Importance of Language

1 Every day we experience one of the wonders of the world around us, without even realising it. It is not the amazing complexity of television, nor the impressive technology of automated transport. They are indeed wonders which we often take for granted. No. The universal wonder we share and experience is our ability to make noises with our mouths, and so transmit ideas and thoughts to each other's minds. In other words, that wonder is our ability to fashion language. This ability comes so naturally we are apt to forget what a miracle it is.

2 Obviously, the ability to talk is something that marks humans off from animals. Some animals have powers just as amazing. Bats home in on flying insects that are their food by means of a sophisticated sound system. Birds can navigate thousands of miles by observing positions of the stars in the sky in relation to the time of day and year. In Nature's talent show, humans are a species of animal that have developed their own special act. If we reduce it to basic terms, it's an ability to communicate information to others, by varying sounds we make as we breathe out.

3 Not that we don't have other powers of communication. Our facial expressions convey our emotions as anger, joy or disappointment. The way we hold our heads can indicate to others whether we are happy or downcast. This is so-called 'body language', and to some extent we are no different from other animals in this respect. Bristling fur is an unmistakable warning of aggression among many creatures. Similarly, the bowed head or drooping tail shows a readiness to take second place in any animal gathering.

4 Such a means of communication is a basic mechanism that animals, including human beings, instinctively acquire and display. Is the ability to speak just another sort of instinct? If so, how did human beings acquire this amazing skill? Biologists can readily indicate that particular area of our brain where speech mechanisms function, but this doesn't tell us how that part of our bodies originated in our biological history. It's tempting to think that for our human ancestors acquiring the power of speech was all a matter of competition.

5 The next phase in the growth of language would have been the way our bodies developed to enable us to utter a growing range of varied sounds. It is this development that makes humans so different from their nearest relatives in the animal world, the chimpanzees. Chimps produce sounds, but attempts to teach them a crude form of human language have been unsuccessful; chimps simply do not have the specialised vocal apparatus that humans have. At some point chimps and humans went different ways in the developing race for superiority, and humans were the winners; acquiring language skills had seen to that.

6 Therefore it's reasonable to assume that Nature down the ages has given the human being a form of 'wired-in' computer in its brain. As soon as a child is born and is exposed to the sounds of language and speech, the 'wiring' begins to function . It babbles away happily, and thrills its parents when it shapes its first recognisable words. Soon these first

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