![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() To put it concisely, walking is an inherent, biologicalfunction of man. In a very real sense the normal human being is predestined to walk, not becausehis elders will assist him to learn the art, but because his organism is prepared from birth, or evenfrom the moment of conception, to take on all those expenditures of nervous energy and all thosemuscular adaptations that result in walking. Indeed, the very conformation of these muscles and of the appropriate parts of thenervous system may be said to be primarily adapted to the movements made in walking and insimilar activities. The child is individually equipped, by the complex set of factors thatwe term biological heredity, to make all the needed muscular and nervous adjustments that resultin walking. Inthe case of the latter function, culture, in other words, the traditional body of social usage, is notseriously brought into play. The process of acquiringspeech is, in sober fact, an utterly different sort of thing from the process of learning to walk. Yet it needs but a moment's reflection toconvince its that this naturalness of speech is but an illusory feeling. It seems as natural toman as walking, and only less so than breathing. Speech is so familiar a feature of daily life that we rarely pause to define it. Introductory: Language defined Table of Contents | Next | Previous ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |