Language is defined in three sentences: Language is a system of symbols and rules that allows humans to communicate complex ideas, emotions and desires through vocal symbols arranged systematically. It is a uniquely human ability that is acquired culturally rather than instinctively, and allows for open-ended creative expression and the development of advanced thought and society. The document then explores seven definitions of language and eleven key characteristics that describe language.

1. Language

2. Relationship
“?”
Language
Societ

3. What is
Language –
Language is an integral part of human life.
It is not possible to live life without language.
Definitions of Laguage –
 1. Aristotle – “Speech is the representation of the experience
of the mind.
 2. Edward Sapir – “Language is a purely human and non-
instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and
desires by means of a system of voluntarily produced symbols.
There are two terms in this definition that call for discussion:
human and non-instinctive. Language, as Sapir rightly said, is
human. Only humans possess language and all normal
humans uniformly possess it. Animals do have a
communication system but it is not a developed system. That
is why language is said to be species-specific and species-

4. Definitions of
Laguage –
 3. Henry Sweet –
“Language is the expression of ideas by means of
speech sounds combined into words.”
 4. Bloch and Trager –
“Language is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols by
means of which a social group cooperates.”
 5. J. Whatmough –
“Language is human-------a verbal systematic
symbolism-----a means of transmitting information------a form of
social behaviour------ (with) a high degree of conventions.”

5. Definitions of
Laguage –
 6. R.H. Robins –
“Language (is) a symbol system-----based on pure or
arbitrary conventions--------infinitely extendable and
modifiable according to the changing needs and conditions
of the speakers.”
According to this definition, language is a symbol
system. Every language selects some symbols for its selected
sounds. The English sound /k/ for example has the symbol k
for it. These symbols form the alphabet of the language and
join in different combinations to form meaningful words.

6.  7. Noam Chomsky –
“ Language is the innate capacity of native
speakers to understand and form grammatical
sentences.”
“A language is a set (finite or infinite) of sentences,
each
finite in length and constructed out of a finite set of
elements”.
Chomsky meant to convey that each sentence has a
structure.
Human brain is competent enough to construct different
sentences from out of the limited set of sounds/symbols
belonging to a particular language. Human brain is so

7. In
short….

8.  Language is, today, an inseparable
part of human society.
 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.

9.  Language is God’s special gift to mankind.
 Without language human civilization, as we now
know it, would have remained an impossibility.
 Language is ubiquitous. It is present everywhere––
in our thoughts and dreams, prayers and
meditations, relations and communication.
 It is our ability to communicate through words
that makes us different from animals.
 Language is a very important means of
communication between humans.

10.  A can communicate his or her ideas, emotions,
beliefs or feelings to B as they share a common
code that makes up the language.
 No doubt, there are many other means of
communication used by humans (body
language) e.g. gestures, nods, winks, short-
hand, Braille alphabet, Morse code, acting,
miming, dancing etc.
 But all these systems of communication are
extremely limited or they too, in turn, depend upon

11.  Language gives shape to people’s thoughts
and guides and controls their entire activity.
 It is a carrier of civilization and culture as
human thoughts and philosophy are
conveyed from one generation to the other
through the medium of language.
 It is through language that they store
knowledge, transfer it to the next generation
and yoke the present, past and the future

12. Characteristics of a
Language
1. 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 logical relation between a symbol
and its sense (meaning), between a word and the meaning attached to it.
There are thousands of languages used in the world. Eventhough an
object or an animal is the same, there are different words used for that
animal or object in different languages.
For example, there is a four-legged domestic pet animal. In
English, it is ‘dog’, in Marathi it is ‘kutra’, in Hindi it is ‘kutta’, in Gujarathi
‘kutaro’, in German ‘hund’, in Telugu ‘kukka’ and in Sanskrit ‘kukkur’.
The animal has been conventionally called by that word. If the
speakers of Marathi decide to call it by the name ‘paani’, there will be no

