10级英本1班杨欢欢2010041121.doc

Term paper of English linguistics Semester II of 2012-2013 Topic content Supporting logic Language grammar Text format General impression Total Proportion 8 8 6 4 4 30 Score Contrasting animal language with human communication Human beings, though considered as the dominator of all the living species, are still a kind of animals. Our language is also a part of animal communication. There are common grounds and distinction in human language and animal language. Species often rely on verbal and non-verbal forms of communication. Verbal communication is defined as spoken communication, including the use of words and intonation to convey meaning On the other hand, non-verbal communication is “silent” communication, including the use of gesture, postures, position, eye contact, facial expressions, and conversational distance. Human language includes vocal and non-vocal channels; animal language belongs to non-verbal form. Human language has four design features: arbitrariness .duality .creativity and displacement Arbitrariness means that there is no necessary connection between a particular sound and the meaning it is associated with. There is no reason that why a pen called a /pen/ Onomatopoeic words such as meow or bark are often cited as counter-examples, based on the argument that they are pronounced like the sound they refer to. However, the similarity very looses: a dog that actually said bark would be very surprising, so even onomatopoeic words are, to some extent, arbitrary. In contrast to human language, animal communication systems are usually not able to express conceptual generalizations. Duality means the discrete parts of a language can be recombined in a systematic way to create new forms. Animals have not this kind of ability. Duality of patterning refers to the ability to recombine small units in different orders. Displacement means that the speaker can talk about things which are not present, either spatially or temporally. N