Lecture 2
What is language?
1

Discuss in groups:
1.
How would you define the term ”language”?
(you may distinguish different senses)
2.
How would you distinguish language from
other forms of communication?
2

The more conceptual (philosophical) question:
What do we mean by “language”? Different
senses…

The more empirical question: How do systems of
communication differ, and which set of
“features” corresponds best to our concept of
language.

The two are closely related!
3
What do we
mean by
“language”?
What kind of
differences are
there between
actual systems of
communication?
4
A particular public language:
“The French language” (≈ ‘langue’)
2. Communication by means of language:
“His language was fluent”, speech. (≈ ‘parole’)
3. In linguistics: Knowledge of (1), permitting (2):
“language as a cognitive phenomenon”
(≈ ‘competence’)
4. In cognitive science: The biological basis for (3):
“language in the brain”
5. In linguistics/philosophy: The capacity for
language:
“Homo sapiens alone possesses language”.
1.
5
Communicative signals:
“the language of birds”
 Any expressive medium:
“the language of art”, “body language”
 Style of speaking:
“flowery language”
 In computer science:
“PROLOG is an easy programming language”
 A people or nation:
“The French are famous for the food”
(The name for a people is almost always the
name given to their language, by “outsiders”)

6
What do we mean
by “language”?
What kind of
differences are
there between
actual systems of
communication?
7
Feature
Animal communication
Language
(1) Degree of learning
Mostly genetically
determined
Mostly learned from
experience
(2) Conscious control
Minimal
High
(3) Contextuality
Tied to a particular context Flexible, relatively
independent from specific
context
(4) Interpretation
Relatively fixed response
Flexible, “negotiable”
(5) Communicative
relations
Mostly dyadic:
Subject-Recipient
(6) Systematicity
None, or very limited
Mostly triadic:
Speaker-AddresseeReferent
High
8








Heredity vs. learning (> 1)
Automatic vs. voluntary (> 2)
Hear-and-now vs. “displacement” (> 3, 4)
Formulaic vs. “productive” (> 3, 4, 6)
Emotional vs. propositional content (> 1, 2, 5, 6)
Analog vs. digital signals (> 6)
Few (discrete) vs. “massive vocabulary”
(> 1,2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
visible AND audible medium (unlike Hockett
1960: “design features of language”)
9
Visible
Mammalian
Audible
Gesture-call system
EmotionalAnalogue
Paralinguistic
Gesticulation
Intonation, Tone of
voice
ReferentialDigital
Quotable
Quotable gestures
Quotable
vocalizations
Linguistic
Sign Language
Spoken Language
Burling (2005) “The Talking Ape”, p. 46
10
“duality of patterning” (“double articulation”) –
“Our huge stock of words would not be possible
without the digital phonological code” (: 33), but
signed languages?
 “arbitrariness” – 50% of the signs (words) of
ASL are iconic, i.e. they resemble their meanings
 “recursive rules” – not the same as hierarchical
structure, a mathematical operation e.g.
S -> NP VP, NP -> NP Comp S

11
12
What do we
mean by
“language”?
What kind of
differences are
there between
actual systems of
communication?
13
Language: A (mostly) conventional
(normative) semiotic system for
communication and thought
(Zlatev 2007, 2008)
14
 ”conventions” and ”norms”
 ”semiotic systems”
 ”communication”
 ”thought”
15

“A regularity R in the behaviour of members of a
population P … is a convention if and only it is
true that, and it is common knowledge in P
that, … (1) everyone conforms to R; (2) everyone
expects everyone else to conform to R; ...”
(Lewis 1969: 76)


Conventions are not just habits (regularities).
The expectation that everyone (should)
”conform to” them implies a normative aspect.
16
John loves Mary. *Loves John Mary.
En hund, *ett hund
A dog is an animal. *A dog is a number.

The judgement that some expressions are correct
(either grammatically or semantically), while others
are not correct, is a pre-theoretical universal.
(Itkonen 1978, …. 2008)

Itkonen’s insistence on the (implicitly) normative
character of language is correct
(Zlatev 2007, 2008), cf. Coseriu (1974, 1985)
17

All conventions (e.g. to drive on the right side
of the road) are not signs.

