Preview

Does Language Play Roles of Equal Importance in Different Areas of Knowledge?

Powerful Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1501 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Does Language Play Roles of Equal Importance in Different Areas of Knowledge?
Does language play roles of equal importance in different areas of knowledge?

Language is a tool to communicate one’s ideas, thoughts and understanding of many different areas of knowledge and it is highly arguable that language plays an equal role of importance in the different areas of knowledge. It is important to state that language is a complex structure only used by humans. Of course animals have language too, but it not useful for the study of the areas of knowledge. The areas of knowledge, the study of mathematics, history, natural sciences, human sciences, ethics and the arts are meant. The areas of knowledge such as history, Mathematics, and ethics and whether language plays a role of equal importance in each will be discussed separately further on.

To be able to discuss the importance of language, one must first understand what is exactly meant by language. As mentioned, language is a sort of tool to transfer one’s information and communicate one’s understanding of events, ideas, and feelings. There are three key features that distinguish language from non-language.
First of all, language is rule-governed. This means that it needs to have some sort of structure, such as grammar. This way, one can know in which order words must be set up to make sense. In the English language, for example, the structure is Subject (noun), then Verb, then Object (noun). This is not the grammar structure for all languages that exist. In Mongolian, on the other hand, the structure is Subject (noun), Object (noun), and then Verb.
Secondly, language must be intended. To fully explain this, consider the following examples. You are bored in class and, while the teacher is writing on the board, you catch someone’s eye across the room and make a yawning gesture by putting your hand to your mouth. Or you are trying to look interested in what someone says and to your horror find yourself starting to yawn. The difference between these two examples is that one is

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Synthesis Essay

    • 537 Words
    • 3 Pages

    In today’s society, language is one of the most important and most used things in everyday life. Language is one of the most effective and efficient ways of communicating with one another, animals, and God. It can be used as a mirror, tool, or a weapon.…

    • 537 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Language can be looked at differently from other types of cognitions. There is a need for language in one form or another to have the ability to communicate with other human beings. This communication is the basis to how human beings express themselves to those around them. With this expression comes the ability to formulate thoughts. These thoughts can be translated to others through language. This language play an important role when analyzing, problem-solving, creating reasons, communicating needs, and making plans. Without the existence of language the attempt for humans to achieve goals would be almost impossible to accomplish. Goals would have to be accomplished be figuring out an alternative method than language to be used for sciences, history, mathematics, and the ability to explain past experiences or cultures. Because language is such an important communication tool, this paper will go into the definition of language and lexicon, evaluating the key features of language, with a description of the four levels of the language structure and processing, and analyzing the role of language processing in cognitive psychology.…

    • 1543 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Language is a very import part in our life, we carry it with us through all the steps, processes, moments experiences of our life, language built us and make us grow and the most important thing is that it grows with us, changes, modifies itself, and becomes more appropriate and specific. As we pointed out language help us to create and understand the world around us, gives meaning to everything and gives birth to emotions and feelings; a world without language would be meaningless and very lonely. Language it’s what help us grow up, the more we learn through it, the more we desire to experience and study in deep, leading us to new prospective, opening our mind to more specific and deep concepts, ideas, projects, goals. We really can’t live our life to the best without it, we are not the same without language and we can only give it the right importance, the importance making our life being in contact and in relation with people, the importance of making us feel alive and passionate of the world we are living with, the importance to fulfill our life to the top.…

    • 1643 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Psy 360 Language Essay

    • 1420 Words
    • 6 Pages

    One big question, when the subject of language comes up, is exactly what language is. What constitutes something as a language? By explaining one definition of a language, and a term associated with language, called a lexicon, a definition of language transpires. Thus, the Willingham (2007) text mentions four certain characteristics communication must possess to, officially, be considered a language. One of these characteristics is that language must be communicative, and thus be communication between individuals in some form or another. Secondly, the symbols standing for words must be arbitrary, and thus have no reason for representing a word. Third, a language must be structured, and not arbitrary. For example, if I say a dog was walking on a sidewalk I cannot say a sidewalk was walking on a dog. etc. Fourth, a language must be generative, and the basic units of a language, words for us, may have infinite meanings. Lastly, the language must be changed constantly and have new words being created. For example, the O'Neil (2006) website mentions that the word nice used to mean foolish, and wicked, but has evolved from the fifteenth century to mean kind, generous, etc. (O'Neil, 2006). Speaking of meanings of words, now that a definition of language has appeared, let us define lexicon. The Merriam Webster Inc.…