13. Characteristics of a
Language
2. Language is Social:
• Language is a set of conventional communicative signals used by
humans for communication in a community.
• Language in this sense is a possession of a social group, comprising an
indispensable set of
rules which permits its members to relate to each other, to interact with each other,
to co- operate with each other; it is a social institution.
• Language exists in society; it is a means of nourishing and developing
culture and establishing human relations.
• Language is a powerful tool of communication used by human beings. A society is
a group of individuals. This group is impossible without a language.
• We can not think of a society which does not use language for
communication. The members in a society establish and maintain their
relationships through verbal
communication. It is through language that social members interact with each
other and co-operate each other. Every society has its distinct culture. This culture

14. Characteristics of a
Language
3.Language is Symbolic:/ Language is a system of Symbols
• Language consists of various sound symbols and their graphological counterparts
that are employed to denote some objects, occurrences or meaning.
• These symbols are arbitrarily chosen and conventionally accepted and employed.
Words in a language are not mere signs or figures, but symbols of meaning. The
intelligibility of a language depends on a correct interpretation of these symbols.
• Language is means or vehicle of communication. We communicate through language
means that we use symbols. A symbol is a word or thing which stands for something
else.
• For example- ‘rose’ word stands for the feeling of love. ‘Red’ stands for love or
danger.
• Communication through language means communicating through symbols. The
symbols in
communication are sounds and words.
• We communicate our thoughts, ideas and emotions though sounds and words.
Every language has a fixed number of sounds.
• These sounds are divided into two broad classes: consonants and vowels.
• These sounds are combined in particular order/pattern to form meaningful words. If
the
sounds are not combined in a permissible way, we produce a non-sense word.
• For example- there are three sounds in
English-/t/,
/ / and/k/. If they are combined in
the
/
order / /k/ /t/ we get a word ‘act’. If we change order /k/
/
/ /t/ we get ‘cat’. If we
change
it as /t/ /k/ / / we get nonsense word ‘tca’. The first two words are permissible and
the last word is not.
• We must put these symbols in permissible way for communicate sensibly.

15. Characteristics of a
Language
4. 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.
• Language consists of speech sounds, words and morphemes. Every language has
a system of sounds, a system of words and a system of morphemes.
• These systems are called phonology, lexicology and morphology, grammar.
Grammar again has systems like articles, tenses, active-passive voice,
prepositions, number and gender.
• Syntax is the study of sentence pattern. There is a sentence pattern ‘S+V+O’
(Subject+Verb+object). If these units are changed in order, a sentence is
ungrammatical. “I like tea” is a structurally correct sentence but “tea I like” is an

16. Characteristics of a
Language
5.Language is Vocal:
• Language is primarily made up of vocal sounds only produced by a physiological
articulatory mechanism in the human body.
• We use articulators like lips, teeth, tongue and lungs for an oral language.
• All normal human beings produce the vocal symbols with the help of these
articulators.
• In the beginning, it appeared as vocal sounds only. Writing came much later, as an
intelligent
attempt to represent vocal sounds.
• Writing is only the graphic representation of the sounds of the language. So the
linguists say that speech is primary.
• Speech is primary and writing is secondary.
• We speak our mother tongue more than we write in it.
• There are many languages in the world which exist only in the spoken form. These
languages do not have the writing system. This also proves that language is vocal or
language is nothing but sound.
• Illiterate people use language without knowing how to write it.

17. Characteristics of a
Language
6.Language is Non-instinctive, Conventional/Cultural transmission :
• No language was created in a day out of a mutually agreed upon formula by a
group of humans.
• Language is the outcome of evolution and convention.
• Each generation transmits this convention on to the next. Like all human institutions
languages also change and die, grow and expand.
• Every language then is a convention in a community. It is non-instinctive
because it is acquired by human beings.
• No body gets a language in heritage; he acquires it because he an innate(inborn)
ability.
• Language is non-instinctive means language is to be acquired.
• It can not be inherited. It is not inborn or instinctive. We can inherit(get) physical
features from our parents/relatives like shape of nose, color, forehead, height, etc.
• Language is a cultural transmission it can not be that a child will necessarily and
automatically acquire language of its parents.
• If the language of the child is Marathi, the child may acquire Hindi or English. It
depends on the situation or context(environment) in which the child is brought up.
• If a child is born in Jalgaon but brought up in Japan, it will acquire Japanese.
• This is because language is non-instinctive.

