Linguistics Encyclopedia.pdf

Animals and language
Linguists’ interest in animal communication systems has been largely fuelled by a desire
to compare such systems with human language in order to show the differences between
the two, and often, by implication, to show the superiority of human language over the
communication systems of animals. One of the most famous attempts at setting up a
system for carrying out such comparisons is that of Charles Hockett (1960; also Hockett
and Altmann, 1968). For the purpose of the comparison, Hockett employs the notion of
the design feature: a design feature is a property which is present in some
communication systems and not in others; communication systems can then be classified
into those that have a particular design feature and those that do not. Hockett lists sixteen
such design features of human language, namely:
DF1 Vocal-Auditory Channel: it is in a sense coincidental that human language is
realized through this channel; there are non-vocal sign systems for use by the deaf (see
SIGN LANGUAGE), and if we found that apes, for instance, could use non-vocal sounds
to engage in what we could conclusively show to be linguistic behaviour (see below), we
would not disqualify this kind of communication on the grounds that it was not vocalauditory.
DF2 Broadcast Transmission and Directional Reception: This is a consequence of
the nature of sound.
DF3 Rapid Fading: again as a consequence of the nature of sound, human language
does not ‘hover in the air’, but ‘fades’ rapidly.
DF4 Interchangeability: adult members of the speech community are
interchangeably transmitters and receivers of the linguistic signal.
DF5 Complete Feedback: the speaker hears everything of what s/he says.
DF6 Specialization: Linguistic signals are specialized in the sense that their only true
function is to convey the linguistic message. There is no isomorphism, for instance,
between loudness of the signal and importance of the message—whether an important
message is whispered or shouted does not, in principle, affect its importance. In Hockett’s
terms, ‘the direct-energetic consequences of linguistic signals are biologically
unimportant; only the triggering consequences are important’. He uses the example of a
woman laying the table for dinner—a non-linguistic action. This action has the purpose
of getting the table ready for dinner, but may also function to inform her husband that
dinner will shortly be ready. In contrast, if the woman says to her husband Dinner will
shortly be ready, then the only function this serves is to inform him that dinner will
shortly be ready.
DF7 Semanticity: linguistic signs are connected to elements and features of the world.
DF8 Arbitrariness: there is no iconicity, or physical resemblance, between a
linguistic sign and the element or feature of the world to which it is connected (except in
the very rare instances of onomatopoeia: those linguistic signs which sound like what
they represent, as in tic-toc for the sound a clock makes or bow-wow for the sound a dog
makes; but even here languages differ—in Danish, the clock says tik-tak and the dog vov-