Abstract

LEJARRAGA, Horacio. Languaje: what makes us humans. Arch. argent. pediatr. [online]. 2017, vol.115, n.4, pp.382-384. ISSN 0325-0075.  http://dx.doi.org/10.5546/aap.2017.382.

Pediatrician carry out the surveillance of language in preschool children as one of the components of child development (language, fine and gross motor skills, etc.). However, language is more than that. The process of transformation of the magic meaning on the word present in the initial stages of human evolution (Myth period) into a new, symbolic meaning as representative of the object (Logos period) took around 40,000 years. With the mastering of language, man was capable of thinking; from then onwards, these two functions, thought and language, became inextricably linked, the evolved hand in hand. But this achievement had a high price : the alienation of man from nature. Hence, language became a social construction which, far from representing the objects of nature, was capable of assigning attributes and meaning to the objects themselves. Language can be used as a commercial strategy (making the words value and cost indistinguishable). According to Lacan, language is also a part of the subject, we are constructed by language. By promoting language in children we contribute to the promotion of the child as a person, as an individual and as a social being.

Keywords : Language; Child development; Promotion; Thought; Social integration.

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