Linguistic Relativity
Body Categorization
When studying language it is important to keep in mind the ongoing
relationship and connection between language itself, thought, and culture.
Sometimes researchers studying language fail to take culture into
consideration as part of their methodology or interpretation.
According to Laura Ahearn in chapter 3 of her book Living Language,
researchers have examined language, thought and culture in several ways.
1) Language-in-general studies. This is the broadest level of inquiry.
How does having any language at all influence thinking? For
example, how do cognition processes of humans differ from other
animals or from those few humans who never learned language?
2) Linguistic structures. How do categories influence thinking and
behavior?
a. Semantic domains – groups of words with core meanings in
common. Groups or categories that most or all language groups have
created albeit in different ways. (Things like color, body descriptors,
spatial relationships etc. etc.)
b. Grammatical categories. The grammar construction in a language
influences an obligatory or habitual unconscious framing of the world.
(Things like gendered nouns, grammar that implies status and
respect in Japan, heat as a noun or a verb etc. etc.)
3) Language use. Researchers investigate how particular habits of
speaking or discursive practices can influence thought and
interpretation. Does language use influence cognition directly or do
habits of language indirectly reinforce or reconfigure thinking?
(Chapter 3 examples: Researcher working with defense intellectuals
and the think tank of nuclear strategies. Researcher studying a
fundamentalist Baptist community.)
The following study is an example of looking at (2a) linguistic
structures and semantic domains.
Language Kuuk Thaayorre
Kuuk Thaayoree is a Paman language spoken on the West coast of Cape York
Peninsula, Australia. Most speakers are now residents in the Aboriginal community of
Pormpuraaw. This group was, until recently in human history, hunters and gatherers.
The Kuuk Thaayoree speakers remain closely linked with their traditional lands. Many
live on outstations through parts of the year.
Alice Gaby of the Max Planck Institute for Pscyholinguists spent time between 2002 and
2004 doing fieldwork among the Kuuk Thaayoree speakers. Her article, The Thaayorre
‘true man’: Lexicon of the human body in an Australian language, explains her findings
in greater detail. Below is a brief description of some of the main points. The article was
published in Language Sciences 28(2006) 201-220.
North Queensland Australia
Domain of the human body is ideal for semantic*
comparison
- Body is a physical universal
- All languages have terms referring to the body
• Cross-linguistic comparison of 10 languages (2006)
• Studying body terminology is conducive to fieldwork based studies
(Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics)
*Semantic: the meanings connected with words or signs.
Body concept compared
by Alice Gaby (2006)
Kuuk Thaayorre (a Paman language of Cape York, Australia)
The term for body in Kuuk Thaayorre
•
Closest similarity to the English term ‘body’ is Pam-minj, which means True Man
True man includes physical presence as well as non-corporeal components
- tracks
- voice
- shadow
- etc., etc.
English
The term ‘body’ in English
• A physical manifestation of a person
• Fairly unproblematic
English idea of body and parts
Thaayorre
Body as “True Man” is used intentionally in typical everyday language:
• To infer opposition to non-human things
• To include non-corporeal elements of humanity
English
Body is used intentionally in typical everyday language:
• To infer opposition to non-physical things
• To exclude the non-corporeal elements of humanity
Mind/Body Distinction?
• Gaby points out that a mind body distinction is difficult to
articulate in Thaayorre.
(Does that mean that the mind, body, soul distinction - that
English speakers take for granted - derives in part from
defining and referring to bodies as purely physical and
separate from the non-corporeal aspects of humanity?)
“Clearly, the boundary between a human’s physical and non-physical
aspects (mind, voice, or footprints) is not as salient in Kuuk
Thaayorre as it is in English.” (Gaby 2006: 207)
Body Parts Distinction?
•
Linguists have proposed that ‘part of’ is a universal part of grammar.
•
Kuuk Thaayorre apparently lacks an expression to mean ‘part of’,
according to Gaby and other language researchers before her.
•
As a result it is difficult to compare Thaayorre body categories with
other languages and their body part categories.
In addition, it would seem that ‘part of’ is not universal to all languages.
What might a lack of an expression such as ‘part of’ mean in terms of worldview
or knowledge?
Trying to establish data for cross-cultural
comparison
At the most, Gaby found that Thaayorre speakers might be induced to talk about the
part of a whole:
• A face has two eyes
• A body has two eyes
• The dog is of the man
• A toenail is of the foot
• A mouth has a tongue
This was the closest the researcher got to eliciting body part
statements
The usefulness of this form is limited because Thaayorre
speakers found body part evaluation unacceptable.
Alice Gaby’s Tentative Conclusions
• “This study placed Kuuk Thaayorre amongst the growing number of
languages shown to adhere to neither a taxonomic nor partonomic model
in their subdivision of the human form.”
• Thaayorre often describe non-human entities and events as
segmentations of the body mapped onto the world as a whole.
• What might this indicate about the ways in which Thaayorre speakers
view themselves and the world?
How might you be able to ‘test’ or ‘check’ your hypotheses?