18. Characteristics of a
Language
7.Language is Productive and Creative:
• Language has creativity and productivity.
•
• The structural elements of human language can be combined to produce new
utterances, which neither the speaker nor his hearers may ever have made or
heard before any, listener, yet which both sides understand without difficulty.
• Language changes according to the needs of society.
• Due to science and technology, language gets new words and sentences.
• For example- mobile, computer, internet, bulldozer, etc.
• We humans discover new words, new sentences or new pronunciations which
were not present in the past in that language.
• For example-
• Traditionally we use ‘Hi’,’Hello’ for greetings, now we use ‘what’s up’.
• We now say ‘bro’ or ‘sis’ than brother and sister.

19. Characteristics of a
Language
8.Language is a ruled governed behaviour:
 Language is a rule governed behaviour. It includes systems like phonology,
morphology, grammar, syntax and semantics.
 We cannot use language as we like and we have to follow the rules of language.
 For example, grammar is a set of rules for using a language. Grammar includes
the systems like tense, articles, prepositions, voice, number and gender. If we
want to form a sentence in Present Simple Tense, we have to follow two rules-
i) If the subject of a sentence is third person singular(he/she/it), the verb takes ‘s/es’
suffix.
ii) If the subject of a sentence is first person singular (I) or plural (we,they), the verb
does not take the suffix ‘s/es’.
For
example- I
like coffee
He likes coffee.
She wants this book.
 If the rules of language are not followed, the sentence produced will be
ungrammatical.

20. Characteristics of a
Language
9.Language is open-ended,extendable and modifiable:
 Language helps us to communicate our thoughts and experiences effectively.
 This means of effective communication is open-ended, extendable and modifiable.
 Language is open-ended means that new words always added to the vocabulary of
language.
 The vocabulary of a language enriches and increases according to the changing
time and needs of speakers.
 New words are added in the course of process of science and technology. For
example, e- mail,fax, modem, internet, download, etc. new words have been
added to the vocabulary of English language.
 Language is extendable and modifiable means that we can take a word and
frame a sentence. We can add a few more words and modify the
sentences. For example-
Birds fly.
Birds fly in the sky.
Birds fly high in the sky.
Birds sitting on the branches fly very high in the sky.
 We can extend and modify a sentence. Of course, there are limits to the
understanding of a listener or reader.

21. Characteristics of a
Language
10.Language is Human/Species specific:
 It means that language is used by the human beings/human speakers only.
 Humans use language as a vehicle of communication.
 We express our thoughts, ideas, emotions and messages through language.
Humans possess an inborn ability to acquire language.
 By using language, human beings can communicate infinite number of
messages and thoughts. By using the same sentence structure they can form
a limitless number of sentence.
 For example- there is a sentence pattern in English –S+V+O (Subject+Verb+Object).
By using
this pattern human beings can produce sentences like the following-
I like tea.
I love my
country. He
plays cricket.
She eats
mangoes. They
read novels.
 Practically speaking there is no end to this. Only humans have an inborn or inbuilt

22. Characteristics of a
Language
11.Language is a means of communication:
 Human beings have an inborn ability to express their thoughts, ideas, emotions and
desires.
 They have the capacity to share information from one person to another person
and from one place to another place.
 Humans also use the system of flags, colors, facial expressions. But these other
system of
communication like flags, colors, facial expressions are limited.
 Through language we can share a large number of messages.
 We can share any thought through language.
 No other system of communication is as perfect as language.