Islamic concept.

Christian concept.

Indian concept.

We came to know from Quran e Pak that we got language from Allah Pak, as He said in Surah E Rahman, Verses # 1-4.

“The Most Merciful. Taught the Quran. Created man. Taught him eloquence.”

In this verse eloquence referred to language, “the ability to argue”.

Christians believed that when God created Adam, he taught them the names of some specific things and angels were asked to tell the names of those things, but they were unable to tell. When Adam was asked, he told the names of all those things. So God asked them to bow before Adam. This incident proves that language exists at the time of Adam. (Genesis)

Hindus believe that language came from Sarasvati, wife of Brahma, creator of the earth.

So we may conclude that language is a gift of God to humans. Humans were created with an innate capacity to use language.

Humans started to utter sounds by mimicking their nature.

He was attracted by various things and tried to copy them.

It is also said that man evolved his LAD due to evaluation.

Language is consciously invented by humans.

Language is learnt through “imitation”.

Hypothesis:- The “ding-dong” hypothesis. The “pooh-pooh” hypothesis. The “bow-wow” hypothesis. The “ta-ta” hypothesis.

The “ding-dong” hypothesis bases the origins of language on onomatopoeia. This idea states that language began when humans started naming objects after a relevant sound that was already involved in their everyday life. Examples include words such as “boom,” “crash”.

These represent the sounds of certain objects, but it is unclear how to provide onomatopoeia for silent objects such as a rock. It also does not consider abstract ideas like love or justice, as there are no sounds for these words. Also, this hypothesis does not supply words for grammar or abstract items in the English language, so it is not hard to imagine that these types of words are unusual and rare in most languages. Onomatopoeia is such a small part of linguistics and varies greatly from language to language. Because of these limitations it is considered a limited hypothesis.

The basis for the “pooh-pooh” hypothesisholds true to the involuntary nature of human speech. Through emotional response, language and speech would have developed in tandem with human interaction and primitive emotional reactions. Such sounds as “wa wa wa” or “ha ha ha,” commonly used to denoted crying or pain and happiness or laughter, respectively, would then develop into a more unique and case-specific series of sounds in association with other emotions and interactions (Vadja).

Is that exclamations, such as the emotional responses that one might associate with these “pooh-pooh” phrases, are in fact dependent on language instead of a basis through which language can be created. For instance, the essence of emotional response for pain is “ouch” in English, “oi” in Russian and “eee” in Cherokee (Vadja). If there was a generalized emotional response that all people made independently of each other, then perhaps there would be some legitimacy to the argument. But those noises that we all do make based on the stimuli of sneezes or hiccups cannot demonstrate a common linguistic nature between peoples.

The “bow wow” hypothesis is the most popular but perhaps the most far-fetched hypothesis of them all. Basically, it is the idea that human language and vocabulary originated as a form of imitation. It is said that language came from the imitation of animal sounds.

Is that a lot of words that describe animal sounds in different languages are similar. For instance, in English a pig makes the sound “oink-oink.” In Russian the sound is translated as “hyru-hyru” and in Chinese the sound is translated as “oh-ee-oh-ee.” As one can see, these words represent the sound of a single animal in different languages. The sound and pronunciation of these words are not similar. The overall idea is that one’s language determines how one interprets a sound, and since we have may languages, one cannot prove that human vocabulary comes from them.

As commonly seen in primates, hand gestures and body movement are important aspects of interaction and cooperation within societies. Originally hypothesized by Charles Darwin, though not necessarily supported by him, the “ta-ta” hypothesis states that language and the development of sound was generated to support the hand gestures and movements of the individual. So as to better demonstrate the meaning behind the gestures, these sounds progressed into more and more distinct words or combinations of sounds inevitably leading to speech patterns.

Although plausible like many of the other hypothesis, the cultural roots of varying hand gestures suggests that this is most likely not the reason behind language. Where in some places nodding means “yes,” in others nodding means the opposite. Such distinct cultural differences implies that this is not a sound hypothesis.

The warning hypothesis. The yo-he-ho hypothesis. The lying hypothesis.

Language may have evolved from warning signals such as those used by animals. Perhaps language started with a warning to others, such as Look out, Run, or Help to alert members of the tribe when some lumbering beast was approaching. Other first words could have been hunting instructions or instructions connected with other work. In other words, the first words were indexes used during everyday activities and situations.

Language developed on the basis of human cooperative efforts.

The earliest language was chanting to simulate collective effort, whether moving great stones to block off cave entrances from roving carnivores or repeating warlike phrases to inflame the fighting spirit.

E. H. Sturtevant argued that, since all real intentions or emotions get involuntarily expressed by gesture, look or sound, voluntary communication must have been invented for the purpose of lying or deceiving. He proposed that the need to deceive and lie--to use language in contrast to reality for selfish ends-- was the social prompting that got language started.

Instead of looking at the types of sounds as the source of human speech we can look at the types of physical features, related to speech production. These physical features are called “articulators”. Here we can have a list of active articulators:-

Teeth. Lips. Larynx. Pharynx. Tongue.Mouth.

Teeth and lips Human teeth are upright, not slanting outwards like those of apes, and they are roughly even in height. Such characteristics are not very useful for ripping or tearing food and seem better adapted for grinding and chewing. They are also very helpful in making sounds.

The human mouth is relatively small compared to other primates and can be opened and closed rapidly. It is also part of an extended vocal tract that has much more of an L-shape than the fairly straight path from front to back in other mammals. In contrast to the fairly thin flat tongue of other large primates, humans have a shorter, thicker and more muscular tongue that can be used to shape a wide variety of sounds inside the oral cavity.

The human larynx or “voice box” (containing the vocal folds or vocal cords) differs significantly in position from the larynx of other primates such as monkeys. In the course of human physical development, the assumption of an upright posture moved the head more directly above the spinal column and the larynx dropped to a lower position. This created a longer cavity called the pharynx, above the vocal folds, which acts as a resonator for increased range and clarity of the sounds produced via the larynx and the vocal tract. Other primates have almost no pharynx

It is believed that human hands and some believe that manual gestures may have been a precursor of language. By about two million years ago, there is evidence that humans had developed preferential right-handedness and had become capable of making stone tools. Wood tools and composite tools eventually followed. Tool-making, or the outcome of manipulating objects and changing them using both hands, is evidence of a brain at work.

The human brain is not only large relative to human body size, it is also lateralized, that is, it has specialized functions in each of the two hemispheres.

Innateness hypothesis:-

It is also one of the believes that humans are genetically equipped to acquire the language.