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Abstract

Language is a symbolic system In order to communicate about things which are not physically present, or which happened in the past, to speculate about what may happen in the future or to handle abstractions of thought or feeling, human beings make use of linguistic signs which stand in for - or signify - components of their experience

Traditionally language has traditionally been studied in relation to the element of which it is composed These micro categories are useful for description and analysis, but the do not necessarily reflect the ways in which we learn to use a language or the ways in which we learn about language. Language can also be considered at a macro level. It is task to be performed, fact to be known, meaning to be experienced, identity to be bound up with individual.

These aspects of language correspond with the nature and functions of language. Language is a system of sounds, meanings and structures; the behaviour which we make outcomes of speaking, listening, writing, reading; the culture as way of life. It functions as a tool of thought; as a vehicle of communication; as the raw material of literature.

This is also a essay a1x>ut issues raised by conventional views about language, which are related with narrowness of the concept of language. Because, in macro sense, language is tasks, facts, meanings, and identities, the contents of teaching language should be broaden to four categories: performance; knowledge; experience; attitude.