Properties of human language
Displacements: Displacement is the property of human
language that allows language users to talk
about things and events not present in the
immediate moment.
* Animal communication is generally considered to lack this property
2. Arbitrariness (in human language)
Generally, there is no ‘natural’ connection between a
linguistic form and its meaning. The relation between linguistic forms and the objects they refer
to is arbitrary
Dog in English and كلبin Arabic.
There are some words (onomatopoeic) in language with
sounds that seems to ‘echo’ the sounds of objects or actions
(less arbitrary)Onomatopoeia: the use of words that sound like the thing
they are describing, (e.g. 'hiss' or 'boom’)
Onomatopoeic words are relatively rare in human language.
Arbitrariness (in animal communication) there is a connection between the conveyed message
and the signal used to convey. It consists of a fixed and limited set of vocal or gestural forms.
(Many are only used in specific situations or at particular times)
3. Productivity (in humans)
Productivity (creativity/ open-endlessness):The capability of humans to continually create new
expressions and utterances to describe new objects and situations
o The number of utterance in any human language is infinite.
Productivity (in animals)
o The communication systems of other creatures don’t have
this flexibility.
o They have a limited set of signals to choose from (fixed
reference)
o Each signal in the system is fixed as relating to a particular
object or occasion.
o They cannot produce any new signals to describe novel
experiences.
o The worker bee example (p. 11)
4. Cultural transmission (in humans)o Humans inherit physical features from their parents but
not
language.
o We acquire a language in a culture with other speakers (not from
parental genes)
Cultural transmission
The process whereby a language is passed on from one
generation to the next.
o We are born with a predisposition to acquire language (but not
with the ability to produce utterances in a specific language)
o We acquire our 1st language as children in a culture.
Cultural transmission (in animals)
Animal are born with a set of specific signals that
are produced instinctively.
Human infants, growing up in isolation, produce no
‘instinctive’ language.
So, cultural transmission of a specific language is
crucial in the human language acquisition process.
5. Duality (double-articulation) – in humans
In speech production:
o At a physical level, individual discrete sounds (e.g. g, d,& o)
mean nothing separately.
o At another level, they take on meaning only when they are
combined together in various ways (e.g. god/ dog)
Human language is organized at 2 levels or layers simultaneously:
o At one level - distinct sounds
o At another level - distinct meanings
Duality is one of the most economical features of human language
(with a limited set of discrete sounds, we are capable of producing a
very large number of sound combinations (e.g. words))
Duality (double-articulation) – in animals
o Animals’ communicative signals are fixed and
cannot be broken down into separate parts
meow is not m + e + o + w
Talking to animals
Can animals understand our language?
Under the impression that animals follow what is being said...
(horses, pets, circus animals!)
Is this an evidence that non-humans can understand human
language?
The standard explanation is that the animal produces a particular
behavior in response to a particular sound-stimulus or ‘noise’, but
doesn’t actually understand what the word in the noise mean.
Can animals of one species learn to produce the signals of
another species? (Horse – cows/ puppy- baby) (p. 13)
Chimpanzees and language
Some researchers devoted their time to teach
a chimpanzee how to use human language-
not successful
Luella & Winthrop Kellogg – 1930s:
o Raised an infant chimpanzee (Gua) with their
baby son.
o Gua- was able to understand 100 words but
did not produce any.
Catherine & Keith Hayes – 1940s:
o raised (Viki) as a human child.
o Spent 5 years attempting to get her to ‘say’ English
words by trying to shape her mouth as she produces
sounds.
o Eventually, she managed to produce poorly articulated
versions of mama, papa, and cup.
This was a remarkable achievement: it has become clear that non-
humans don’t actually have a physically structures vocal tract which
is suitable for articulating the sounds used in speech.
Apes & gorillas, like chimpanzees, communicate with a wide range
of vocal calls (but they just can’t make human speech sounds)
Beatrix & Allen Gardner:
raised Washoe as a human child.
taught her to use ASL (learned by many deaf
children as their natural 1st lang.)
Sign language was always used when she’s around
+ she was encouraged to use signs.
In 3 ½ years, she came to use signs for more than a
100 words. (e.g. baby, banana, window, woman,
you, etc)
She was able to combine forms to produce
sentences (e.g. more fruit/ open food drink)
She invented some forms (e.g. water bird = swan) –
productivity.
Ann & David Premack
Taught Sara to use a set of plastic shapes (represented
‘words’ and could be arranged in sequence to build
‘sentences’)
She was systematically trained to associate these shapes
with objects or actions.
Food rewards
She was capable of:
getting an apple by selecting the correct plastic shape (a
blue triangle)
Producing ‘sentences’ (e.g. Mary give chocolate Sarah)
Understanding complex structures (e.g. If Sarah put red on
green, Mary give Sarah chocolate.)
Duane Rumbaugh
Trained Lana using a similar training technique (artificial language – Yerkish)
Yerkish consisted of a set of symbols on a large keyboard linked to a computer
For water = press 4 symbols in the correct sequence = please machine give water
Both Sara & Lana demonstrated an ability to use (word symbols + basic structure)
The controversy
Can animals speak human-like languages? Can animals perform linguistically on a level
comparable to a human child at the same
age?
