Organisms communicate with other members of their species. A communication system functions to transfer information from the nervous system of one organism to that of others of its species. It is therefore a reflection of the structure and function of that nervous system. Human communication—language—has features that enable us to share information and ideas that are cultural. The traits of human language reflect the features of our brain that make culture possible. Thus, human language is very different from the communication systems of even our closest evolutionary relatives.

Human language has four main features: displacement, duality, productivity, and an arbitrary quality. Displacement refers to the ability to talk about things that are not immediate stimuli. The subjects of human language can be displaced in time and space. The second feature of human language, duality implies that our language is comprised of sound and meaning. Productivity is made possible by duality. It means that new units of language can be endlessly combined to express new meanings, ideas, and concerns. Finally, sounds and units of meaning are arbitrary. Language is culturally agreed upon and because it is, each language creates its own sets of symbols.

Language is a combination of culture and biology. The ability to have language is biological, but the unique features of language are cultural in nature. They use abstract, arbitrary symbols. Descriptive linguistics is the study of the components of language.

Human language is said to be an open communication system. That is, human language is almost infinitely creative because of its duality and productivity. However, nonhuman primates’ communication systems are closed, and calls and signs have specific meanings. Calls, facial expressions, and gestures among chimpanzees express fear, aggression, sexual stimulation, or excitement. They mainly name things, or refer to things in their physical environment. There are exceptions.

Human evolution involved taking a closed system of communication and turning it into an open one. Linguists speculate on how and when the transition occurred. Examination of the fossil record, especially the crania and the use of endocasts, allows speculation on how changes to the brain size and complexity may have affected the development of language.

Research on great apes and their capacity to learn to communicate has yielded some interesting results. Laboratory research on both chimpanzees and gorillas are ongoing

Classification and reconstruction of language is difficult. Historical linguists utilize words that change little with culture contact. Language is important to the success of a culture, and is the most important way that a culture is learned and passed on. Anthropology has long sought to understand the relationship between cultural systems and language within a given culture. Many attempts have been made to describe phonemes, morphemes, and grammar rules and their relationship to a particular culture. No practical reason seems to exist to explain particular nuances within and between languages. Specific features of languages seem to undergo their own unique evolutionary random changes not directly related to their cultural adaptation.

Words are directly related to cultural systems, and help us to understand the categories people recognize, and how they express ideas and view their world. Kinship terminology is a good example. Folk taxonomies are a way of grouping things according to a society’s worldview. Ethnosemantics is the study of these taxonomies. The words used for snow is often used as an illustration. The Shuam of the Ecuadorian forest and the arctic Eskimo offer interesting contrasts in their respective use of color terms.

Color terms have also been a focal point of study, and differ greatly between societies. The Dani of New Guinea, for example, distinguish only two color terms—roughly corresponding to light and dark. Differences between cultures do not demonstrate perceptual abilities, but rather, the cultural importance each assigns to sections of the visible spectrum. These differences may be environmentally conditioned.

Numbering systems, too, vary widely across cultures. Languages have histories that relate to the cultural history of their societies and vary according to the social contexts in which they are used. Sociolinguistics is a field that focuses on how languages differ by geographic region, class, gender, ethnic group, and social setting. A good illustration of this is the term used regionally for large sandwiches in the US, variously termed hoagies, grinders, subs, and heroes.

Language is an integral part of any cultural system, and a useful mechanism to learn and transmit the basics of that cultural system to others. The words used and their meanings and categories reflect the worldview of that culture