language and culture - dogs and squirrels

Language and Culture; Dogs and Squirrels

 

Walking my dog one frosty evening I reflected on her frequent stops to listen, sniff or look at something in the semi-dark of glowing windows and the streetlights. Her senses are tuned differently to mine, of course, and I had seen this in other dogs, as well. But what had not occurred to me before is the parallel between a dog's expanded sense of time, thanks to the ability to perceive how fresh or old the scent of rabbit or squirrel, for example, and the way that different languages predispose its speakers to different salient social or environmental or aesthetic reference points. In other words, much as the scent trails do not seem salient to me, so too will the sensitivity to social status and visual presentation not seem as salient to a native English speaker like me when contrasted to a native Japanese speaker, for example.

 

There are other analogies to illustrate the way that awareness and purpose is predisposed by language relativism, or the Lingua-cultural Ideology, as Paul Friedrich called it his 1989 article. Using the image of tinted glasses, the person wearing blue tints will soon adapt to the scenes around him, although bluish things like the sky will lighter because that is what the lens is filtering. Color complements such as yellows and oranges on the other hand will be deeper by the same principle. A person wearing yellow of amber tints will have the opposite experience: the color cast will soon be ignored by the brain, but those things natively yellow will appear a little paler than the naked eye sees them and blue things will be intensified, as well. Using this analogy for languages, each one allows a person to see the full spectrum of experiences, but certain facets will be paler or deeper compared to other languages.

 

Looking at the uneven development of vocabularies for certain aspects of life and livelihoods, commentators often point out the wealth of distinctions possible among dessert dwellers for conditions there, among arctic dwellers for their ecotope, and among coastal dwellers for their environment. These points of contrast are true, but what do these facts illustrate or suggest about the language – culture relationship? The analogy of occupational vocabularies can help to illuminate the consequence of specialized knowledge for its speakers and the typical discussions that they conduct. Certainly a specialist in airport security risks will see the air travel experience differently to an economy traveler or to a first-class paying customer. Each brings different expectations, past experiences, and a verbal toolbox of labels, categories, distinctions and priorities that allows the person to ignore what is in the range of normal and instead react to things that are sub-par on the one hand, and things that exceed expectations on the other hand.

 

Similarly health specialists see things differently to the patient who presents his conditions. While it is not impossible for the one to understand the perspective of the other, it may well be easier for a colleague to see the salient point than it is for someone who is not versed in the issues and specialized vocabulary known to the experts. Here, then, is the analogy for linguistic relativism: it is not impossible for a native speaker of English to understand a joke or culturally loaded term such as 'gezelligheid' (Dutch for 'cozy' in multiple social and experiential senses) or 'han' (Korean ethnomedical concept of repressed but explosive emotional response), for the fellow speaker of the particular foreign language, the given expression will have immediate meaning, while the effort to translate and give the accompanying connotations will slow down and belabor the meaning for the English speaker. Just so the five fields of humor, politics, literary arts, emotional expression, and religious experience are deeply rooted in a given cultural context and historical moment.

 

So while the meanings are not impossible for all humans to apprehend, it will be easiest for a native speaker of the particular language to respond to the significance. Thus, when trying to estimate the relative consequence of translation problems between languages or between centuries of just one language, it is helpful to regard each language as belonging to an occupational specialism, like that of mechanics, surgeons, pilots, quarterbacks, goal keepers, or lion tamers. It is not that you or I cannot see the meanings that the specialist attaches to certain actions or ideas, but that we may well require lengthy explanation. In that case of having to explain joke, having to explain the meaning takes away the rhythm, timing and punch since the full experience of the humor comes only in the flow of live conversation, not by careful dissection.

 

Whether it is the analogy of scent trails invisible to us but that a dog can 'see', the image of tinted lenses that alter the mix of relative color intensities, or the example of occupational vocabularies, surely the differences between languages are significant and consequential, whether the languages be closely related or come from unrelated families. In the end the meanings embedded in the cultural context of one language are not unknowable to people who do not speak the language. But those meanings are buried, sometimes deeply, and require effort to excavate.

 

Sadly the communities engaged in many of the human languages are so small that there is nobody in the next generation to speak the words and the languages die. Something less than 7,000 languages remain from the time of humans on this planet. We are all poorer when the diverse ways to see life and practice livelihoods on the earth's environmental zones grow fewer and fewer each generation. Think of the joy of the dog tracking squirrels and wonder: what is invisible to me? What am I missing by living in my one language and culture?

 

January 5, 2012
St. Johns, Michigan

 

References

Friedrich, Paul 1989 "Language, Ideology, and Political Economy" in American Anthropologist 91, 2 (June): 295-312.

Harrison, K. David 2009 When Languages Die. The Extinction of the World's Languages and the Erosion of Human Knowledge. London: OUP.

Why don’t other animals produce or consume such things as dance, music, visual art...

Humans feel motivated to create and consume many artistic forms. Why don't other animals produce or consume such things as dance, music, visual art, verbal arts of story and lyric and declamation?

 

Recognizing patterns and relationships, then applying ones known by experience to new material is something that characterizes human minds and hearts. In abstract terms this search for meaning is an extension from the core motivation in spoken (and thus also written) language. For some reason a given musical phrase, movement sequence, or choice of words stands out in a person's mind. It "means" something or resonates with a feeling or concept in one's own mind, as yet perhaps not articulated into a definite form. The artist answers a specific itch by producing sequences of pattern and meaning. The audience may dwell on a novel piece of work to grasp it, or in dim recognition of knowing it from another place or medium. Alternatively the audience may be actively seeking something to touch the itch they feel, and therefore browse rapidly through the works until they find something partly or fully connected to the meaning they are seeking. In the case of visual arts, the elements of composition, light, texture, narrative (intertexuality) or context could spark the feeling of recognition and personal meaning attached to the work. In other words the meaning can be perceived indirectly, incidentally and thus unintentionally.