    • 1420 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Language plays an important role in human life. One tries to acquire, learn and use language as a means of communication, and simultaneously as social symbol of humanity. By using language someone could make statements, convey facts and knowledge explain or report something, and keep social relations among the language users. These indicate that by means of language, people can express their ideas, feeling, information etc through communication.…

    • 376 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Language is the tool for all of people around the world to communicate with each other; it is a product of human’s creativity which we can consider as the first evolution for the human kind. However, in different place, people use different languages which are differed in many ways: structure, pronunciation, meaning, and way of writing. Base on the Sapir-Whorf theory, language help mould the way we think; specially, the language habits of community. According to my way of thought, the way we think are affected by lots of different things; like education, family’s condition, environment, friends, traditions, … . So, it do that language help to mould the way we think but we would hardly think in the same way even we spoke the same language.…

    • 587 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    “Non-verbal communication tends to provide the context of verbal communication and has the power to disambiguate or invalidate the content of linguistic expressions”, (Krippendorff, 1986)…

    • 1539 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Seminar Linguistic

    • 4145 Words
    • 24 Pages

    Language has a social function as a tool to make connection between human beings. Without language, it seems impossible for people to interact with others in their daily life because language can express people’s feeling, willing, and opinion. In short, language is the oral symbols that represent meaning as they are related to real life situation and experience. People use language to communicate with another people. Their feeling, emotion, and desire can be showed by using language.…

    • 4145 Words
    • 24 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    My Friend

    • 506 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Language is the major means in which human beings communicate . Language is also needed to satisfy the human need to speak out emotions , complex needs , thoughts and ideas . Spoken language is a structured set of sounds while written language is a structured set of symbols . Language is acquired or learned , and the ability to use language effectively greatly affects our ability to operate well within society . There are different forms of language , which are used at different times for different situations , these requires a high level…

    • 506 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Linguistics

    • 566 Words
    • 3 Pages

    LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS OVERVIEW • The origin of Language • Features of Language • Knowledge of Language • Linguistics • Branches of Linguistics • Approaches to Linguistic Studies • Schools of Linguistics THE ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE • The divine source • The natural sound source o Primitive words o Cuckoo, splash, rattle, hiss, buzz o “Bow-wow theory of language origin.” • The social interaction source • The physical adaptation source •…

    • 566 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Impotance of English

    • 1165 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Language, so far as we know, is something specific to humans, that is to say it is the basic capacity that distinguishes humans from all other living beings. Language therefore remains potentially a communicative medium capable of expressing ideas and concepts as well as moods, feelings and attitudes.…

    • 1165 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Language means many things to people. It is the systematic means to communication. It is the way through which we could express our ideas, thoughts and feelings. It is very important to each one of us in order to understand one another. It is one way to be connected to people we love like our family, friends, relatives and people we meet along the way. It can help build up new relationship to others. One cannot live without language. He or she is not capable of mingling with others.…

    • 1282 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    There is no way to overrate the importance of language. For some, it is a career. For others, it is the difference between life and death. Language, as a form of knowledge, pervades every other realm of knowledge—simply because it is the most commonly used way to communicate logic, ideas, and perceptions. Language simply is one of the most important tools, as well as one of the most powerful ones, that human beings use everyday. Language runs into problems when the multiple meanings of words, the multitude of words representing one meaning and the ambiguity of some definitions, leads to problems with misunderstanding and deception.…

    • 944 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Importance of Language

    • 1238 Words
    • 5 Pages

    The issues concerning language and knowledge call for conscious scrutiny in order to recognize its influence on thought and behavior. In the Arts, for instance, language is completely neccessary to explain the meaning of art to an individual. Essentially, art is all language, just like every other form of knowledge. Art is not possible without some form of symbolism. For example, dance is a great performing art. Body language is a notable form of communication. This means, it is not directly said or even said at all. It is all interpreted from the perspective of the audience. Another example of art would be paintings and photography, also known as symbols that are portrayed for…

    • 1238 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Language opens the door for learners to acquire knowledge that others already have. Learners can use language to know and understand the world and solve problems. It serves a social function but it also has an important individual function. It helps the learner to regulate and reflect on his own thinking.…

    • 313 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays