A language is a system used to facilitate communication among higher animals and/or computers. This article is about the fundamental features typically found in nearly all natural human languages. For information about artificial languages specifically for computers, see machine code. Higher animals believed to employ audible language only, without symbols, include, but are not limited to, dolphins and whales. For information about this subject, see "Animal communication".
Language is emerging as the central preoccupation of our time.
As of early 2007, there are 6,912 known living human languages, according to "Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Fifteenth edition". A "living language" is simply one which is in wide use by a specific group of living people. The exact number of known living languages will vary from 5,000 to 10,000, depending on the precision of one's definition of "language", and in particular according to how one treats dialects. There are also many dead or extinct languages.
Human languages are usually referred to as natural languages, and the science of studying them is linguistics.
Making a principled distinction between one language and another is usually impossible. For instance, there are a few dialects of German similar to some dialects of Dutch. The transition between languages within the same language family is sometimes gradual (see dialect continuum).
Some like to make parallels with biology, where it is not always possible to make a well-defined distinction between one species and the next. In either case, the ultimate difficulty may stem from the interactions between languages and populations. (See Dialect or August Schleicher for a longer discussion.)
The concepts of Ausbausprache, Abstandsprache and Dachsprache are used to make finer distinctions about the degrees of difference between languages or dialects.
Language is emerging as the central preoccupation of our time.
As of early 2007, there are 6,912 known living human languages, according to "Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Fifteenth edition". A "living language" is simply one which is in wide use by a specific group of living people. The exact number of known living languages will vary from 5,000 to 10,000, depending on the precision of one's definition of "language", and in particular according to how one treats dialects. There are also many dead or extinct languages.
Human languages are usually referred to as natural languages, and the science of studying them is linguistics.
Making a principled distinction between one language and another is usually impossible. For instance, there are a few dialects of German similar to some dialects of Dutch. The transition between languages within the same language family is sometimes gradual (see dialect continuum).
Some like to make parallels with biology, where it is not always possible to make a well-defined distinction between one species and the next. In either case, the ultimate difficulty may stem from the interactions between languages and populations. (See Dialect or August Schleicher for a longer discussion.)
The concepts of Ausbausprache, Abstandsprache and Dachsprache are used to make finer distinctions about the degrees of difference between languages or dialects.