The Effects Of Language On Language Influences

Most questions of whether and how language shapes thought start with the simple observation that languages differ from one another. And a lot! Just look at the way people talk, they might say. Certainly, speakers of different languages must attend to strikingly different aspects of the world just so they can use their language properly.

The main reason that Boroditsky’s argument that language shapes our minds is valid is that the research she did with her teams covers a wide variety of aspects on this topic while still keeping her article cohesive. The first research Boroditsky introduces to her audience is the research on the Kuuk Thaayorre, which is an

It is often thought that the reality that is being expressed in spoken word is the very same as the reality which is being perceived in thought. Perception and expression are frequently understood to be synonymous and it is assumed that our speech is mostly based on our thoughts. This idea presumes that what one says is dependent of how it is encoded and decoded in the mind. (Badhesha, 2002) In any case, there are numerous individuals that trust the inverse: what one sees is reliant on the talked word. The supporters of this thought trust that thinking is reliant on language. Linguistic Edward Sapir and his understudy Benjamin Lee Whorf are known as far as concerns them in the promotion of this very guideline. Their aggregate hypothesis, known as the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis, also known as theory of linguistic relativity, relativism, determinism, Whorfian hypothesis or even Whorfianism. Initially talked about by Sapir in 1929, the speculation got to be prominent in the 1950s after post mortem production of Whorf's works on the subject. After incredible assault

In his article "Does Your Language Shape How You Think?" the author Guy Deutscher discusses how the acquisition of one's mother tongue shapes one's view of the world. The article was published in The New York Times in August 2010. The author's major paradigm is that every language one learns influences one's mind and feelings in a different way. Deutscher explains that depending on one's mother tongue, objects can be considered masculine or feminine, which results in the speaker feeling differently about them. The author believes that different languages do indeed make one speak about space in different ways as well; although he claims people do not have entirely different views of it. Deutscher then explains that experiments have shown that

Famous American anthropologist and social theorist Clyde Kluckholm , claims in one of his publication that “Every language is also a special way of looking at the world and interpreting experience concealed in the structure of language are a whole set of unconscious assumptions about the world and the life in it”(Writing logically, Thinking critically 7th edition P 35). Based on this theory, we can learn more

Linguistic relativity is the notion that language can affect our thought processes, and is often referred to as the ‘Sapir-Whorf hypothesis’, after the two linguists who brought the idea into the spotlight. Whorf writes how “Language is not merely a reproducing instrument for voicing ideas but rather is itself the shaper of ideas, the program and guide for the individual’s mental activity” (1956:212), and I will explain how it is able to do so. In this essay I will argue that certain ways of mental categorization, spatial cognition and reality interpretation, based on the characteristics of our specific variety of language, influence our perception of the world. I will discuss how languages divide up nature differently, and

　　　　Benjamin Lee Whorf believed that language had power over the mind however, this theory has crashed due

Language change happens every day. New words are constantly being added and new dialects are forming. People have always argued about the causes of language change and tried to control the changes that occurred but ultimately they accomplished nothing. Languages changes and spread as a result of the people who use it daily. African American English and California English are both examples of the different ways language can change. People try to resist the changes in their language because they do not want to see it change. Language change is a natural process that can be affected by others but never stopped. This course has done an excellent job explaining how language change starts and spreads.

In the article “Lost in Translation”, the author, Lera Boroditsky, maintains as her thesis that the languages we speak not only reflect or express our thoughts, but also shape the very thoughts we wish to express. Boroditsky begins the main section of her essay with the history of the issue of whether or not languages shape the way speakers think. Charlemagne was the first to think that languages do in fact shape the mindset of speaker, but Noam Chomsky rebutted this idea with his thought that languages do not differ much from each other, thus in turn proposing that linguistic differences do not cause a difference in thinking. Now with scientists

2. The critics of Sapri-Whorf Hypothesis had insisted the bond between culture and language, doubts the relevance of person’s view of the world. The example of Shona which tribe has only three category of colors does not mean that Shona’s eye is psychologically different; and can’t see rainbow as English-speakers do. It’s just hard to speak the definition of the color.

Language is the universal connection that brings all humans together. We share this common ground to communicate. The three major points that I would like to focus on are: How does language influence our culture? Does it define us, or does it refine us? And lastly, the impact that language has on our societies.

Linguistics has impacted cognitive psychology as the quest to understand language acquisition and the structure of language itself is undertaken. Linguistics is a complex and multifaceted; it includes language structural patterns and language development (Barsalou, 2005). The process of language development is complicated and dense, as the study of language is examined; the role of cognition is inherently examined and analyzed. Sternberg (2006) also explores language as an innate process and presents the idea that humans are born ready for language as a biological and cognitive process.

The Sapir Whorf hypothesis mentioned above is based on the ideas of Edward Sapir and Benjamin Whorf who studied aboriginal languages among Native American tribes, mostly the Hopi. They believed that the language one speaks is directly related to the way they understand the reality and see the world. For example, Whorf once wrote ‘we dissect nature along lines laid down by our native languages’ (Whorf cited in Salzmann 1993: 153) which led to Zdenek Salzmann’s conclusion of Whorf’s ideas: ‘Difference among languages must therefore be reflected in the differences in the worldviews of their speakers’ (1993: 156). This hypothesis has been challenged many times by several anthropologists and linguists and there are arguments and evidence for and against it.

The idea that language affects the way we remember things and the way we perceive the world was first introduced by the influential linguists Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf (Harley, 2008). The central idea of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, today more commonly known as the linguistic relativity hypothesis, holds that “each language embodies a worldview, with quite different languages embodying quite different views, so that speakers of different languages think about the world in quite different ways” (Swoyer, 2003). In the late 1990s, Cameron claimed that the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis was regarded as “that which must be refuted

Through looking at patterns of social interaction of different languages it is easy to predict the linguistic results of language contact. This could be seen through multilingualism which is a result of language contact between multiple different languages. Multilingualism can create diglossia which helps display the multilingualism of a country or community and helps show it is useful for predicting the results of language contact. Code switching in which people switch from one language to another depending on the situation, helps show how social interaction between speakers of different languages helps us predict the linguistic results of language contact. Then there is dialect levelling and language change which helps show the beginning