Unit 1 Awareness of Our Language

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Unit 1Awareness of Our Language

• Performance Objectives
• 1 .Be aware that language is crucial to human
  evolution
• 2. Be aware that language is crucial to human
  civilization
• 3. Be aware of some traditional and popular views
  about language
• 4. Get a gist of what linguistic science is about
  

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• In English,when we use the word LANGUAG without
  an indefinite article,likeLanguage is a tool of
  communication, it means any language or all
  languages put together.Here is the first
  important point about this book It is about
  language,not confined to any particular
  language.When English and Chinese are being
  talked about,they are used as two specific
  examples of language.So the title of Unit1
  reads Awareness of Our Language.It can be
  Chinese,or English,or French,or German.

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• To summarize Unit 1 in one sentence,this sentence
  will bewe must appreciate the fact that we owe
  our humanity and civilization to language.Other
  animals can beat us in many different ways,but
  what makes us superior to all of them is our
  possession of language.In this unit we also
  attempt to seek an answer to the questionIs
  language inside or outside the brain? It is known
  as the nature-nurture controversy.The position we
  adopt ishuman are born with language capacity
  that enables them to acquire,any language,during
  their formative years.They cab be learn any
  foreign language through efforts in their
  adulthood.

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Activity 1Language,Homo Sapiens and Civilization

• Task 1 Reflect on language(Awareness)
• Language is more important to humans than
  eyes,mouth,hands,legs,etc.,are.Without language
  human beings will remain like apes and
  chimpanzees and will have no civilization at all.
• Language is unique to humans and that no other
  animals will be able to speak a human
  language.This century has witnessed that
  researchers who have failed to teach chimpanzees
  to speak human language or use sign language.

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• Task 2 Is language in the brain?(Awareness)
• Language has something to do with human brain.A
  very influential theory of linguistics is known
  as transformational generative grammar( ???? ??
  ) that emphasizes the innateness of human
  language.There are also interdisciplinary studies
  that focus on the relation between language and
  brain,notably psycholinguistics( ????? ),and
  neurolinguistics( ???? ? ).

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• Task 3 Is language outside the brain?(Awareness)
• There is an age-old debate known as the
  nature-nurture controversy.That is,people debate
  over the issue of whether language is already
  there in the brain or it is not there and it has
  to be learned,i.e. nurtured.
• It is more acceptable to many to hold a middle
  ground position,that is,to believe that language
  capacity that enables them to acquire
  language,any language,during their formative
  years.Since language capacity in the brain can
  hardly be called language,language
  proper(i.e.itself) is therefore not inside the
  brain.Its nature is shaped by the way language
  users use it in communication.

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• Task 4 Why so many languages?
• Language serves different functions to different
  people--the earliest language became gradually
  different As time went by, the differences became
  so great that different language were born. That
  is why there are more than 5000 languages in the
  worlds.

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The History of the Worlds Languages(1)

• the origin of mankind
• Africa, 3,000,000 years ago,Homo i.e.
  man2,000,000 years ago,Homo habilis i.e.handy
  mantool-making and tool-using1,500,000 years
  ago, Homo erectus i.e. upright man---walking
  upright with hands free300,00 years ago Homo
  sapiens i.e. wise man 175,000 years ago Homo
  sapiens sapiens i.e.modern man
• the origin of language
• one language at the very beginningdeveloped by
  African men,between 250,000 and 50,000 years ago

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The History of the Worlds language(2)

• The migration from Africa to the other parts of
  the worldAfrican men walked out Africa and
  spread all over the world,about 35,000 to 12,000
  years ago
• Various dialects becoming languagesseparated for
  too long,unable to understand one another any
  more.
• Language familiesmodern linguists try to
  reconstruct historical links between the
  present-day different languages

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• Task 5 Language and civilization
• No language no civilization.Without language,man
  would have remained in the jungle rubbing
  shoulders with chimpanzees.
• Before writing was invented,civilization was
  preserved through speech and songs.

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Activity 2Traditional and Popular Views of
Languages

• Task 1 Word magic(Awareness)
• The belief that words possess magic power is
  all-pervasive in mans history.Words of course
  never work wonders all by themselves.Only
  language users can make things happen.Word magic
  is a kind of superstitious beliefs,which is often
  due to ignorance or to the the fear of things
  that people do not have power to control.

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• There is another superstitious belief that words
  have social and political power.
• The reason that the king mentioned in the book
  kept for three years is that he was aware that
  whatever he said would be treated as words of
  laws,and would have a tremendous effect on the
  life of his subjects.

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• Task 3 Is the name the person?
• There is another traditional view about the power
  of wordsit is the attitude towards proper
  name.Proper names are associated with
  political,social and religious power.
• Practically speaking,a name gives people an
  identity.You can identify him easily with it,and
  it is particularly handy when the person you are
  talking about is absent.

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• Task 4 Written language as social status
• There is another popular view about language
  which is not universal,namely attitudes towards
  written languages.
• People who cannot read or write their mother
  language are termed illiterate,and illiterate
  people are very much underprivileged and remain
  low in social hierarchy,Those who can read and
  write well,on the other hand,are regarded as
  educated scholars,and command respect.

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• Speaking ones mother language is spontaneous and
  almost effortless.However,it takes years of hard
  practice to write it well.Moreover,speech dies as
  soon as one finishes speaking,whereas writing
  can last for ever if one is determined to keep
  it,So naturally people trust writing more than
  speech.
• The ability to read and write is crucial for
  access to communication and information.A society
  with no access to these two things would have
  difficulty in surviving in modern times.that is
  why it is a national policy that citizens should
  be illiterate.

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Activity ThreeLanguageYours and Not Yours

• Is the language you speak yours?
• First we must make a distinction between Chinese
  we speak and what we speak in Chinese.What you
  speak is yours.
• The Chinese you speak ,ignoring the content of
  what you say this time,is yours and at the same
  time not yours.This is because the Chinese you
  speak is one of the Chinese language all Chinese
  native speaks speak and you cannot make changes
  to it without the consensus of all the Chinese
  speakers.

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• Language is everyones language,but it belongs to
  no one.It is possessed by the language community
  as a whole.It is used by everyone,but it goes
  beyond the total sum of all the users put
  together
• Task 2 Languagea dialect with gun and powder
• A nations language is very likely to be a
  dialect spoken by people living in the capital
  city.It is made to represent the nation due to
  social and political reasons. So a linguist once
  commented that language is a dialect with gun and
  powder.Linguistically speaking,all dialects are
  equal,and any of them is fully qualified for a
  language status.
• The English you and I are learning is
  historically a
• London dialect.

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• Task 3 Towards a linguistic science
• In Activity 1, we look at language from a very
  broad perspective, a human perspective.
• Only humans can have language. We humans owe our
  humanness and civilization to language.
• Human brain is not born with a language already
  there,but with the ability to learn any
  language.language is found in communication.
• At the very beginning of mankind there was only
  one language,to start with,and then new languages
  emerged as people walked out of Africa,to the
  Middle East,to Europe,to Asia and to America,and
  settled all over the earth.

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• From Activity 2 to Activity 3,we change our
  perspective from a broad human one to a narrow
  culture-specific one.
• Different cultures have different views on
  language,e.g. on word magic,on language power,and
  so on.They are popular views derived from
  superstitious beliefs,cultural values,prejudices,a
  nd bias.
• Language is in essence a dialect that is given a
  privileged status owing to social and political
  considerations.