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Language Portal

see Language (journal) for the linguistics journal.

A language is a system, used to communicate, comprised of a set of symbols and a set of rules (or grammar) by which the manipulation of these symbols is governed. These symbols can be combined productively to convey new information, distinguishing languages from other forms of communication. The word language (without an article) can also refer to the use of such systems as a phenomenon. Image File history File links Broom_icon. ... Image File history File links Portal. ... Language (E-ISSN: 1535-0665 Print ISSN: 0097-8507) is the official journal for the Linguistic Society of America, published since 1924. ... System (from Latin systēma, in turn from Greek sustēma) is a set of entities, real or abstract, comprising a whole where each component interacts with or is related to at least one other component. ... Communication is the process of exchanging information usually via a common system of symbols. ... Grammar is the study of rules governing the use of language. ... The ASCII codes for the word Wikipedia represented in binary, the numeral system most commonly used for encoding computer information. ... An article is a word that is next to a noun or any word that modifies a noun to indicate the type of reference being made by the noun. ... This article does not cite its references or sources. ...

A Specimen of typeset fonts and languages, by William Caslon, letter founder; from the 1728 Cyclopaedia.

Human languages use patterns of sound and/or hand gesture for symbols. These sounds can be converted into written form with little loss of information. Gestures and intonation are a part of delivery, but are not conveyed in written form. Some invented human languages have been built entirely on visual cues to enable communication. In human languages, the symbols are sometimes known as lexemes and the rules are usually known as grammars. "Language" is also used to refer to common properties of languages. Language learning is normal in human childhood and is biologically driven: a crucial role of this process is performed by the neural activity of a portion of the human brain known as Broca's area. There are thousands of human languages, and many, if not most seem to share certain properties (see Universal Grammar) as shown by generative grammar studies pioneered by the work of Noam Chomsky. Recently, it has been proved that a dedicated network in the human brain (crucially involving Broca's area, a portion of the left inferior frontal gyrus), is selectively activated by those languages that meet the Universal Grammar requirements. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (2898x3807, 1794 KB) This description text was copied from the original place of the image (see below) from: http://images. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (2898x3807, 1794 KB) This description text was copied from the original place of the image (see below) from: http://images. ... 1913 advertisement for Encyclopædia Britannica. ... Trinomial name Homo sapiens sapiens Linnaeus, 1758 Humans, or human beings, are bipedal primates belonging to the mammalian species Homo sapiens (Latin: wise man or knowing man) under the family Hominidae (the great apes). ... Sound is a disturbance of mechanical energy that propagates through matter as a longitudinal wave, and therefore is a mechanical wave. ... Sign language interpreter on stage A sign language (also signed language) is a language which uses manual communication instead of sound to convey meaning - simultaneously combining handshapes, orientation and movement of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions to express fluidly a speakers thoughts. ... See mouse gesture for gestures in computing Military signalmen use hand and body gestures to direct flight operations aboard aircraft carriers. ... Look up Communication in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Definition A lexeme is an abstract unit of morphological analysis in linguistics, that roughly corresponds to a set of words that are the same in basic meaning. ... Grammar is the study of rules governing the use of language. ... Brocas area is the section of the human brain (in the opercular and triangular sections of the inferior frontal gyrus of the frontal lobe of the cortex) that is involved in language processing, speech production and comprehension. ... Universal grammar is a theory of linguistics postulating principles of grammar shared by all languages, thought to be innate to humans. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Generative linguistics. ... Avram Noam Chomsky, Ph. ... Brocas area is the section of the human brain (in the opercular and triangular sections of the inferior frontal gyrus of the frontal lobe of the cortex) that is involved in language processing, speech production and comprehension. ...

