In order to understand the nature of language, you are encouraged to know clearly about the three views of language:
The structural view
The functional view
The interactional view
1. Let's firstly pay attention to key sentences telling the meaning of each view.
The structural view
This view sees language as a linguistic system made up of various subsystems. Based on this view, to learn a language means to learn the structural items in order to understand and produce language.
The functional view
This view not only sees language as a linguistic system but also as a means for doing things. In order to perform functions, learners need to know how to combine the grammatical rules and the vocabulary to express notions that perform the functions.
The interactional view
This view considers language as a communicative tool, whose main use is to build up and maintain social relations between people. Learners not only need to know the grammar and vocabulary of the language but also they need to know the rules for using them appropriately in different communicative contexts.
