Language vs. Speech: Key Differences Explained
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ScribdTranslationsLanguage vs. Speech: Key Differences Explained
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ScribdTranslationsDifference between language, speech, dialect, and talk
Language
Language is conceived as the general system of signs.
organized, whose main function is communication. The
Essential characteristics of language are:
Language is social.
It is abstract.
It is conventional.
It is linear.
It is the speakers who give life to the language, for this reason, when it stops being spoken
It is said that a language is a "dead language" when it is spoken very little. Moreover, the language is
It changes as speakers make use of it.
Speak
It is the particular way in which each person communicates. It comes to
to be the concretization of the language. Its two characteristics
fundamentals are:
Speech is individual.
It is concrete.
This individual instance in communication receives various names: speech, discourse, act
speech, spoken chain, and produced language.
Language
On the other hand, language is the exclusively human faculty that allows us to learn.
one or more languages (Chomsky, 1984). Their characteristics are:
It is physiological.
It ispsychological.
Finally, it is interesting to know that the main reason why
Many times, people confuse the meaning of these.
terms (especially, language and speech) is because the majority of
books that Hispanics use and that talk about these
concepts; are translated from English and in this language, both language
As a language, they are written the same 'language'. Therefore, only taking into account the
context can be understood when an author refers to a
either this or that.
Language
Linguists often use the
words language and tongue. For them, there is not much difference.
between these terms. In popular speech, however, the
The word language usually refers to a tongue that has a literary corpus or that is used in
national and international forums; that has a larger number of speakers or that has
standardized in some formal way.
Key differences between language, speech, and talking
Language is the faculty that only humans possess and that enables them to learn.
Languages. Language is a set of symbols or an abstract system whose main
function is communication. Speech is the concretization of language and unlike
This is not social, but individual.