There is no clear distinction between a language and a dialect, notwithstanding linguist Max Weinreich's famous aphorism that "a language is a dialect with an army and navy." In other words, the distinction may hinge on political considerations as much as on cultural differences, distinctive writing systems, or degree of mutual intelligibility. A dialect (from the Greek word διάλεκτος, dialektos) is a variety of a language used by people from a particular geographic area. ... A dialect (from the Greek word διάλεκτος, dialektos) is a variety of a language used by people from a particular geographic area. ... Max Weinreich (1893/94 Goldingen(Kuldiga), Courland (Latvia) - 1969 New York) was a Yiddish linguist. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... A language is a dialect with an army and navy is one of the most frequently used aphorisms in the discussion of the distinction between dialect and language. ... Writing systems of the world today. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ...

Humans, sometimes using computer programs, have also constructed other languages, including constructed languages such as Esperanto, Ido, Interlingua, Klingon, Lojban, programming languages, and various mathematical formalisms. These languages are not restricted to the properties shared by human languages. A constructed or artificial language — known colloquially as a conlang — is a language whose phonology, grammar, and/or vocabulary have been devised by an individual or small group, instead of having naturally evolved as part of a culture. ... Look up Esperanto in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Ido (pronounced ) is a constructed language that was created to become a universal second language for speakers of different linguistic backgrounds, easier to learn than any ethnic language. ... Interlingua is an international auxiliary language (IAL) published in 1951 by the International Auxiliary Language Association (IALA). ... The Klingon language (tlhIngan Hol in Klingon) is the constructed language spoken by Klingons in the fictional Star Trek universe. ... Lojban (IPA , official full name Lojban: a realization of Loglan) is a syntactically unambiguous, predicate logic-based constructed language which was created by the Logical Language Group in 1987 as a realization of Loglan, with the intent to make the language more complete, usable, and freely available. ...

Properties of language

Some of the areas of the brain involved in language processing: Broca's area, Wernicke's area, Supramarginal gyrus, Angular gyrus, Primary Auditory Cortex

Languages are not just sets of symbols. They also often conform to a rough grammar, or system of rules, used to manipulate the symbols. While a set of symbols may be used for expression or communication, it is primitive and relatively unexpressive, because there are no clear or regular relationships between the symbols. Because a language also often has a grammar, it can manipulate its symbols to express clear and regular relationships between them. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (2084x1640, 189 KB) Summary The areas of the brain with color code to significant language areas. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (2084x1640, 189 KB) Summary The areas of the brain with color code to significant language areas. ... Brocas area is the section of the human brain (in the opercular and triangular sections of the inferior frontal gyrus of the frontal lobe of the cortex) that is involved in language processing, speech production and comprehension. ... Approximate location of Wernickes area highlighted in gray Wernickes area is a part of the human brain that forms part of the cortex, on the left posterior section of the superior temporal gyrus, posterior to the primary auditory cortex, on the central sulcus (part of the brain where... Brodmann area 40, or BA40, is part of the parietal cortex in the human brain. ... The angular gyrus is a region of the brain in the parietal lobe, that lies near the superior edge of the temporal lobe, and immediately posterior to the supramarginal gyrus; it is involved in a number of processes related to language and cognition. ... The primary auditory cortex is the region of the brain that is responsible for processing of auditory (sound) information. ... Grammar is the study of rules governing the use of language. ...

Another property of language is the arbitrariness of the symbols. Any symbol can be mapped onto any concept (or even onto one of the rules of the grammar). For instance, there is nothing about the Spanish word nada itself that forces Spanish speakers to use it to mean "nothing". That is the meaning all Spanish speakers have memorized for that sound pattern. But for Croatian or Serbian speakers nada means "hope". Serbian (српски језик; srpski jezik) is one of the standard versions of the Shtokavian dialect, used primarily in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Croatia, and by Serbs everywhere. ...

However, it must be understood that just because in principle the symbols are arbitrary does not mean that a language cannot have symbols that are iconic of what they stand for. Words such as "meow" sound similar to what they represent (see Onomatopoeia), but they could be replaced with words such as "jarn", and as long as everyone memorized the new word, the same concepts could be expressed with it. Look up onomatopoeia in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

Human languages

Main article: Natural language

Human languages are usually referred to as natural languages, and the science of studying them is linguistics. The term natural language is used to distinguish languages spoken and signed (by hand signals and facial expressions) by humans for general-purpose communication from constructs such as writing, computer-programming languages or the languages used in the study of formal logic, especially mathematical logic. ... Linguistics is the scientific study of language. ...

