6. Aaron Peckham

While a freshman computer science major at California Polytechnic State University, Peckham started Urban
Dictionary. With over 7 million user-generated entries, this online dictionary is keeping Samuel Johnson’s spirit
alive with such beautiful 21st-century definitions as:
Sportgasm: the feeling of relief, happiness, excitement, and euphoria one feels when their team wins a game
in the final moments of a game.
Cameragoer: A person who prefers to view a live musical performance through the screen of his or her
camera/phone, thus blocking the view of the concertgoers behind the camera.
Volunteer’s remorse: When you volunteer to help with something and immediately regret doing so.
Human charity shield: What you become if someone walks close behind you to avoid getting hassled by charity
collectors in the street.
Managerial we: When a manager says “we” and means “you”
Friendscaping: The act of trimming one’s friends lists on various social media sites.

What is language change example?

Words' meanings may also change in terms of the breadth of their semantic domain. Narrowing a word limits
its alternative meanings, whereas broadening associates new meanings with it. For example, "hound" (Old
English hund) once referred to any dog, whereas in modern English it denotes only a particular type of dog.
What are some ways that the English language develops and changes?
Here are some of the primary ways:
 Trade and migration. As cultures interact, mix and trade, language shifts to accommodate these
changes. ...
 Technology and new inventions. New words and phrases are also invented to describe things that
didn't exist before. ...
 Old words acquiring new meanings.
Factors that influence it include gender, age, social class, etc. The factors that influence a speaker's
or writer's choice of language vary, and they include the context that surrounds the speaker or writer,
the age, gender, culture, etc.
Dialect is a specific kind of language spoken by a defined group or region. So you see that language
is a broader term, and dialect comes under its shade. Language plays the role of a parent, and
different dialects are stemming from it. We can view the difference between dialect and language
while writing about it.19 Feb 2021
 What’s The Difference Between Dialect And Language?
What’s the difference between a language and dialect? To your surprise, it’s a difficult question than it may
seem.
But if you have a sheer interest in languages, then you will enjoy exploring the answer.
Those people are more fascinated by the concept of languages that translate to make a living.
1. What Is A Language?
We can define a language in different ways. Do you know why? Because a language is a whole new world with
various cultural and linguistic factors.
1. Language is a system of communication used by the people of a country or community.
2. We, humans, use language as a method of communication with different words. It can be both oral or
written.
Both these definitions are quite clear. Do you still think that language is a complicated thing? I hope you don’t
do so.
What’s that point where a language becomes a dialect and vice versa? Although there’s not a clear line
between these two but still differentiable.
2. What Is A Dialect?
Dialect is a specific kind of language spoken by a defined group or region. So you see that language is a broader
term, and dialect comes under its shade.
Language plays the role of a parent, and different dialects are stemming from it. We can view the difference
between dialect and language while writing about it.
But in the real world, when things get practical, it’s harder to define the blurred line between these two.
Mutual intelligibility is a herring in the difference between language and dialect.
English language has different dialects, mutually intelligible and spoken around the globe.
All the dialects in a language are equally important no matter which time these got developed.
How Do Dialects Evolve?
Linguists believe that all languages got originated from one human language.
Can we consider all these languages of the modern world as dialects of that initial language?
If yes, then how come there are some many dialects and languages today? And these all are so different from
one another, interesting!
More interesting is the reason, i.e., the geographical isolation. As people separated their regions, they
developed their speech patterns and words.
More interesting is the reason, i.e., the geographical isolation. As people separated their regions, they
developed their speech patterns and words.
Dialects do relate to a geographical area and social class. Relations between dialects and social types have
different examples.
These examples are visible in urban areas as rural areas have less diversity of dialects. But there are always
exceptions in the case of languages and dialects. Isn’t it an exciting adventure?
Read these two main types of dialects to see what you’re missing out on.
1. Linguistic Dialects:
Linguistic dialects are variations of a language that are mutually intelligible.
People speaking one kind of language can comprehend other speakers. And they don’t have to learn the
language beginning from scratch.
2. Sociopolitical Dialects:
For some social reasons, some languages are less important than a standard language.
A good example is the one you can see in Italy! Italy’s official language is standard Italian.
Other languages are considered Italian dialects like Romanesco and Occitan.
Sicilian language, recognized by UNESCO, is still not the official language of Italy.
Countries like Peru, Spain, and Columbia speak the same language. But all these versions are different from
each other.
So each version should be categorized as the dialect of Spanish.
The difference between a language and a dialect has no clear answer the reason is that the boundaries
between the subjects are too blur to differentiate.
You’ll see some languages as proper dialects while some dialects have the right to be a language. Quite
confusing, right?
References:
Fromkin, V., Rodman, R. and Hyams, Nina. 2007, An Introduction to Language. Thompson
Wadsworth.
Yule, G. 2006. The Study of Language. (3rd Edition). Cambridge: Cambridge University
Website: The LANGUAGEDOCTORS.ORG.

Activity (Quiz)

A. Discuss briefly any two of the following:

1. Nature, Origin and characteristics of language.
2. The two main hypotheses concerning the origin of languages.
3. The persons who changed the English language and their contributions.
4. The differences between language and dialects, aside from the discussion given can you give other
differences?

Prepared By:

Asabellla
AIDA S. ABELLA
Instructress