Language Properties Prepared by: Pishtiwan A. sabir 28th Feb 2011

Key Points Human Unique properties :Properties related to human language. Non Unique properties: properties related to the language of both human and other creatures.

Unique properties are: 1-Arbitrariness 2-Displacemnet 3-Duality 4-Productivity(Creativity) 5-discreteness 6-patterning 7-Structure Dependence 8-Cultural Transmission

1- Arbitrariness: House Ready to pounce Arbitrariness means there is no connections or relationship between the Linguistic forms and the meaning. For example when we pronounce the word house, it has nothing to do with the shape of house. But When a cat arches its back, it means the cat wants to jump. House No relationship Ready to pounce There is relationship

2- Displacement: Displacement means Human being can talk about past, present and future while animals cannot do that. But occasionally in animal life this will happen. For example when a worker bee finds the source of nectar, it returns to hive and makes a complex dance to clarify the exact location of the nectar.

3-Duality: Duality is another distinctive characteristic of language which refers to the fact that language consists of a set of segments or units in which they are not carrying meaning by themselves like “A” “E” “T” letters, but when they are combined in certain sequences, they form larger units and they carry meaning. Also Human can play with the sounds, for example they can make “Eat” “Ate” “Tea” But Animals has specific stock of sounds which varies according to species. Most of the animals can use the sound only once. .

4- Productivity. The Term refers to the creativity in human language. Example we can utter a sentence which has never been said before. At the same time we can write a paragraph, or essay or a novel. But we cannot notice such things in Animal life.

5- discreteness Discreteness means human language consists of distinctive units, different pronunciation in the sounds of human language leads to different meaning. Back -------- Pack Pin -------- Bin Heat----------Meat Feat----------Seat

6- patterning: Pattering means human create words and sentences systematically not haphazardly. For example we can make couple of words in these letters( A-N-T), like: Ant and Tan. But if we say *Atn -* Nat, they are meaningless.

7-Cultural transmission: Another key features of human language is Cultural transmission, which means language is not transferring genetically from parents to their children. For example when we transfer a newly Kurdish born baby to England, he will learn English, but if we transfer a newly born kitten from Kurdistan to England, the kitten will have the mew.

8-Structure Dependence: Structure dependence means the human language depends on an understanding of the internal structure of a sentence, rather than on the number of elements involved. For example : each of these sentences has a similar basic structure The man is my brother The man who gave me the gift is may brother. He is my brother. Also if we look at these sentences we realize that human language has its own structure. I closed the door. We can not always add “ed” to the second word in every sentences. The company - ed was bankrupted.

Non Unique properties: 1- Vocal Auditory channel. 2-specialization. 3-interchangability 4-Rapid Fade 5-Non directionality 6-Prevarifications

1- Vocal Auditory Channel: It means in both human and animal language there is listener and speaker.

2-Specialization: Both Human and Animal has basic stock of sounds: For Example: In Kurdish we have 35 sounds In English we have 44 sounds Dog has 8 sounds Cow has 10 sounds

3-Interchangability: By interchangeability we mean both human and animals exchange roles.

4-Rapid fade: Rapid fade means the sounds will be disappeared as soon as they are produced.

5-Non Directionality: This property states that the linguistic sounds will not be directed only to one person, any one within the hearing range can pick up the sounds. For example when I will speak to the students, some body out side of the class will hear it.

6-prevarification: It means the ability of both Human and animals to lie or deceive others. For example fox can trick easily.

Sources 1-An introduction to Language, Fromkin, Rodman and Hyams 2-Linguistics, Aitchison 3-Dictionary of Language teaching and Applied linguistics. Richard and Platt. 4-An introduction to language and Linguistics. Fasold. 5- A dictionary f Linguistics and Phonetics. Crystal 6-http://www.slideshare.net/cupidlucid/today-the-properties-presentation

Thank you