Language Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ===Tool for communication=== [[File:ASL family.jpg|right|thumb|A conversation in [[American Sign Language]]]] Yet another definition sees language as a system of communication that enables humans to exchange verbal or symbolic utterances. This definition stresses the social functions of language and the fact that humans use it to express themselves and to manipulate objects in their environment. [[Functional theories of grammar]] explain grammatical structures by their communicative functions, and understand the grammatical structures of language to be the result of an adaptive process by which grammar was "tailored" to serve the communicative needs of its users.<ref name="Myths"/><ref>{{harvcoltxt|Van Valin|2001}}</ref> This view of language is associated with the study of language in [[pragmatics|pragmatic]], [[cognitive linguistics|cognitive]], and interactive frameworks, as well as in [[sociolinguistics]] and [[linguistic anthropology]]. Functionalist theories tend to study grammar as dynamic phenomena, as structures that are always in the process of changing as they are employed by their speakers. This view places importance on the study of [[linguistic typology]], or the classification of languages according to structural features, as it can be shown that processes of [[grammaticalization]] tend to follow trajectories that are partly dependent on typology.<ref name="NewmeyerForm"/> In the philosophy of language, the view of pragmatics as being central to language and meaning is often associated with [[Ludwig Wittgenstein|Wittgenstein's]] later works and with ordinary language philosophers such as [[J.L. Austin]], [[Paul Grice]], [[John Searle]], and [[Willard van Orman Quine|W.O. Quine]].{{sfn|Nerlich|2010|p=192}} Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page