Making a principled distinction between one language and another is usually impossible. For instance, there are a few dialects of German similar to some dialects of Dutch. The transition between languages within the same language family is sometimes gradual (see dialect continuum). A dialect (from the Greek word διάλεκτος, dialektos) is a variety of a language used by people from a particular geographic area. ... Current distribution of Human Language Families Most languages are known to belong to language families. ... A dialect continuum is a range of dialects spoken across a large geographical area, differing only slightly between areas that are geographically close, and gradually decreasing in mutual intelligibility as the distances become greater. ...

Some like to make parallels with biology, where it is not always possible to make a well-defined distinction between one species and the next. In either case, the ultimate difficulty may stem from the interactions between languages and populations. (See Dialect or August Schleicher for a longer discussion.) This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biodiversity. ... Interaction is a kind of action that occurs as two or more objects have an effect upon one another. ... A dialect (from the Greek word διάλεκτος, dialektos) is a variety of a language used by people from a particular geographic area. ... August Schleicher August Schleicher (February 19, 1821 - December 6, 1868) was a German linguist. ...

The concepts of Ausbausprache, Abstandsprache and Dachsprache are used to make finer distinctions about the degrees of difference between languages or dialects. The Ausbausprache - Abstandsprache - Dachsprache framework is a tool developed by sociolinguists, e. ... For Pierre Bourdieus book Distinction see La distinction. ...

Origins of human language

Main article: Origin of language

There is disagreement among anthropologists on when language was first used by humans (or their ancestors). Estimates range from about two million (2,000,000) years ago, during the time of Homo habilis, to as recently as forty thousand (40,000) years ago, during the time of Cro-Magnon man. This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... Binomial name †Homo habilis Leakey et al, 1964 Homo habilis (IPA ) (handy man, skillful person) is a species of the genus Homo, which lived from approximately 2. ... A Cro-Magnon male skull The Cro-Magnons (IPA: or anglicised IPA: ) form the earliest known European examples of Homo sapiens sapiens, from ca. ...

Language taxonomy

The classification of natural languages can be performed on the basis of different underlying principles (different closeness notions, respecting different properties and relations between languages); important directions of present classifications are: It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Concept mining. ...

• paying attention to the historical evolution of languages results in a genetic classification of languages—which is based on genetic relatedness of languages,
• paying attention to the internal structure of languages (grammar) results in a typological classification of languages—which is based on similarity of one or more components of the language's grammar across languages,
• and respecting geographical closeness and contacts between language-speaking communities results in areal groupings of languages.

The different classifications do not match each other and are not expected to, but the correlation between them is an important point for many linguistic research works. (There is a parallel to the classification of species in biological phylogenetics here: consider monophyletic vs. polyphyletic groups of species.) Grammar is the study of rules governing the use of language. ... Linguistics is the scientific study of language. ... In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biodiversity. ... In biology, phylogenetics (Greek: phylon = tribe, race and genetikos = relative to birth, from genesis = birth) is the study of evolutionary relatedness among various groups of organisms (e. ... In phylogenetics, a group is monophyletic (Greek: of one stem) if all organisms in that group are known to have developed from a common ancestral form, and all descendants of that form are included in the group. ... In biology, a taxon is polyphyletic if it is descended from more than one root form (in Greek poly = many and phyletic = racial). ...

The task of genetic classification belongs to the field of historical-comparative linguistics, of typological—to linguistic typology. Historical linguistics (also diachronic linguistics or comparative linguistics) is primarily the study of the ways in which languages change over time, by means of examining languages which are recognizably related through similarities such as vocabulary, word formation, and syntax, as well as the surviving records of ancient languages. ... Linguistic typology is the typology that classifies languages by their features. ...

