Fundamentally, this course is about understanding human language. We will do this by first looking at other forms of communication: the way animals communicate and the way people use gestures and movement to communicate. Then we will describe the different components of language, and we will look for them in different languages across the world as well as in constructed languages. Finally, we will look at the influence that language has on real life: e.g., lawsuits that hinge on meaning; what is and isn’t allowed in advertisements; and how we show who we are via the words we use.