Linguistics: Understanding Language Structure

What is Linguistics?

A linguist is usually described as a person who is skilled in some way with a given language, including ancient languages. The term can be used to describe a person who specializes in linguistics, which is the study of language, or it can refer to someone who is well-versed in the translation, interpretation, and application of a language. At the same time, this title may be used for someone who is fluent in multiple languages.

In the academic sense, a linguist is a person who engages in and studies linguistics. This is the scientific study of language—both theoretical and practical. Such a person may be studying or professionally practicing either theoretical or applied linguistics.

Examples of theoretical linguistics include grammar, syntax, semantics, origin, and phonetics. Applied linguistics encompasses practical utilization of the knowledge of a language, such as an interpreter, translator, a speech therapist, or a language teacher or professor.

Though the spoken and written words often intertwine, a linguist typically focuses more on the spoken word. A polyglot, or person skilled in multiple languages, for example, could be considered a linguist. So may a person skilled in the written word, but this would depend on the length and depth of his or her area of study in linguistics.

Cognitive Science and Linguistics

How do we think? How do we give expression to our thoughts? These are fundamental questions posed by linguists investigating the ways language might be organized in the mind, psychologists who study perception, computer scientists wishing to model intelligence, or curious individuals wondering about the nature of human cognition. Answers lie within the human mind-brain, and the clearest, most observable expressions of human thought are found embedded and reflected in the processes of language.

Cognitive Science and Linguistics are two disciplines that seek to understand the human mind and experience. Cognitive Science, an area of psychology, examines the mind and its processes, including emotion, thought, creativity, and language. Linguistics is the study of language in all its forms, including natural language development, organization, and use.

The Nature of Language

Each human language is a complex of knowledge and abilities enabling speakers of the language to communicate with each other, to express ideas, hypotheses, emotions, desires, and all the other things that need expressing. Linguistics is the study of these knowledge systems in all their aspects: how is such a knowledge system structured, how is it acquired, how is it used in the production and comprehension of messages, and how does it change over time? Linguists consequently are concerned with a number of particular questions about the nature of language:

• What properties do all human languages have in common?
• How do languages differ, and to what extent are the differences systematic (i.e., can we find patterns in the differences)?
• How do children acquire such complete knowledge of a language in such a short time?
• What are the ways in which languages can change over time, and are there limitations to how languages change?
• What is the nature of the cognitive processes that come into play when we produce and understand language?

Subfields of Linguistics

The part of linguistics that is concerned with the structure of language is divided into a number of subfields:

• Phonetics: The study of speech sounds in their physical aspects.
• Phonology: The study of speech sounds in their cognitive aspects.
• Morphology: The study of the formation of words.
• Syntax: The study of the formation of sentences.
• Semantics: The study of meaning.
• Pragmatics: The study of language use.