All signs are not conventional (e.g. most
gestures – unlike signed language – most
pictures, etc.)

But what is a ”sign”?
18
A sign is used if and only if E (expression) signifies C (content)
or at least R (referent), for subject S, so that:
 E and C/R are connected: in perceiving or enacting E, S
indirectly perceives, or conceives of C/R
 E and C/R are differentiated: E is qualitatively different
from C/R for S
 The relation is asymmetrical (E  C/R, not C/R  E)
19




All signals are not signs (e.g. spontaeous face
expressions, bodily postures).
Some signs are not mostly conventional (e.g.
pictures).
Some conventional signs are not organized
in systems: emblematic (”quotable”)
gestures.
Laguages are (mostly) conventional sign
systems.
20
Signals
Signs
Conventional
signs
Conventional
sign systems
21

Dance and Larson (1976, Appendix A) list 126
different definitions.

Differ in at least:
 Degree of generality?
 Imply or not intentionality/purposefulness?
 Imply or not success?
(Dance 1970; Littlejohn 1999)
22

“Communication is the process that links discontinuous part of the living
world to one another.” (Ruesch 1956: 462) too general

“Those situations in which a source transmits a message to a receiver
with conscious intent to affect the latter’s behaviors.” (Miller 1966: 92)
too specific: “conscious intent”

“It is the process that makes common to two or several what was the
monopoly of one.” (Gode 1959: 5) too general + “success”

“Communication is the verbal interchange of a thought or idea.” (Hoben
1954: 77) too specific: “verbal”, “success”

“Communication is the transmission of information.” (Berelson and
Steiner 1964: 254) too general: “information”
23

Communication is the transmission of meanings
through different (bodily) expressions between
two or more subjects.



Generality: intermediate
Intentionality: non-committed
Success: uses the (often criticized) notion of
“transmission”, but does not
(a) focus solely on the “sender”, but on both parties and
(b) require in all cases for the sender’s meaning to be
identical with the that of the receiver: individual
interpretation and collective negotiation
24
Chanels
Level
Production: Body
Vocal apparatus
Extra-bodily
Perception: Vision/Touch
Hearing
Vision, hearing…
1
Bodily reactions
Cries
Traces
2
Intention-movements,
Directed calls
Marks
“Vocal gestures”
Early picture
Attention getters
3
Gesture, pantomime
comprehension
4
Signed language
Spoken language
Writing, external
representations
25
26
27
28
29

Non-mediated cognition:
perception, procedural memory, anticipation...

Non-verbal thought: Cognition mediated by
non-linguistic signs: thinking in images, analogymaking...

Verbal thought: Cognition mediated through
language: internal speech, complex planing,
narratives,autobiographic self...
30

Since conventions are by definition social, it
follows that languages are necessarily social
phenomena.

Since signs require a subject, i.e. consciousness,
languages are also necessarily mental
phenomena.

Since consciousness (appears to) require a
certain kind of (neuro)biology, languages are
also biological phenomena.
31
“The three worlds are: the physical world 1 of
bodies and physical states, events and forces;
the psychological world 2 of experiences and
of unconscious mental events, and the world
3 of mental products.” (Popper 1992, p.9)
32
“The order of world 1, 2 and 3 (as indicated by these
numbers) correspond to their age. According to the
current state of our conjectural knowledge, the
inanimate part of world 1 is by far the oldest; then
comes the animate part of world 1, and at the same
time or somewhat later comes world 2, the world of
experiences; and then with the advent of mankind
comes world 3, the world of mental products; that
is the world that anthropologists call ‘culture’”
(Popper 1992, p.9)
33

Language interacts with other types of
signals during communication (e.g. affective
prosodi, iconic gestures)

... But this does not give us sufficient ground
to regard these as part of language, in a
more narrow sense.
34
What do we mean
by “language”?
What kind of
differences are
there between
actual systems of
communication?
35

Try to classify the child’s communicative signals
using the 4 level taxonomy:





Bodily reactions + cries
Intention movements
Non-linguistic signs
Language
Say STOP when you wish to “tag” a particular
act.
36