The basic units of language

The basic units of language 

What are the basic units of language? This is the wrong question, since there are different kinds languages which have different basic units. For example,  

The basic units of body language are body movements.  

The basic units of spoken language are speaking sounds. 

The basic units of hieroglyphics are pictographs. 

The basic units of modern written language are words. 

  

The basic units of language in General Linguistics is the study of units in written language, neither spoken nor body language. Most linguists are not hearing impaired people. They all speak and write so they have tended to conflate or confuse the speaking sound and the pronouncing of a letter and a word. 

A phone is one of sounds in speaking. Phonemes are not the smallest units of sound in speaking, but the pronouncing of letters, precisely, letters of IPA.  

Syllables are not the single units of speaking, but parts of a word.  

Without writing, there are neither phonemes nor syllables in speaking. Therefore, the basic units of language usually refer the basic units of written language.

语言的基本单位 

语言的基本单位是什么？这是一个错误的问题。因为不同的语言有不同的基本单位，例如： 

肢体语言的基本单位是身体的动作。 

口头语言的基本单位是说话的声音。 

象形文字的基本单位是象形文字。 

现代书面语言的基本单位是word。 

普通语言学里面的基本单位是指书面语言的单位，不是口语和肢体语言的单位。大多数语言学家都不是聋哑人和盲人，他们能说会写，因此他们常常把说话的声音和读字母的声音混为一谈。 

phone 是说话的声音， phoneme 是一个读字母的声音，严格地说，是读国际音标的声音。 

音节不是一个说话声音的单位，而是划分word读音的单位。 

如果没有文字，口头语言里不可能有 phoneme 和 syllable 这两个概念。所以说所谓语言的基本单位就是书面语言的基本单位，也就是文字的基本单位。