Narrator Listen to part of a discussion in a linguistics class. No

Professor  Well, today I think we’d talk about whether animals besides humans also have language. You see, what makes humans different from other animals is the power of speech. Right? Perhaps it is the power of speech that helped human beings develop into modern society. Now I’m going to ask a question that sounds like an easy question but really it isn’t. The question is, do animals have language? It is a question worth considering. How do you think of it? First I want to hear your opinions.
Mike In my opinion, 1 don’t think... um... I think other animals have language like humans do, because... because they cannot communicate thoughts and feelings.
Jennifer Mike, I don’t agree with you. How do you know that they can’t communicate thoughts and feelings? Actually...uh...actually the bee has ways of telling other bees about food. And the dolphin has ways of giving information to other dolphins. One more, the monkey is similar to humans in many ways. It can use a human language system. So...so...I think other animals do have language. But...but...they have a different language system from humans.
Professor  Sounds very reasonable. Some animals ,seem to have a communication system like...as you said...the bee, the dolphin and the monkey. Does this mean animals have language? To address this question, we need to study these animals carefully. As you all have done the readings, we know... that bees do two kinds of dances to tell other bees their discovery of food. One, when food is close by, the bee does a round dance. In this dance, it moves...uh...moves in a circle inside the hive. A second kind of dance is a...a...tail-wagging dance. In this dance, the bee wiggles the end of its body as it moves in a straight line. The tail-wagging dance is used when the food is more than ten meters away. The bees know from the speed of the tail-wagging dance just how far away the food source is. The line the bee dances on shows the direction that the bees must fly in to find the food. Isn’t this interesting? The bees’ communication system is extremely interesting. Each bee can tell all the
other bees where to look for food...and...and if the food is especially good and how much of it there is. But the book mentioned an experiment conducted to study the bees’ communication system. In this experiment, a food source was placed very high above the bee hive and a bee was put into the food. The bee returned to the hive and did the round dance, but none of the other bees could find the food. So, what does this experiment suggest?
Mike  Although bees have two ways of telling others about the food source, this experiment shows...uh...shows that bees do not really have a language. You know, in this experiment,  the bee can’t tell  other bees the place of the food,  even though...uh...even though it saw the food.
Jennifer  Well, Mike, only one experiment cannot tell everything. I figure...um...that something might be wrong with the experiment, since, as said in the book, bees do have two dances to tell others the food source. Dances are their communication system. They just have...uh...a different way of communicating.
Professor  Hmmm, well... for now, there is no further information about the experiment... and... we don’t know other experiments done to study bees. But, how about dolphins? Scientists have also made interesting discoveries. The dolphin has three kinds of calls or noises to tell other dolphins about food, danger, or...other things. For communication, however, the dolphin’s system is much more limited than a person’s. And also monkeys. There are some interesting findings too. In mid-1960’s, scientists tried to teach a monkey named Washoe to use a sign language.
Jennifer   Sorry... what language?
Professor  Uh, it’s a sign language, the language usually used by the deaf. In this experiment, signs are made with hands, because...because scientists considered that monkeys don’t have the same kind of mouth and throat as humans do. After two years, Washoe could make thirty-four signs with her hands. For example, she put signs together to make sentences...and...and used one sign for all things of one kind. Besides, she can generalize her use of the sign. The ability to combine and to generalize is very important in language use. Another monkey named... uh... Lana was also studied. She had learned to use the nearly 100 symbols on the computer board and could make sentences by pressing symbols. Lana also showed that different word orders have different meanings. It seems that monkeys do have language. Is it right?
Mike  Well, I read about monkeys learning languages. In fact, compared with humans, their language ability  is quite limited. They can’t express complex thoughts and feelings. And their use of language is rather mechanical.
Jennifer
    [interrupting]
    Come on...Mike. Being mechanical doesn’t mean...that they don’t have language. It just proved that they can’t communicate as flexibly...as humans. Anyway, they use signs and symbols to communicate.
Mike  But, Jennifer, a parrot can say a word after you teach it many times. Does it mean the parrot really understands what the word means.
Professor  Our discussion gets more and more interesting. Do animals have language? The answer to this question rests with how "language" is defined. Language may be defined as any system for exchanging information. If this definition is adopted, then bees, dolphins, and monkeys all have a language. But language may be defined as a system for exchanging information by making new combinations of symbols. If this definition is used, then bees and dolphins do not have language, but monkeys may have one. Animal language, therefore, is a very complex matter. It cannot be concluded whether animals have language or not. Much more research will have to be done before any conclusion can be made.