ABSTRACT
When asked what the main function of language is, most people will say that language is a tool used to learn or gather information on topics such as computing or astronomy. In other words, language is needed to enable us to find out “things” about the world. While such a function of language may explain the thriving role of language, it does not tell us why it spreads, dies, multiplies, colonizes, and rejuvenates, or why it sometimes is used as a lingua franca (LF). In fact, we rarely utilize language when computing, as it is often a solitary activity. Accounting, welding, and/or dancing is also more often learned by demonstration and practice than by speech. So too when we try to find out information about the world on the Internet or in the library, a totally literate activity; we are, ironically, once again often alone. Information is more likely to be digested upon reflection rather than through interaction. So the “best” answer here as to the primary function of language is that it is a device for social bonding rather than information gathering. In this study, language is viewed instrumentally, and its social interactional capacity enables it to have far-reaching sociopolitical implications (Dunbar 2003). This social interactional phenomena does not only take place within close networks such as families, friends, and neighbors for before long, populations expand and people will feel the need to communicate beyond these immediate networks due to extended purposes. The world we live in has long been a multilingual and multicultural one, and hence people are tempted, constantly, to break down language barriers so as to create a common medium of communication. To do this, new languages are then created or existing languages made to fulfill this communicative function.
