Language Acquisition
Human language is a remarkable symbolic means of communication that makes it possible for individuals to convey their thoughts and feelings to others. Although babies are born completely without language, by the time they are three or four years old, children have acquired thousands of vocabulary words, complex grammatical and sound systems, and the ability to speak appropriately in many different social situations. Although societies around the world differ in many ways, language is a universal phenomenon, and children around the world acquire their native language in very similar ways.
The Structure of Language
All human languages include a number of systematic features that the young learner must master. Languages are organized hierarchically and include a number of subsystems. The systems of language include phonology, morphology, the lexicon and semantics, syntax, pragmatics, and discourse. Children begin to acquire some aspects of their language during their first few months of life.
The phonology of a language is its sound system. This system includes all of the significant sounds that are used in the language, as well as the ways in which they can be combined to make acceptable-sounding new words. For example, a new cereal in English might be called "Crunchix," but not "Kshicrun," because acceptable English words cannot begin with "kshi." Across the world, languages use many hundreds of different sounds, from trills on the tongue to scrapes in the throat, but each language employs only a small subset of these possible sounds.
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