Nature of Language

Within many of my linguistic classes, including this one, we have discussed how language is a "uniquely human character." (pg 32 Saville-Trokie) Humans of many different races, cultures, and beliefs speak a language unique to them and the people with whom they speak it. As we all may be very well aware, as humans, we do not speak/understand every language that is in existence. Does that mean that because we are not able to understand and utilize that process it is not real? Obviously the answer to this is no, yet, saying language is uniquely human is something that has bugged me for years. Just because we cannot understand different creature's ways of communicating does not mean they do not exist. An utterance is defined as a spoken word, statement, or vocal sound, which many animals are more than capable of producing. For example, dolphins and whale use sound systems to communicate their thoughts and feelings to one another. Humans often think that because we are the top of the food chain that we are on a much higher level than animals. I am not saying that this is a false statement since we are self-aware and have the ability of deeper thinking than most animals. However, according to Saville-Trokie "languages are social. Each language reflects the social requirements of the society that uses it." (pg 32) When reading about behaviorist ideas regarding SLA I begin to think how a dog is trained to respond to human words with the SRR process. I understand that this may seem to be an irrelevant topic to teachers, yet, this was the only thing I could think about while doing the readings.