Human Language: Knowledge and Communication

The Language

Symbolic Language: Opening a Shared World

Human speech is an interpersonal communication system that carries three functions:

• Representative: Linguistic signs are symbols used to represent states.
• Expressive: Language signs are signs that show the states of the speaker.
• Appeals: Linguistic signs are signals routed to the caller, for which a reaction is expected.

With this triple function, human communication and the creation of a shared world are achieved.

Knowledge and Language

Language has a very close relationship with both the activity known as to its outcome: knowledge.

Regarding knowledge acquired via linguistic knowledge, it is conserved through language and shared with others because we can communicate it.

These three relationships remain important. There is another important aspect, which is in a relationship with the activity of knowing: the linguistic constitution of knowledge.

The Linguistic Constitution of Knowledge

Language gives humans the ability to organize the disjointed succession of perceptions, and that is what allows us to see the world.

We can therefore say that language is the medium in which the activity takes place to meet. We conclude that our knowledge of reality is not independent of language and is even limited by it. Knowledge would not be possible without language: this is its condition of possibility.

Dimensions of Human Language

The main form of human communication is the word, as part of a code. We can distinguish three basic dimensions:

• The syntactic dimension: Refers to the relations of signs. Syntax rules tell us how the words are to be placed so that the resulting sentence can convey a message.
• The semantic dimension: Refers to the relations of signs and their meanings. In the dictionary for each language, the meanings are considered to be linked to each word according to the common uses of the linguistic community. These applications run as rules that allow to form meaningful sentences and succeed in the media.
• The pragmatic dimension: Refers to the relationship established between signs and users of such signs. Users are the speakers, the signs are the words, and the pragmatic dimension is constituted by the intention of the speakers and the context in which communication occurs.