Communication, Language and
Culture
Historical Linguistics
• Subfield of linguistic anthropology
• Compares and contrasts shifts and changes
of languages use and structure over time
and across space
• Origin and transformation of words
Two major
Theoretical Influences
• The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (late 18th and early 19th
hundreds)
• --language influences culture; (Nahuahtl, Nicaraguan
language)
• --Paiute of Arizona
• --The Spot of level ground in the mountains surrounded by
ridges
• Sociolinguistics
• --culture influences language
• --William Labor (1966)
• --class, occupation
Linguistic anthropologists look at
the relationship between:
•
•
•
•
Language and socialization
Language and power
Language and social change
By analyzing discourse: engage
conversation or discussion, verbal or written
speech.
Bilingual or multilingual nations
• India:
• --hundreds of languages spoken
• Four linguistic families: Indo-aryan, Dravidian,
Austro-Asiatic and Tibeto-Burman
• Canada:
• Official bilingualism
• French and English
• Francophone, anglophone and allophone