Definitions of Language by Some Experts

Definitions of Language 

Language has been defined by many linguists, W. N. Francis (1958:3) defines language as an arbitrary system of articulated sounds made use of by a group of humans as a means of carrying on the affairs of their society. According to Finocchiaro (1974:3), language is a system of arbitrary, vocal symbols which permits all people in a given culture, or other people who have learned the system of that culture, to communicate or to interact. Pei & Gaynor (1954:119) state that language is a system of communication by sound, i.e., through the organs of speech and hearing, among human beings of a certain group or community, using vocal symbols possessing arbitrary conventional meanings, Wardhaugh (1972:3) defines language as a system of vocal symbols used for human communication, According to Greene (1972:25), language is the set of all possible sentences; and the grammar of a language is the rules which distinguish between sentences and non-sentences. Chomsky (1957:13) defines language as a set (finite or infinite) of sentences, each finite in length and constructed out of a finite set of elements.

Finally, A. A. Hill (1958:9) describes language as the primary and most highly elaborated form of human symbolic activity. Its symbols are made up of sounds produced by the vocal apparatus, and they are arranged in classes and patterns which make up a complex and symmetrical structure. The entities of language are symbols, that is, they have meaning, but the connection between symbol and thing is arbitrary and socially controlled. The symbols of language are simultaneously substitute stimuli and substitute responses, so that discourse becomes independent of an immediate physical stimulus, The entities and structure of language are always so elaborated as to give the speaker the possibility of making linguistic response to an experience.

According to Charles F. Hockett (1958:137-138), a language is a complex system of habits. This system can be broken down into five principal subsystems:

a. The grammatical system: a stock of morphemes, and the arrangements in which they occur;
b. The phonological system: a stock of phonemes, and the arrangements in which they occur;
c. The morphophonemic system: the code which ties together the grammatical and the phonological systems;
d. The semantic system: which associates various morphemes, combinations of morphemes, and arrangements in which morphemes can be put, with things and situations, or kinds of things and situations;
e. The phonetic system: the ways in which sequences of phonemes are converted into sound waves by the articulation of a speaker, and are decoded from the speech signal by a hearer.

The first three are the central subsystems and the last two are the peripheral subsystems.