See also Taxonomy, and Taxonomic classification for the general idea of classification and taxonomies. Look up taxonomy in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Concept mining. ...

Genetic classification

Main article: Language family

The world's languages have been grouped into families of languages that are believed to have common ancestors. Some of the major families are the Indo-European languages, the Afro-Asiatic languages, the Austronesian languages, and the Sino-Tibetan languages. Current distribution of Human Language Families Most languages are known to belong to language families. ... The Indo-European languages comprise a family of several hundred related languages and dialects [1], including most of the major languages of Europe, as well as many spoken in the Indian subcontinent (South Asia), the Iranian plateau (Southwest Asia), and Central Asia. ... The Afro-Asiatic languages constitute a language family with about 375 languages (SIL estimate) and more than 300 million speakers spread throughout North Africa, East Africa, the Sahel, and Southwest Asia (including some 200 million speakers of Arabic). ... The Austronesian languages are a language family widely dispersed throughout the islands of Southeast Asia and the Pacific, with a few members spoken on continental Asia. ... Sino-Tibetan languages in red. ...

The shared features of languages from one family can be due to shared ancestry. (Compare with homology in biology.) In biology, two or more structures are said to be homologous if they are alike because of shared ancestry. ...

Typological classification

Main article: Linguistic typology

An example of a typological classification is the classification of languages on the basis of the basic order of the verb, the subject and the object in a sentence into several types: SVO, SOV, VSO, and so on, languages. (English, for instance, belongs to the SVO language type.) Linguistic typology is the typology that classifies languages by their features. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... The subject of a sentence is one of the two main parts of a sentence, the other being the predicate. ... An object in grammar is a sentence element and part of the sentence predicate. ... In linguistics, a sentence is a unit of language, characterised in most languages by the presence of a finite verb. ... In linguistic typology, subject-verb-object (SVO) is a sentence structure where the subject comes first, the verb second, and the object third. ... In linguistic typology, Subject Object Verb (SOV) is the type of languages in which the subject, object, and verb of a sentence appear (usually) in that order. ... Verb Subject Object—commonly used in its abbreviated form VSO—is a term in linguistic typology. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... In linguistic typology, subject-verb-object (SVO) is a sentence structure where the subject comes first, the verb second, and the object third. ...

The shared features of languages of one type (= from one typological class) may have arisen completely independently. (Compare with analogy in biology.) Their cooccurence might be due to the universal laws governing the structure of natural languages—language universals. Two structures in biology are said to be analogous if they perform the same or similar function by a similar mechanism. ... A linguistic universal is a statement that is true for all languages. ...

Areal classification

The following language groupings can serve as some linguistically significant examples of areal linguistic units, or sprachbunds: Balkan linguistic union, or the bigger group of European languages; Caucasian languages. Although the members of each group are not closely genetically related, there is a reason for them to share similar features, namely: their speakers have been in contact for a long time within a common community and the languages converged in the course of the history. These are called "areal features". A Sprachbund (German for language bond, also known as a linguistic area, convergence area, diffusion area) is a group of languages that have become similar in some way because of geographical proximity. ... The Balkan linguistic union or Balkansprachbund is the similarity in grammar, syntax, vocabulary and phonology among languages of the Balkans, which belong to various Indo-European branches, such as Albanian, Greek, Romance and Slavic. ... It has been suggested that Languages of the European Union be merged into this article or section. ... The term Caucasian languages is loosely used to refer to a large and extremely varied array of languages spoken by more than 7 million people in the Caucasus region of Eastern Europe, between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. ... Current distribution of Human Language Families Most languages are known to belong to language families. ... In linguistics, an areal feature is any typological feature shared by languages within the same geographical area. ...

N.B.: one should be careful about the underlying classification principle for groups of languages which have apparently a geographical name: besides areal linguistic units, the taxa of the genetic classification (language families) are often given names which themselves or parts of which refer to geographical areas. A taxon (plural taxa) is an element of a taxonomy, e. ... Current distribution of Human Language Families Most languages are known to belong to language families. ...

