Communication The different categories of communication include: Spoken or Verbal Communication: face-to-face, telephone, radio or television and other media. Non-Verbal Communication: body language, gestures, how we dress or act - even our scent. Written Communication: letters, e-mails, books, magazines, the Internet or via other media. Visualizations: graphs and charts, maps, logos and other visualizations can communicate messages

Communication Systems & Language Communication systems used by other animals such as bees or non-human primates are closed systems, that consist of a closed number of possible things that can be communicated.  Human language is open-ended, meaning that it allows humans to produce an infinite set of utterances from a finite set of elements.

NONHUMAN PRIMATE COMMUNICATION Call Systems: use a limited number of sounds that are produced in response to specific stimuli Automatic and cannot be combined At some point in human development, our ancestors began to combine calls and to understand combinations

WHAT IS LANGUAGE? Allows humans to: Conjure up elaborate images Discuss the past and future Share experiences with others Benefit from their experiences Anthropologists study language in its social and cultural context

6 Properties of Language The six unique properties of language are as follows: Displacement Productivity or Creativeness Discreteness Arbitrariness Duality Cultural transmission

Linguistics Study of the Structure & Function The five main components of language are phonemes, morphemes, lexemes, syntax, and context. Along with grammar, semantics, and pragmatics, these components work together to create meaningful communication among individuals. A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound that may cause a change of meaning within a language but that doesn't have meaning by itself. A morpheme is the smallest unit of a word that provides a specific meaning to a string of letters (which is called a phoneme). There are two main types of morpheme: free morphemes and bound morphemes. A lexeme is the set of all the inflected forms of a single word. Syntax is the set of rules by which a person constructs full sentences. Context is how everything within language works together to convey a particular meaning.

Prescriptive vs Descriptive Linguistics

Historical Linguistics