Chapter 1

Review on Linguistic Components of

Language

Introduction

Language's linguistic components refer to the five basic rules systems found in
language. According to Allisonfors (2021), the five basic components are Syntax (The
rules that govern word order to form clauses, phrases, and sentences), Morphology
(The rules that govern change in meaning at the word level/the study of how
morphemes, the smallest parts of words with meaning, combine or separate to create
different words. ), Phonology (The rules that govern the structure, distribution, and
sequencing of speech-sound patterns), Semantics (The rules that govern the meaning
and context of words or grammatical units), and Pragmatics (The rules that govern
language use across communication contexts). Certainly, these subfields understanding
these components can help improve communication between people, contribute to
translation activities, assist in literacy efforts, and treat speech disorders. By
understanding the structure of language, we can learn to use language more effectiv
ely.
Hence, it is necessary to review the linguistics components (of any language),
reference to Ernst-Slavit and Egbert (2023), to be proficient in a language requires
knowledge and skills using the linguistic components. It also requires background
knowledge, critical thinking and metacognitive skills, as well as understanding and
applying cultural nuances, beliefs, and practices in context. In reference to Canada
Institute of Linguistics (2023), every language is like a one-of-a-kind species. It captures
unique conceptualizations of the world and has its own ways of constructing words,
phrases and sentences for communicating ideas. As we compare the words and
structures of various languages, we come to a greater understanding of the world we
live in. Apart from simply understanding the intricacies of world languages, this
P a g e 1 | 19
knowledge can be applied to improving communication between people, contributing to
translation activities, assisting in literacy efforts, and treating speech disorders. And, of
course, linguistics training is also valuable for studying and learning languages. The
University of Chicago (2023), states that Linguistics is a major feature that provides
insight into one of the most intriguing aspects of human knowledge and behavior.
Majoring in linguistics means learning about many aspects of human language,
including sounds (phonetics, phonology), words (morphology), sentences (syntax), and
meaning (semantics).

Culture, history, and social factors have all impacted and had an impact on
languages. You should understand how these factors influence language affects the
way how individuals communicate. Because of this, it is crucial for language instructors
to be well-versed in the fundamentals of linguistics. Your students will be more
engaged, and your classes will be more interesting if you incorporate linguistic concepts
into your teaching. You will be able to provide clear and compelling explanations of
concepts like verbal behavior and language choice. Additionally, linguistics can be used
to develop stimulating and enjoyable language activities.

Review on Definitions of Language

According to Crystal and Robins (2023), numerous language definitions were
proposed. Language is a system of conventional (Used and accepted by most people;
usual or traditional) spoken, manual (signed), or written symbols by means of which
human beings, as members of a social group and participants in its culture, express
themselves. Crystal and Robins (2023) also states that language is the expression of

ideas by means of speech-sounds combined into words. Moreover, a language is a

system of arbitrary (No logical connection between the form of a word and its meaning)

vocal symbols by means of which a social group cooperates.

Furthermore, language is a structured system of communication that consists of

grammar and vocabulary. It is the primary means by which humans convey meaning,
both in spoken and written forms, and may also be conveyed through sign languages.

P a g e 2 | 19
Properties of Human Language

1. Language is arbitrary, meaning that there is no inherent connection between

words and their meanings.
2. Language is productive (A language user can manipulate his or her linguistic
resources, meaning that it can generate an infinite number of sentences from a
finite set of elements.
3. Language is creative, meaning that it can express new ideas and thoughts that
have never been uttered before.
4. Language is symbolic, meaning that it uses signs and symbols to represent
objects, events, and ideas.
5. Language is systematic, meaning that it follows rules and patterns of grammar
and syntax.
6. Language has displacement, meaning human language can overcome the
limitations of time and space. Human language can refer to past, present, and
future – I am flying to Paris next week. Human language has abstract concepts –
things that do not exist in real life such as Batman, Superman, and Santa
Clause.
7. Language has Cultural Transmission, meaning languages are passed down by
the society in which one lives and grows up – we acquire language with other
speakers and not from parental genes. Language passes from one generation to
another.

Review on Macro Skills

Macro skills are sets of complex capabilities that enable the individual to act
effectively and efficiently. Macro skills are most referred to listening, speaking, reading,
and writing in English language. The four macro skills, if practiced consistently,
strengthens the fundamentals of our identity and abilities to perform in society.
According to Rubie (2021), when these macro skills are enhanced, we become

P a g e 3 | 19
proficient and free to express intent and necessities to improve our social and economic
status.

