What is language?
According to Webster's Dictionary language is defined as:
Simply put, language is what people and animals use
to communicate their thoughts, ideas and feelings. Of course, animals communicate with each other differently than humans, and each type of animal communicates differently. For example, a bee uses a sophisticated dance to tell the rest of the bees in the hive where there is food, while humpback whales communicate through the use of melodic sounds. One could say then, that animals use different languages.
Like animals, people also use different languages.
Each culture has its own words and symbols that are used by people within that culture to communicate
with others in the same culture. For example, a person living in Japan will use the Japanese language to communicate with other Japanese. Unlike animals though, some cultures use more than one language. People within these cultures are said to be either bilingual or multilingual. One such place is Canada. It is very likely that a person living in Canada may speak both French and English. Likewise, a person living in Switzerland may speak Italian, German and French.
Not only do people use different languages to communicate, but languages also have different dialects. A dialect is a variation of a language which uses words and grammar somewhat differently from the standard form of the same language. For example, people who live in Manchester, England speak in a dialect that is slightly different from people who live in London, England; however, people in both cities speak English.
There are also some people who don't use a spoken language at all. These people use their hands to communicate. This type of language is called sign language and is most commonly used by people who are deaf.
Now that we know how people
communicate, we are faced with a question. Are we part of a specific culture because of the language we speak, or do we speak a particular language because we are part of that culture? To put it more simply, is a Korean person Korean because he speaks Korean, or does he speak Korean because he was born in Korea? What part does language play in the definition of culture?