Interspecies Communication in Linguistic and Cognitive Perspective: An Analysis of Human and Equine Communication Systems

Abstrakt

The paper compares human speech and horse communication from a psycholinguistic perspective, aiming to determine the extent to which horse communication system exhibits features of language as understood in cognitive linguistics and what information processing mechanisms are common to both species. It briefly presents the main paradigms of interspecies communication, relating to the language features proposed by Charles Hockett. Particular attention is given to the theory of prototypes, which allows for the analysis of communicative abilities as a continuum rather than a rigid division between “language” and “non-language.” The conclusions indicate that while horse communication does not meet all the criteria for language, it exhibits some features of semiotic systems and can be analysed within the context of cognitive psycholinguistics.