The Four Macro Skills

Listening Skills. Listening skills indicate the person's abilities to receive and interpret
information in the communication process. Listening skills are skills that contribute to
your ability to accurately receive information when communicating with others.
Speaking Skills. Speaking skills are defined as the skills which allow us to
communicate effectively through conveying information verbally. Speaking skills are
using language to communicate using verbal and nonverbal symbols orally in different
context that can be improved through learning language. As a skill, speaking is also
known as productive skills. Speaking can be formal or informal: Informal speaking is
typically used with family and friends, or people you know well. Formal speaking occurs
in business or academic situations, or when meeting people for the first time.
Reading Skills. Reading skills are mental skills that allow a person to decode, read,
comprehend, and interpret the written word. Reading is a fundamental but complex skill
that children must acquire because they must learn to read before they can read to
learn.
Writing Skills. Writing skills are which apply to writing (Usually meaning composition
and language skills, not mechanical handwriting/typing.) "Written skills", if it meant
anything, would mean those skills which had been written. Basic writing skills are
sometimes called the “mechanics” of writing. Generating text: Text generation involves
putting our thoughts into words, what might be thought of as the “content” of writing.
Text generation includes word choice (vocabulary), elaboration of detail, and clarity of
expression. Writing skills involved planning and editing: Especially after the
earliest grades, good writing involves planning, revising, and editing your
own work. Writing skills refer also to writing knowledge: Writing knowledge
includes an understanding of discourse and genre — for example,
understanding that a narrative is organized differently than an informational
text.

P a g e 4 | 19
Review on Communicative Competence

Communicative competence is the ability to use a language effectively in

different situations. It includes knowing the rules of grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation,
and also the social and cultural aspects of language use. According to Nordquist (2019),
the term communicative competence refers to both the tacit knowledge of a language
and the ability to use it effectively. The communicative competence model is a theory
that explains how people use language effectively in different situations. It has four main
components: linguistic competence, sociolinguistic competence, discursive
competence, and strategic competence. The communicative competence model is used
to teach and learn foreign languages and is the result of multiple linguists’ efforts. The
development of the communicative competence model started with Chomsky in the
1960s when he used grammatical competence as a theoretic ground for teaching,
learning, and testing languages.

Linguist Dell Hymes in 1972

Hymes’ view of communicative competence (cf.

1967; 1972) brought an anthropological understanding to
language, as it provides a model for analyzing a
communicative event in its socio-cultural context. His model
indicates the various parameters that govern
communication in terms of what to say, when, to whom,
and how to say it, and with what intention. This set of
parameters in its pragmatic, goal-oriented, and functional
aspects has served as a guide for language teaching since
the 1980s. It formed the basis of the functional approach to Fig. 1 Linguist Dell Hathaway Hymes

language teaching (cf Wilkinson, 1976), which was

developed further in the Threshold Levels (Van Ek, 1991)
of the Council of Europe, the precursor to the Common European Framework,

P a g e 5 | 19
 This approach focused on language functions in a few specific domains of
language use such as shopping, travel, house and home, food, and drink. Language
teaching for communicative competence reduced Hymes’ notion of communication to a
limited and fixed set of situational topics, through which the learner would encounter
and practice communicative acts such as giving a warning, inviting someone or asking
for help, within set domains using set phrases. Its focus became a goal-oriented view of
language where limited features of the situational context were the principal
determinants of the linguistic choices to be made.

Fig. 2 Common European framework

Fig. 3 A guideline used to describe achievements of learners of foreign languages across

Europe

P a g e 6 | 19
Canale and Swain's Model of Communicative
Competence in 1983

In 1980, the applied linguists Canale and Swain published an influential article in
which they argued that the ability to communicate required four different sub-
competencies:
 grammatical (ability to create grammatically correct utterances),
 sociolinguistic (ability to produce sociolinguistically appropriate utterances),
 discourse (ability to produce coherent and cohesive utterances), and

P a g e 7 | 19
  strategic (ability to solve communication problems as they arise).

Canale and Swain defined communicative competence as a global competence

that subsumed four separate but related competencies: grammatical, sociolinguistic,
discourse, and strategic.

