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Senior Joined: Sep 13, 2008 Posts: 36

Rules (at least) apply to all languages that are used for communication:

1. A language must have rules.

2. Language must have have basic units, which have their own meaning. For spoken language, these are the words (phrases with a meaning that cannot be deduced from the basic units that make them can also be regarded as basic units).

3. Most of the of the messages are combinations of several words, according to some rules (grammar).

4. The basic structure of most of messages is association of some object with attribute or effect.

5. The rules of combinations are express by one of: meaning of the words, word order, word modifications, special words, modification of words by adding something.

6. Semantic information normally used whenever it is available to decide about the appropriate combination.

7. Word order is used for simple and frequently used features of the grammar.

8. The grammar has to allow combining any message with more information. (This includes the so-called 'recursion').

9. The main bulk of words mean either an object, an attribute, an action or an effect.

10. The language must have tools to make identification of objects efficient.

11. The language must have a way to signify repeated reference to the same object, and make it cheap.

12. Languages are far from optimum.

Any language that is used for communication by humans must have these features, independently on any innate rules. Therefore, finding these rule does not support theirs innateness.

Other, more specific rules, are more difficult to predict directly from the communicative role of language, because our understanding of language and human cognitive performance is not good enough, but they seems to be plausible. These include:

1. The fixed location of a header in a phrase. This is an example of using word order for combining the meaning of words to the complete phrase. Fixed location in different types of phrases is presumably less confusing than different word order for each kind of phrase.
2. Fixed order of subject, verb, object. Again, a usage of word order.

King Joined: Sep 11, 2008 Posts: 711

Your post is quite clear and useful. But I think it will be better if you can give us some examples for each point. Do you think so?

Senior Joined: Sep 25, 2009 Posts: 20

there are many rules in language, so it is not easy to master a language. although i am a Vietnamese, sometimes, i use wrong words in some situations.

spammer Joined: Oct 04, 2009 Posts: 655

I wonder if what have been said in your post can be applied to contextual or socialinguistic situation and complication?

Expert Joined: Sep 11, 2008 Posts: 100

I can see your point, however, you only give theory, it's not enough. why don't you try to find more examples to prove your points, that would be more informative.

spammer Joined: Oct 04, 2009 Posts: 655

the information is good enough but to make a more profound understanding, it should be developed by the support of examples, or explanantion.

Professional Joined: Sep 13, 2008 Posts: 40

Thank you for posting but these rules are somehow general.

Senior Joined: Oct 19, 2009 Posts: 20

learning English is difficult because it has many rules but to know all the rules is not easy. I think this is not a good article because it does not show us how to master the rules. I think it will be better if it has this. anyway, thank your article.

Expert Joined: Sep 14, 2009 Posts: 124

I agree on this "A language must have rules". The other ones are not convincing. They are too general to make "rule" for "language rules".

spammer Joined: Oct 04, 2009 Posts: 655

until now, i've still agreed that language rules which are generalized during the language acquisition process can spoil the process and the concious realization of the learners themselves

Expert Joined: Sep 11, 2008 Posts: 114

Not only the title but the content of your post is very interesting and helpful. We, language teachers in the future, should learn these rules by heart. I think they are very useful. Thanks for your information.

Professional Joined: Sep 11, 2008 Posts: 49

I thought this post says something about the similarities that all existing languages will have. Anyway, it's good to know how to form a new language, I wonder if anyone may base on these rules to make a new language.

Professional Joined: Sep 13, 2008 Posts: 74

The rules are not specific enough, could you please make it clearer?

Professional Joined: Sep 11, 2008 Posts: 63

Among those rules, I like the first rule most and i think it's the most important one. Language is a very complicated system, and if it is a system there must be rules to work it.

Professional Joined: Sep 11, 2008 Posts: 48

when i first looked at this article, i probably thought that every language had its own rules. however, in this article, you pointed out some common ruls for all language. thx!

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