Language
PSY/360
May 16, 2015

Language
Introduction
The art of language and communication has been around for millions of years. Although it has never stayed the same as a whole the general idea of it has. Everything uses some form of language to communicate among their kind. Animals even have a language of their own. Sometimes there are barriers that limit us from understanding what others are saying such as; speaking a different language or not being able to speak at all. We do however have many universal ways to communicate so that we can all understand one another. This can be by body language or simply pointing at what you are trying to explain. Also if words are misspoken we can also figure out what people are trying to say by these gestures or from our experience.
Language
Language has a very broad definition according to Dictionary.com (2015) language is defined as:
1. a body of words and the systems for their use common to a people who are of the same community or nation, the same geographical area, or the same cultural tradition: the two languages of Belgium; a Bantu language; the French language; the Yiddish language ("Language ," 2015).
2. communication by voice in the distinctively human manner, using arbitrary sounds in conventional ways with conventional meanings; speech ("Language ," 2015).
3. the system of linguistic signs or symbols considered in the abstract (opposed to speech) ("Language ," 2015).
4. any set or system of such symbols as used in a more or less uniform fashion by a number of people, who are thus enabled to communicate intelligibly with one another ("Language ," 2015).
5. any system of formalized symbols, signs, sounds, gestures, or the like used or conceived as a means of communicating thought, emotion, etc.: the language of mathematics; sign language ("Language ," 2015).
6.the means of communication used by animals: the language of birds ("Language ," 2015).
7. Communication of meaning in any way; medium that is expressive, significant, etc.: the language of flowers; the language of art ("Language ," 2015).

Lexicon
A lexicon is a mental dictionary of words, their sounds, pronunciation, spelling, and mental images that act an object representations (Willingham, 2007). The lexicon is the person’s individual vocabulary. An eight-month-old child’s lexicon is starting to develop with the addition of phonemes. Typically, the first phonemes are vowel sounds. As a child develops, those sounds form into words that are associated with objects in the child’s immediate environment (Willingham, 2007). By 24 months of age, these sounds form into familiar concepts like mama, papa, dog, no, bye, and clock. An individual lexicon develops with the first word association (Willingham, 2007). With the introduction of new and novel concepts, the lexicon will develop.
Key Components
There are four key features of language, which are the most important part of a communication system. The four key features of language are phonemes-phonetics, words, sentences, and text.
Phonemes-phonetics is the first most important key feature of a language, which makes each language different. Phonemes is in linguistics, a speech sound that plays a meaningful role in a language and cannot be analyzed into smaller meaningful sounds, conventionally indicated by slash symbols. A speech sound is held to be meaningful in a given language if its contrast with other sounds is used to mark distinctions of meaning. Phonetics is the branch of linguistics that studies the physical properties of speech sounds and the physiological means by which these are produced and perceived (Boundless 2015).
Words are very important in language for reasons being that words are the main part of a conversation. Without words a language would not exist. In most languages words don’t even have to be spoken they can also be signed through sign language or written like in written communication. Word is defined as being a unit of