TOPIC 1: LANGUAGE AS COMMUNICATION. ORAL AND WRITTEN LANGUAGE.

ELEMENTS
IN
A
COMMUNICATIVE
SITUATION:
SENDER,
RECEIVER,
FUNCTIONALITY AND CONTEXT
This topic is about language as communication, oral and written language and the factors that define a
communicative situation: sender, receiver, function and context.
It is related to our official curriculum, set in Decree 89/2014 of July 24th, for the Community of
Madrid. First, because the 1st of the 7 basic competences of our curriculum is the linguistic competence.
Moreover, this topic covers 4 of the blocks of contents that our curriculum establishes for the area of
English language:
- Oral comprehension
- Oral expression
- Reading comprehension
- Written expression
Therefore, as English teachers, the role of language as a means of communication is our focus.
Language and communication are two terms that have an extremely close relationship. Communication
is the exchange of meaning between individuals through a common system of symbols. In other
words, humans use language to communicate.
1. LANGUAGE AS COMMUNICATION
According to the Spanish translation to the title of this topic, the term language refers to what
Saussure called la langue. He said that it is possible to distinguish between langage (language) or
the human ability to create systems of symbols to communicate through them. These systems are called
langues or languages and they are composed by signs and some rules to use them. The signs
themselves are composed of two parts: the signifier (the letters or the sounds of a word) and the
signified (the concept that appears on our mind when we hear or read the signifier). The putting into
practice of language is the parole (speech).
Language is exclusively human. However, it is important to know that not only human beings are able
to communicate. For example, bees have a system of communication to tell other bees the location of
sources of pollen. C. HOCKETT proposed a set of 13 features of human oral language:
1. Use of the auditory-vocal channel: We use our vocal organs to produce sound and our auditory
organs to receive it.
2. Broadcast transmission and directional reception: a signal can be heard by any auditory system
within earshot, and the source can be located by the hearer.
3. Rapid fading: auditory signals are transitory.
4. Interchangeability: the sender can become a receiver and vice versa.
5. Total feedback: Speakers are aware of their own speech and of the effect this produces on the
hearer.
6. Specialization: the only function of human language is communication.
7. Semanticity: there is a stable relationship of meaning between the expressions in a language and
real world.
8. Arbitrariness: the relationship between the linguistic sign and its meaning is arbitrary,
conventional.
9. Discreteness: Each sound of a language differs from the rest.
10. Displacement: it is possible to talk about events remote in space or time from the situation of the
speaker.
11. Productivity: with a limited set of elements we can understand unlimited messages.
12. Traditional transmission: language is transmitted from one generation to the next one.
13. Duality of patterning: the sounds of language do not convey meaning, but combine in different
ways to form other elements, such as words, which do convey meaning.
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2. ORAL LANGUAGE AND WRITTEN LANGUAGE

Now, let I am going to move on to the next part of this topic, which deals with writing and speech. The
most obvious difference is that speech is spoken and heard, while writing is written and read. However,
there are many other differences, such as these:
- Oral language comes before writing historically. The first known writing, Mesopotamian
cuneiform, was developed by the Sumerians around the 4th millenium B.C.
- Another difference is universality. Humans everywhere can speak, some people cannot write. In
addition many languages lack a written form.
- Another difference is natural acquisition. Children automatically learn to speak but have to be
taught how to read.
- Oral words are momentary, but writing is permanent. The permanence of writing allows repeated
reading and close analysis. The spontaneity and rapidity of speech minimises the chance of
complex pre-planning.
- Oral communication can be effective in expressing meaning to an audience. This is because of
the use of intonation, volume, pitch, pauses, movement, visual cues, etc.
3. ELEMENTS IN A COMMUNICATIVE SITUATION
Now that we have dealt with the differences between speech and written language, I am going to to
focus on the factors involved in a communicative act, following the communication models developed
by different authors.
SAUSSURE developed a communication model where the basic elements were:
- The sender (speaker or writer)
- The receiver (listener or reader)
The sender and the receiver switch roles and a dialogue occurs.
Other scholars have developed Saussures model. Karl Buhler, a European linguist and psychologist
added in the 1960s new element: the context or environment. He also described three functions of
language, each one based on a different element of his communication model:
- the Expressive function, centered on the sender
- the Conative function, centered on the receiver
- the Representational function, centered on the context or environment
Buhlers model was enriched and completed by Jakobson, who based his work on Saussure. Jakobson
added the Metalinguistic function, centered on the code and the Poetic function, centered on the message
itself.
In their book The Mathematical Theory of Communication, Shannon and Weaver developed a model of
communication in which they included the concepts channel, and noise.
The channel is the medium through which the message is transmitted.
Noise is the interferences that may occur on the channel.

If the signal is stronger than noise the message will be comprehensible, but if noise is stronger than the
signal the message will be distorted.
Later, Malinowski, a linguistic anthropologist, noticed the existence of a Phatic function in
communication, centered on the channel. The phatic function serves to establish, to prolong, or to
discontinue communication.
CONCLUSION
To conclude this essay, I would like to stress the fact that using English as the language of
communication in the English class is the best way to develop our students communicative competence,
which is the first basic competence set in our curriculum. Using English as the language for
communication in the class helps students to be confident in their understanding and progressive
production of the spoken language. Our curriculum gives priority to oral comprehension and expression
activities. Writing is introduced gradually since the first year of Primary Education towards a certain
degree of reading and writing autonomy at the end of the Primary Education stage. According to
D.89/2014 at the end of Primary Education,students must have acquired the communication skills
defined by the A1 level of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages in oral
comprehension (listening) , oral expression (speaking) , reading comprehension ( reading) and written
expression (writing ) .
BIBLIOGRAPHY
D. 89/2014 of 24th July for the Community of Madrid
HARMER, J. The Practice of ELT. Longman, 2007.
SAUSSURE, F. Course in general linguistics. OUP, 2006.