The Use of Language: Dimana or Di Mana?

Dimana or Di mana, does not really matter. What's matter is people understand the meaning. Really?

What does 'language' mean? 

From the definition in Cambridge Publishing What is Language?, language is a rule-based system of signs. The definition is similar to Harimurti's: the systemic sign of sound that agreed by certain speech community to cooperate, communicate, and identified themselves ("Bahasa adalah sebuah sistem tanda yang disepakati oleh masyarakat tertentu untuk bekerja sama, berkomunikasi, dan mengidentifikasi diri," p. 3). Both definition mention 'system' to define language. It is shown that language is not abstract. So, we use a systemic form of language to express our sadness or happiness. 

Speaking is as natural as waking up each day: it is an unconscious action that we rarely notice we are even doing; I'll generalize 'speaking' as using a language. We do use a rule-based system language in our daily without noticing it.

Other than that, language rules are conventions. 

The community who use those conventions is sharing the same set of signs that convey meaning. That is why the person who sharing the same set of signs could understand the messages delivered by the interlocutor. Besides signs, using a language is about sharing the same experience or background. If we do not have any experience on "I write a five pages essay" or "eating pizza at Pizza Hut", we surely can not understand the message. So does the communication is all about. In the language community, people can be communicating and understanding each other because they both have the same impression about the world (Kushartanti, p. 23).

Moreover, the sign that shared by the speaker in the community is arbitrary. It means it doesn’t possess any inherent connection with its meaning. For example, in American English, the word for the object that can open or close a large opening in a wall is a door. The fact that this word varies from one language to another shows that it is arbitrary. Another example, some people use coke, but other people use soda, to referring to the drink made by sodium bicarbonate. The arbitrariness of language made variations into the usage of language (see the article "What Is Language?"). This variation may cause the difference of pronunciation or how to write it in the written form. Another example from Bahasa, some people write 'dimana' but other people write 'di mana'. This example shows that the variation may cause the mistakes of the uses of language; they did not know the conventions that normally used. Some don't know it, but some don't care. 

Language in communication plays an important role. An effective communication requires an understanding and recognition of the connections between a language and the people who use it. In communication context, it will be no different when I write 'dimana' to interlocutor because we both have the same impression about words 'dimana': defining where you are or explaining the exact position of some place.

However, 'dimana' does not right because it does not follow the rule-based system of Bahasa's.

Why do we need rules if the rules were made based on the conventions?

It is undoubtedly that language needs protection, because language could be lost and gone. The way to protect the language is doing the documentation. Documentation is about making and keeping of permanent records on what the language has produced. It is a kind of insurance policy against the breakdown of oral transmission (Ostler, p. 329). In other words, documentation is the written version of language conventions, including grammar.

Can you imagine if the next generation uses our language with confusion because they do not know which conventions they should use? And how would our language turn to be in the future if there are too many conventions (rules, grammar: the written version of language conventions)?

Can changes occur in language?

Yes. 

Changes in a language is not an odd thing to happen. 

Bahasa was rooted from Malay language and as the time goes by, it becomes Bahasa as we know today. The vocabulary, the spelling, the rules are all evolving around time. Maybe, 30 years later we will lost some words just because we simply don't use it anymore. 

That's why as long as we can use it, use it wisely. Because it is part of documenting and preserving the language itself.