International Auxiliary Languages

Main article: International auxiliary language

Some languages are meant specifically for communication between people of different nationalities or language groups. Several of these languages have been constructed by an individual or group, as noted below. Others are seen as natural, pre-existing languages. Their developers merely catalogued and standardized their vocabulary and identified their grammatical rules. These languages are called naturalistic. One such language, Latino Sine Flexione, is a simplified form of Latin. Another, Occidental, was drawn from several Western languages. An international auxiliary language (sometimes abbreviated as IAL or auxlang) is a language used (or to be used in the future) for communication between people from different nations who do not share a common native language. ... Latino sine flexione (Latin without inflections) is an auxiliary language invented by the mathematician Giuseppe Peano in 1903. ... The language Occidental, later Interlingue, is a planned language created by the Baltogerman naval officer and teacher Edgar de Wahl and published in 1922. ...

To date, the most successful naturalistic language is Interlingua. The vocabulary of Interlingua consists of international words from any language family. Most Interlingua words are of Greco-Latin origin, because Greek and Latin have penetrated very widely into modern-day languages. Interlingua makes use of Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French, English, German, and Russian as control languages to confirm the internationality of each eligible word. The International Auxiliary Language Association, which standardized Interlingua, found that this selection of controls gave Interlingua the greatest possible internationality. Interlingua is an international auxiliary language (IAL) published in 1951 by the International Auxiliary Language Association (IALA). ... The International Auxiliary Language Association that existed from 1924 to 1954 was a notable proponent of international auxiliary languages. ...

Constructed languages

Main article: Constructed language

Some individuals and groups have constructed their own artificial languages, for practical, experimental, personal, or ideological reasons. For example, one prominent artificial language, Esperanto, was created by L. L. Zamenhof as a compilation of various elements of different languages, and was intended to be an easy-to-learn language for people familiar with similar, mostly Indo-European, languages. Other constructed languages strive to be more logical ("loglangs") than natural languages; a prominent example of this is Lojban. Both of these languages are meant as international auxiliary languages. A constructed or artificial language — known colloquially as a conlang — is a language whose phonology, grammar, and/or vocabulary have been devised by an individual or small group, instead of having naturally evolved as part of a culture. ... An artificial or constructed language (known colloquially as a conlang among aficionados), is a language whose vocabulary and grammar were specifically devised by an individual or small group, rather than having naturally evolved as part of a culture as with natural languages. ... Look up Esperanto in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... L. L. Zamenhof Dr. Ludovic Lazarus (Ludwik Lejzer, Ludwik Łazarz) Zamenhof (December 15, 1859 – April 14, 1917) was an eye doctor, philologist, and the initiator of Esperanto, the most widely spoken and successful constructed language in the world. ... Lojban (IPA , official full name Lojban: a realization of Loglan) is a syntactically unambiguous, predicate logic-based constructed language which was created by the Logical Language Group in 1987 as a realization of Loglan, with the intent to make the language more complete, usable, and freely available. ...

Some writers, such as J. R. R. Tolkien, have created fantasy languages, for literary, artistic, or personal reasons. John Ronald Reuel Tolkien CBE (January 3, 1892 – September 2, 1973) was an English philologist, writer and university professor who is best known as the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. ... An artistic language (artlang) is a constructed language designed for aesthetic pleasure. ...

