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Language and Thought

Nicholas Hanna. Language and Thought. What do we do using our language?. Generate Manipulate Record. Research Questions. Does the language we speak limit our thoughts? Does the language we speak influence our thoughts?. Color. Setswana: 1 word for both blue and green

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Language and Thought

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  1. Nicholas Hanna Language and Thought

  2. What do we do using our language? • Generate • Manipulate • Record

  3. Research Questions • Does the language we speak limit our thoughts? • Does the language we speak influence our thoughts?

  4. Color • Setswana: • 1 word for both blue and green • Group these items together1 • English and Russian • Do not group these items together

  5. Grammatical Features • Chinese and Navajo1 • Categorize items differently • Consistent with features of their grammars

  6. Quantity • Pirahã, of Brazil • { “One”, “Two”, “Many” } • “unable to reliably tell the difference between four objects placed in a row and five in the same configuration”2

  7. Language trains us to segregate • Practice makes perfect • Different languages demand we segregate different features

  8. Intuition • We want a more expressive language • More categories

  9. Evidentials • Affixes to words • Specify the source of knowledge (witnessed, inferred, …) • Required in some languages

  10. Evidentials • In languages with evidentials, children: • Evaluate degree of certainty from a younger age7 • Differentiate between credible and non-credible sources from a younger age7 • Are more reliable in court testimony7

  11. What this means… • In English the idea behind the evidential • can be represented by words or phrases • can be left out • In languages with evidentials • Evidentials are not optional • Therefore • English is more expressive • The “less expressive” language is linked with the positive effects

  12. Programming Languages • How we structure a problem? • Recursive or Iterative? • Parallel or Sequential?

  13. Conclusion • Does the language we speak limit our thoughts? • Maybe. • Does the language we speak influence our thoughts? • Yes. Heavily.

  14. Applications • Cross-cultural communication • Are speakers of different languages capable of the same thoughts? • Multilingualism • Benefits to learning multiple languages. • Constructed language • Can we design a more capable language to enhance knowledge? • Can we accidentally hinder a language to the point of hurting knowledge?

  15. References • Arrieta Espinoza, Anita. “Language Culture and Thought: Toward a Reacquaintance with the Whorfian Hypothesis.” Kanina. 27.2: 173-83. • Biever, Celeste. “Language May Shape Human Thought.” New Scientist. • Boroditsky, Lera. “Does Language Shape Thought? Mandarin and English Speakers' Conceptions of Time.” Cognitive Psychology. 43.1 (2001): 1-22. • Chafe, Wallace. “Language and Memory.” Language. 49.2 (1973): 261-81. • Chen, Jenn-Yeu. “Do Chinese and English speakers think about time differently? Failure of replicating Boroditsky.” Cognition. 104.2 (2007): 427-36. • Gobel, Eric. "Neural correlates of skill acquisition: Decreased cortical activity during a serial interception sequence learning task." NeuroImage. 58.4 (15 October 2011): 1150-7. • Matsui, Tomoko. “Knowing how we know: Evidentiality and cognitive development.” New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development. 2009.125: 1-11. • Skerrett, Delaney Michael. “Can the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis save the planet? Lessons from cross-cultural psychology for critical language policy.” Current Issues in Language Planning. 11.4: 331-40. • Tohidian, Iman. “Examining Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis as One of the Main Views on the Relationship Between Language and Thought.” Journal of Psycholinguistic Research. 38.1: 65-74.

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