Language

Language is a tool for communication.

While the use of language was often regarded as an uniquely human attribute, it is now recognized that cetaceans also use a form of language to communicate with one another.

Anthropologist debate when our ancestors started to communicate in a form we would recognize as language. Approximately ten thousand years ago humans independently invented several forms of written language.

Deaf people use forms of sign language like American sign language, which are distinct languages.

The instructions written for computers are generally called "computer languages", but they are not languages in the same sense as human languages.

References

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Further reading

• Crystal, David (1997). The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 
• Cysouw, Michael; Good, Jeff (2013). "Languoid, doculect and glossonym: Formalizing the notion 'language'". Language Documentation and Conservation 7: 331–59. http://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/handle/10125/4606. 
• Swadesh, Morris (1934). "The phonemic principle". Language 10 (2): 117–29. doi:10.2307/409603. JSTOR 409603.