The study of language

Main article: Linguistics

The historical record of the study of language begins in Northern India with Pāṇini, the 5th century BC grammarian who formulated 3,959 rules of Sanskrit morphology, known as the Aṣṭādhyāyī (अष्टाध्यायी). Pāṇini’s grammar is highly systematised and technical. Inherent in its analytic approach are the concepts of the phoneme, the morpheme, and the root; the phoneme was only recognised by Western linguists some two millennia later. Its classification of the alphabet into consonants and vowels, and elements like nouns, verbs, vowels and consonants which he put into classes, were also breakthroughs at the time. Linguistics is the scientific study of language. ... Indian postage stamp depicting (2004), with the implication that he used (पाणिनि; IPA ) was an ancient Indian grammarian from Gandhara (traditionally 520–460 BC, but estimates range from the 7th to 4th centuries BC). ... (2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC - 1st millennium) The 5th century BC started on January 1, 500 BC and ended on December 31, 401 BC. // The Parthenon of Athens seen from the hill of the Pnyx to the west. ... The Sanskrit language (Skt. ... For other uses, see Morphology. ... The Ashtadhyayi (AṣṭādhyāyÄ«, meaning eight chapters) is the earliest known grammar of Sanskrit, and one of the first works on descriptive linguistics, generative linguistics, or linguistics altogether. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... In morpheme-based morphology, a morpheme is the smallest lingual unit that carries a semantic interpretation. ... The root is the primary lexical unit of a word, which carries the most significant aspects of semantic content and cannot be reduced into smaller constituents. ... In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a sound in spoken language that is characterized by a closure or stricture of the vocal tract sufficient to cause audible turbulence. ... Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ...

In the Middle East, the arabic linguist Sibawayh made a detailed and professional description of Arabic in 760 CE in his monumental work, Al-kitab fi al-nahw (الكتاب في النحو, The Book on Grammar), bringing many linguistic aspects of language to light. In his book he distinguished phonetics from phonology. A map showing countries commonly considered to be part of the Middle East The Middle East is a region comprising the lands around the southern and eastern parts of the Mediterranean Sea, a territory that extends from the eastern Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... Sibawayh (سيبويه Sîbawayh in Arabic, سیبویه Sibuyeh in Persian) was a linguist of Persian origin born ca. ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... Linguistics is the scientific study of language. ... Phonetics (from the Greek word φωνή, phone meaning sound, voice) is the study of sounds and the human voice. ... Phonology (Greek phonÄ“ = voice/sound and logos = word/speech), is a subfield of linguistics which studies the sound system of a specific language (or languages). ...

Later in the West, the success of science, mathematics, and other formal systems in the 20th century led many to attempt a formalisation of the study of language as a "semantic code". This resulted in the academic discipline of linguistics, the founding of which is attributed to Ferdinand de Saussure. Part of a scientific laboratory at the University of Cologne. ... Euclid, Greek mathematician, 3rd century BC, as imagined by by Raphael in this detail from The School of Athens. ... In logic and mathematics, a formal system consists of two components, a formal language plus a set of inference rules or transformation rules. ... This is a list of academic disciplines (and academic fields). ... Linguistics is the scientific study of language. ... Saussure Ferdinand de Saussure (pronounced ) (November 26, 1857 – February 22, 1913) was a Geneva-born Swiss linguist whose ideas laid the foundation for many of the significant developments in linguistics in the 20th century. ...

Non-human languages

Main article: Animal language

The term "animal languages" is often used for non-human languages. Linguists do not consider these to be language; they may better be described as animal communication, because they are fundamentally different in their underlying principles from true language, which has only been found in humans. Animal language is the modeling of human language in non human animal systems. ... Animal language is the modeling of human language in non human animal systems. ... Animal communication is any behaviour on the part of one animal that has an effect on the current or future behaviour of another animal. ...

In several publicised instances, non-human animals have been taught to understand certain features of human language. For example, chimpanzees and gorillas have been taught hand signs based on American Sign Language; however, they have never been successfully taught its grammar. There was also a case in 2003 of Kanzi, a saved bonobo chimpanzee, allegedly independently creating some words to mean certain concepts. While animal communication has debated levels of semantics, it has not been shown to have syntax in the sense that human languages do. Type species Simia troglodytes Blumenbach, 1775 distribution of Species Pan troglodytes Pan paniscus Chimpanzee, often shortened to chimp, is the common name for the two extant species in the genus Pan. ... Type species Troglodytes gorilla Savage, 1847 distribution of Gorilla Species Gorilla gorilla Gorilla beringei The gorilla, the largest of the living primates, is a ground-dwelling omnivore that inhabits the forests of Africa. ... American Sign Language (ASL; less commonly Ameslan) is the dominant sign language of the Deaf community in the United States, in the English-speaking parts of Canada, and in parts of Mexico. ... Kanzi (born October 23, 1980), a bonobo, is one of the most most famous and accomplished linguistic apes, in research led by E. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh. ... Semantics (Greek semantikos, giving signs, significant, symptomatic, from sema, sign) refers to the aspects of meaning that are expressed in a language, code, or other form of representation. ... For other uses, see Syntax (disambiguation). ...