Fig. 4 Canale and Swain Formulated the First Model of Communicative Competence,
which Included Grammatical, Sociolinguistic, Strategic, and Discourse Competence

Knowledge of Lexical items, Sociocultural use and

morphology, syntax, rules of discourse
semantics, and phonology

Grammatic Socio-
al Linguistic
Competenc Competen
e ce

Discourse Strategic
Competen Competenc
ce e
How ideas are connected Overcome language
through patterns of gaps, achive
organization, cohesive, & conversational fluency
transitional devices and modify text for
audience

Review on Views on Language

Language is seen from structural, functional, and interactional point of views.

Educators need to see language from these points of view because if language is
taught to be only a system of structures; it would be a partly observation. Language
makes sense when it is seen from its structural, functional, and interactional perspective
(Banerjee, 2021).

P a g e 8 | 19
STRUCTURAL VIEW
This view focuses on the rules and vocabulary of a language. it assumes that
knowing a language means knowing its grammar and words. By general terms,
structure means a framework or skeleton of something. In language, structure refers to
phonemes, morphemes, words, and sentences. According to structural view of
language is the idea that language is a system of structurally related elements for the
transmission of meaning. These elements are usually described as phonological units
(phonemes), grammatical units (phrases, clauses, sentences), grammatical operations
(adding, shifting, joining or transforming elements), lexical items (function words and
structure words).

FUNCTIONAL VIEW

Systemic Functional Linguistics

(SFL) has a functional and contextual
approach to language. It views language as
having the key function of making
meanings, actually, three kinds of
meanings simultaneously. Whenever we
use language, SFL linguists claim, we
make meanings about the world around us
both external and internal, about the roles
interacts take up as they use language and Fig. 5 Illustrating Functional Language Expression in
a Formal Situation
the attitude they express toward experience,
and finally, meanings that have to do with how we use language in a text, how it relates
to its co-text and context and how it is put together. These three kinds of meanings are
called experiential, interpersonal and textual meanings.
Functional language is language that you need in different day-to-day situations.
For example: greeting, introducing yourself, asking for or giving advice, explaining rules,

P a g e 9 | 19
apologizing, or agreeing and disagreeing. Any one of these functions can have a
number of different exponents, or fixed expressions. For example, giving advice we
could say: I think you should …, Why not …’ How about …? Have you thought about
…? Or, to explain rules, we can say: We cannot …, we are not allowed to …, and we
have to ….
The more functional language you know; the more real-life situations you can
interact in. You can learn different expressions for different contexts. Some expressions
are more suitable for a formal situation than an informal one, some you use with close
friends and others with strangers. If you are learning a new language. As functional
language involves interaction and dialogue, it is best to present it in the context of a
real-life situation so that learners can see how functional language is used to achieve
different objectives.

INTERACTIONAL VIEW

The interactional view of language suggests that language is communicative tool

that is used to build and maintain social relations between people – language is
dependent upon social interaction. The interactionist approach (sociocultural theory)
combines ideas from sociology and biology to explain how language is developed.
According to this theory, children learn language out of a desire to communicate with
the world around them. Language emerges from, and is dependent upon, social
interaction. The Interactionist approach claims that if our language ability develops out
of a desire to communicate, then language is dependent upon whom we want to
communicate with. This means the environment you grow up in will heavily affect how
well and how quickly you learn to talk. For example, infants being raised by only their
mother are more likely to learn the word “mama”, and less likely to develop “dada”.
Among the first words we learn are ways to demand attention or food. In reference to
can be compared to transactional language, which normally carries a message and is
the language used to get things done.
The theory that language is acquired from an interaction of a human’s innate
biological capabilities to acquire language with exposure to language in the environment
P a g e 10 | 19
in which the child is developing. The interaction theory of language development is a
compromise between the nativist theory and the behaviorist theory of language
development. The interaction theory recognizes that both environmental and biological
factors are important in language development. all interactionists believe that language
acquisition occurs as a result of the natural interaction between children and their
environment, more specifically, their parents or caregivers.

