Charlane T.

Aragon
ELT 201
Instructor: Amor Melendez-Clarido

Language as Human

Humanity is considered as dominant in the animal kingdom, apart from other species
we are exceptionally complex and unique. This brings out the question, What makes human
being unique? Many may disagree and might go for about how our brain works as one reason
of being rational which makes us different. As per opinion, Id say that would be Language. The
language I believe makes us uniquely human which gives us the ability for symbolic thinking. It is
where Language serves as the basis for the ways of how we humans learn.

Humanity has many diverse components, but I truly believed that language is the soul
foundation making a path towards infinite knowledge leading the way for dominance. It is an
essential innate advantage we possess that further developed self-awareness, culture,
understanding, and the ability to communicate with the world around us. Being able to easily
adapt separated us from our ancestors that further widened that gap which truly made humans
unlike any other animal. With language, we are able to respond to the world in a meaningful
way.

Human language is so much different compared to how other animals communicate with
another. The use of Alphabets in the human language gives an opportunity to conserve
knowledge for the generations to come. This is achieved by means of language either through
non-verbal (writing) and verbal channels. There is no other species capable of language and
writing, thus, makes it a unique human ability. This is one of the various characteristics which
animals do not have.

Marshal (2013) stated in one of her article Language makes us human, and its encoded
in our DNA. Marshal further mentioned, Language is fundamentally what makes us what we
are. These claim by Marshal had been confirmed by Professor Doctor Wolfgang Klein of the Max
Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in his research on Language and Genetics (2010). Humans
have a unique natural ability to develop highly complex linguistic systems an ability that lies in
our genes but is also shaped by our different environments. We can learn languages from others
and use them to share our thoughts, feelings and desires; languages are the foundation of
society, culture and science.

Unique qualities and characteristics are means to determine one as different from other
species. It serves as a symbol of diversity that all things are created possessing at least one unique
trait to distinguish belongingness.

Language is what makes us human, language is humanity.