Some researchers argue that a continuum exists among the communication methods of all social animals, pointing to the fundamental requirements of group behaviour and the existence of "mirror cells" in primates. This, however, is still a scientific question. What exactly is the definition of the word "language"? Most researchers agree that, although human and more primitive languages have analogous features, they are not homologous. A mirror neuron is a neuron which fires both when performing an action and when observing the same action performed by another (possibly conspecific) creature. ... Families 15, See classification A primate (L. prima, first) is any member of the biological order Primates, the group that contains all the species commonly related to the lemurs, monkeys, and apes, with the latter category including humans. ... Analogy is both the cognitive process of transferring information from a particular subject (the analogue or source) to another particular subject (the target), and a linguistic expression corresponding to such a process. ...

Formal languages

Main article: Formal language

Mathematics and computer science use artificial entities called formal languages (including programming languages and markup languages, but also some that are far more theoretical in nature). These often take the form of character strings, produced by some combination of formal grammar and semantics of arbitrary complexity. In mathematics, logic, and computer science, a formal language is a set of finite-length words (i. ... Computer science, or computing science, is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and their implementation and application in computer systems. ... A programming language is an artificial language that can be used to control the behavior of a machine, particularly a computer. ... A specialized markup language using SGML is used to write the electronic version of the Oxford English Dictionary. ... In various branches of mathematics and computer science, strings are sequences of various simple objects (symbols, tokens, characters, etc. ... In computer science and linguistics, a formal grammar, or sometimes simply grammar, is a precise description of a formal language — that is, of a set of strings. ...

Language and culture

Language is an element of culture that contributes to every aspect of human relationships. Andy Clark’s assertion that language is the ultimate cultural artifact is backed by the countless functions that language serves. The role that language plays in human interaction transcends basic communication (such as commanding somebody to do something, or providing information when asked a question) to facilitate the existence of ethos and mythos. This cultural artifact encodes meanings through its ability to manipulate what others imagine. The existence of denotations, what we mean to point out or say, is often received as connotation, what people have culturally subscribed to understanding when something is pointed out. Because of language’s proficiency to encode an extensive range of meanings, and represent almost all ideas including thoughts, it is the ultimate cultural artifact.^{[citation needed]}

