Theiling Online    Sitemap    Conlang Mailing List HQ   

Re: Defining "Language"

From:Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>
Date:Thursday, July 19, 2007, 13:30
Quoting taliesin the storyteller <taliesin-conlang@...>:

> * John Crowe said on 2007-07-19 10:38:04 +0200 > > It seems that most of the suggestions fail to differentiate language from > > lower level communication. For example, "means of symbolic communication" > > would include road signs and such. > > I agree with Andreas as to what is minimally needed for a language, > namely the arbitrariness [of morpheme composition]
For the record, I did not say that that is minimally needed for a language. I said it is something that characterizes human speech as compared to non-human modes of communication. Andreas