On the radio the other day there was a story about an Indigenous woman, a victim of the Sixties Scoop, reclaiming her heritage. She talked about how important studying her native language was to the process.
It made me think about how much we take language for granted. Once you learn it, you do things automatically because it becomes so ingrained and we do not appreciate just how important it is.
An argument can certainly be made that language is the most important technology humans ever developed. It is foundational to everything that has come since.
And there is no question there are huge cultural differences between groups of people who speak different languages.
But does the language we speak influence the way we see the world, or is it the other way around?
There has been some fascinating research done on this subject.
Researchers at Stanford University cite, for example, a tribe in Brazil that has no words for numbers. Because of that they cannot quantify things accurately. Consequently, quantifying things accurately is unimportant in their culture. Or was it because they didn鈥檛 think accurately quantifying things was important that they didn鈥檛 develop words for numbers?
In any event, wouldn鈥檛 that drive most English speakers crazy?
Apparently English also makes us more likely to lay blame, or is it that the people who developed the language liked to lay blame and thus it is reflected in the language?
In fact, it is drilled into us not to use the passive voice. If, for example, I bumped into a table and聽 knocked over a lamp, I would probably say, 鈥淚 broke the lamp.鈥�
Speakers of other languages such as Spanish and Japanese are more likely to say, 鈥渢he lamp broke鈥� because to say 鈥淭hom broke the lamp鈥� implies in was intentional.
The Stanford researchers even tested the impact of passive versus active voice by asking people to watch the infamous Janet Jackson 鈥渨ardrobe malfunction鈥� from the 2005 Super Bowl then read a story about it.
The subjects who read Justin Timberlake 鈥渞ipped the costume鈥� were more likely to blame him and recommended 53 per cent higher fines than those who read 鈥渢he costume ripped鈥� even though they all witnessed the same event.
What does it say about English culture? On the one hand we might be too uptight, on the other, maybe we have a mature sense of responsibility.