See also

Brocas area is the section of the human brain (in the opercular and triangular sections of the inferior frontal gyrus of the frontal lobe of the cortex) that is involved in language processing, speech production and comprehension. ... Universal grammar is a theory of linguistics postulating principles of grammar shared by all languages, thought to be innate to humans. ... This list of languages is alphabetical by English name. ... // See List of official languages by institution. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Ethnologue: Languages of the World is a web and print publication of SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics), a Christian linguistic service organization which studies lesser-known languages primarily to provide the speakers with Bibles in their native language. ... An official language is a language that is given a privileged legal status in a state, or other legally-defined territory. ... An extinct language (also called a dead language) is a language which no longer has any native speakers. ... Symbolic communication is exchange of messages that change a priori expectation of events. ... Look up translate in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... It has been suggested that Interpreter (communication) be merged into this article or section. ... A whistled language is the use of whistling to emulate speech and facilitate communication. ... Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) is an approach to language teaching and learning in which computer technology is used as an aid to the presentation, reinforcement and assessment of material to be learned, usually including a substantial interactive element. ... This article or section includes a list of works cited but its sources remain unclear because it lacks in-text citations. ... Language education refers to the teaching and learning of a language. ... Language reform is a kind of language planning by massive change to a language. ... Many countries have a language policy designed to favour or discourage the use of a particular language or set of languages. ... A language school is where one can learn a foreign language. ... Linguistic protectionism is any state policy introduced to protect a given language from the expansion of a stronger language (usually a language with a much greater number of speakers), or against mixing (or deliberate compatibility) with a different dialect or a closely related language. ... Linguistics is the scientific study of language. ... This is a list of bodies that regulate languages. ... When you create an image to communicate an idea, you are using visual language. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... Intercultural competence is the ability for successful communication with people of other cultures. ... Metacommunicative competence is the ability to steeringly intervene within difficult conversations and to correct communication problems by utilizing the different ways of practical communication: verbal communication: by words or their meaning paraverbal communication: loudness of speaking, manner of speaking, when keeping silent, meaning of interrupting or interfering the conversation nonverbal... A name is a label for a person, thing, place, product (as in a brand name) and even an idea or concept, normally used to distinguish one from another. ... http://members. ... Gender-neutral language (gender-generic, gender-inclusive, non-sexist, or sex-neutral language) is language that attempts to refer neither to males nor females when discussing an abstract or hypothetical person whose sex cannot otherwise be determined, as opposed to more traditional language forms, which may use male or female... The orthography of a language is the set of symbols (glyphs and diacritics) used to write a language, as well as the set of rules describing how to write these glyphs, including spelling, punctuation, and capitalization. ... Philology is the study of ancient texts and languages. ... Historical linguistics (also diachronic linguistics or comparative linguistics) is primarily the study of the ways in which languages change over time. ... Philosophy of language is the reasoned inquiry into the nature, origins, and usage of language. ... Look up Profanity in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Psycholinguistics or psychology of language is the study of the psychological and neurobiological factors that enable humans to acquire, use, and understand language. ... Sign language interpreter on stage A sign language (also signed language) is a language which uses manual communication instead of sound to convey meaning - simultaneously combining handshapes, orientation and movement of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions to express fluidly a speakers thoughts. ... In linguistics, the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis (SWH) states that there is a systematic relationship between the grammatical categories of the language a person speaks and how that person both understands the world and behaves in it. ... Slang is the use of highly informal words and expressions that are not considered standard in the speakers dialect or language. ... It has been suggested that Speech-Language Pathology, Speech pathology, Phoniatrics be merged into this article or section. ... Terminology, in its general sense, simply refers to the usage and study of terms, that is to say words and compound words generally used in specific contexts. ... A tongue-twister is a phrase in any language that is designed to be difficult to articulate properly. ... ISO 639 is one of several international standards that lists short codes for language names. ... ISO 639-3 is in process of development as an international standard for language codes. ... FOXP2 (forkhead box P2) is a gene that is implicated in the development of language skills, including grammatical competence. ... The Interagency Language Roundtable (ILR) scale is a set of descriptions of abilities to communicate in a language. ...

References

• Crystal, David (1997). The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
• Crystal, David (2001). The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
• Gode, Alexander (1951). Interlingua-English Dictionary. New York, Frederick Ungar Publishing Company.
• Katzner, K. (1999). The Languages of the World. New York, Routledge.
• McArthur, T. (1996). The Concise Companion to the English Language. Oxford, Oxford University Press.
• Kandel ER, Schwartz JH, Jessell TM. Principles of Neural Science, fourth edition, 1173 pages. McGraw-Hill, New York (2000). ISBN 0-8385-7701-6

The Interlingua-English Dictionary (IED), developed by the International Auxiliary Language Association (IALA) and published by Storm Publishers in 1951, is the first Interlingua dictionary. ... Eric Richard Kandel (born November 7, 1929) is a psychiatrist, a neuroscientist and professor of biochemistry and biophysics at Columbia University. ... Principles of Nerual Science cover First published in 1981, Principles of Neural Science is a neuroscience textbook edited by Eric R. Kandel, James Schwartz, and Thomas Jessell. ...

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