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A linguistic universal is a pattern that occurs systematically across natural languages, potentially
true for all of them. For example, All languages have nouns and verbs, or If a language is spoken,
it has consonants and vowels. Research in this area of linguistics is closely tied to the study of
linguistic typology, and intends to reveal generalizations across languages, likely tied to cognition,
perception, or other abilities of the mind. The field originates from discussions influenced by
Noam Chomsky's proposal of a Universal Grammar, but was largely pioneered by the linguist
Joseph Greenberg, who derived a set of forty-five basic universals, mostly dealing with syntax,
from a study of some thirty languages.

Noam Chomsky's work related to the innateness hypothesis as it pertains to our ability to rapidly
learn any language without formal instruction and with limited input, or what he refers to as a
poverty of the stimulus, is what began research into linguistic universals. This led to his proposal
for a shared underlying grammar structure for all languages, a concept he called universal
grammar (UG), which he claimed must exist somewhere in the human brain prior to language
acquisition. Chomsky defines UG as "the system of principles, conditions, and rules that are
elements or properties of all human languages... by necessity."[5] He states that UG expresses
"the essence of human language,"[5] and believes that the structure-dependent rules of UG allow
humans to interpret and create an infinite number of novel grammatical sentences. Chomsky
asserts that UG is the underlying connection between all languages and that the various
differences between languages are all relative with respect to UG. He claims that UG is essential

P a g e 17 | 19
to our ability to learn languages, and thus uses it as evidence in a discussion of how to form a
potential 'theory of learning' for how humans learn all or most of our cognitive processes
throughout our lives. The discussion of Chomsky's UG, its innateness, and its connection to how
humans learn language has been one of the more covered topics in linguistics studies to date.
However, there is division amongst linguists between those who support Chomsky's claims of UG
and those who argued against the existence of an underlying shared grammar structure that can
account for all languages.

UNIVERSALS OF LANGUAGE
Languages we do not speak or understand may sound like meaningless babble to us, but all the
human languages that have ever been studied by linguists are amazingly similar. They all share a
number of characteristics, which linguists call language universals. These language universals
can be considered properties of the Universal Grammar that Chomsky proposed. Here is a list of
some of the major ones.

All human cultures have a human language and use it to communicate.

All human languages change over time, a reflection of the fact that all cultures are also constantly
changing.
All languages are systematic, rule-driven, and equally complex overall, and equally capable of
expressing any idea that the speaker wishes to convey. There are no primitive languages.
All languages are symbolic systems.
All languages have a basic word order of elements, like subject, verb, and object, with variations.
All languages have similar basic grammatical categories such as nouns and verbs.
Every spoken language is made up of discrete sounds that can be categorized as vowels or
consonants.
The underlying structure of all languages is characterized by the feature duality of patterning,
which permits any speaker to utter any message they need or wish to convey, and any speaker of
the same language to understand the message.

Universal Grammar (UG) is a theoretical concept proposed by Noam Chomsky (not without
criticism or controversy from scholars in the scientific community) that the human brain contains
an innate mental grammar that helps humans acquire language. Chomsky theorized that the
brain contains a mechanism he referred to as a language acquisition device (LAD), which is
“separate from other faculties of cognitive activity….Input is needed, but only to ‘trigger’ the
operation of the language acquisition device” (Ellis 32). Without this LAD, according to Chomsky,
children would never be able to learn language from the input they receive.

P a g e 18 | 19
Nowak et al. summarizes the theory in this way:

“Children acquire their mental grammar spontaneously and without formal training. Children of the
same speech community reliably learn the same grammar. Exactly how the mental grammar
comes into a child’s mind is a puzzle. Children have to deduce the rules of their native language
from sample sentences they receive from their parents and others. This information is insufficient
for uniquely determining the underlying grammatical principles (4). Linguists call this phenomenon
the “poverty of stimulus” (5) or the “paradox of language acquisition” (6). The proposed solution is
universal grammar” (114).

Poverty of stimulus is the ability of the human brain to recognize correct and incorrect grammar
even in novel sentences. Vivian Cook writes,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_universal

https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Courses/HACC_Central_Pennsylvania's_Community_College/
ANTH_205%3A_Cultures_of_the_World_-_Perspectives_on_Culture_(Scheib)/
05%3A_Language/
5.04%3A_Language_Universals_and_the_Structure_of_Language#:~:text=UNIVERSALS%20OF
%20LANGUAGE,-Languages%20we%20do&text=They%20all%20share%20a%20number,some
%20of%20the%20major%20ones.
https://worldenglishes.lmc.gatech.edu/universal-grammar-ug/

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