The Relation of Language and Culture


Language and culture

·        Is an “organized, generally agreed-upon, learned symbol system that is used to represent
the experiences within a geographic or cultural community” (Samovar: 14)

·        Formative role of language in culture: language as symbolic action that creates the
substance of culture (Johnson: 186)


The importance of language for a person’s worldview: Benjamin Lee Whorf and Edward Sapir

·        "Although a culture's language expresses how that society perceives and understands the
world, the language itself influences that society's percpetions and understandings..."

·        "Human beings live in a social reality that is at the mercy of their language."

·        The real world is sub-consiously built from the group's language habits.

·        Examples:

Hopi Indians in the Southwest of North America: they use verbs with not tense- no past, present, or
future. "Instead, the verbs differ depending on such factors as the relative length of time an
event lasts, its completion or expected occurence, and its regularity..."

Navajo Indians do not distinguish among third-person pronouns as his, her, its, or their, and
instead use a "compound word of adjectives and nouns such as "one-wife-of-one-man" to indicate "his
wife"."

                                                                                   (Parillo: 18-19)


  * linguistic systems in our minds: “We cut nature up, organize it into concepts, and ascribe
significance as we do, largely because we are parties to an agreement to organize it this way …”
(Whorf; quoted in Johnson: 187)
  * “cultural frameworks give rise to particular languages, which in turn shape mental processes
and the organization of reality, which in turn create cultural frameworks.” (ibid.







Literature:


Johnson, Fern L. “Cultural Dimensions of Discourse.” In Samovar, Larry A., Porter, Richard, E.
(eds.) Intercultural Communication. Belmont, USA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2003, p. 184 – 197)


Parillo, Vincent N. Diversity in America. USA: Pine Forge Press, 1996


Samovar, Larry A., Porter, Richard E. “Understanding Intercultural Communication: An Introduction
and Overview.” In Samovar, Larry A., Porter, Richard, E. (eds.) Intercultural Communication.
Belmont, USA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2003, pp. 6-17.