THE LINGUISTIC RELATIVITY HYPOTHESIS by Michele Nathan A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the College of Social Science in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts Florida Atlantic University Boca Raton, Florida December 1973 THE LINGUISTIC RELATIVITY HYPOTHESIS by Michele Nathan This thesis was prepared under the direction of the candidate's thesis advisor, Dr. John D. Early, Department of Anthropology, and has been approved by the members of his supervisory committee. It was submitted to the faculty of the College of Social Science and was accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. SUPERVISORY COMMITTEE: &~ rl7 IC?13 (date) 1 ii ABSTRACT Author: Michele Nathan Title: The Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis Institution: Florida Atlantic University Degree: Master of Arts Year: 1973 Although interest in the linguistic relativity hypothesis seems to have waned in recent years, this thesis attempts to assess the available evidence supporting it in order to show that further investigation of the hypothesis might be most profitable. Special attention is paid to the fact that anthropology has largely failed to substantiate any claims that correlations between culture and the semantics of language do exist. This has been due to the impressionistic nature of the studies in this area. The use of statistics and hypothesis testing to provide mor.e rigorous methodology is discussed in the hope that employing such paradigms would enable anthropology to contribute some sound evidence regarding t~~ hypothesis. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Introduction • 1 CHAPTER I THE.HISTORY OF THE FORMULATION OF THE HYPOTHESIS. 5 Notes to Chapter I 20 II SOME PERIPHERAL ASPECTS OF LINGUISTIC RELATIVITY. 21 III THREE OF THE FOUR LEVELS OF EVIDENCE. 25 Notes to Chapter III • 40 IV THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL CONTRIBUTION • 41 v FURTHER RESEARCH POSSIBILITIES. 84 VI CONCLUSION . 90 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 94 iv Introduction In my opinion, the language-and-culture problem is the greatest challenge to linguistics since the phoneme • • • it is largely through the language-and-culture field that linguistics can become most clearly relevant to the other social sciences, and thereby become a meaningful social science itself. I think this is what Whorf had in mind • • • • And this is where most of American linguistics has marked time since Whorf and Sapir. --Garvin 1956:568-569 The provocative writings of Benjamin Lee Whorf had great influence on the fields of linguistics, anthropology, and psychology in the 1940's (Heidbreder 1958:87), when they were first published and then, later, when they were collected by John B. Carroll into one volume in 1956, along with some unpublished articles. The excite- ment that attends such a revolutionary idea as linguistic relativity, however, eventually dies down, and so we find that the Whorf Hypoth- esis, although frequently mentioned in academia, is no longer inspiring the conferences and research that it once did. This waning of interest is the result not only of loss of novelty, but also of the difficulty in researching the problem and of the disappointing results of much of the research that has thus far been performed. However, the question of linguistic relativity--that language differences can be related to differences in perception, cognition, and culture--is ~= oo small importance and certainly deserves a more 1 2 thorough exploration than has as yet been accorded it. As a special type of cultural relativity (Fearing 1954:49), linguistic relativity could be most valuable in aiding cross-cultural understanding, especially when the nature of a culture and its language are inspected together (Hoijer 1954:102). As Wharf himself suggested (1971:78-80), insights of ethnology and psychological linguistics can cross­ fertilize, with benefit to both sciences. If the hypothesis is true, understanding different languages will give us a fuller understanding of human nature (Wharf 1971:263-264). There are also more practical benefits that exploration of the hypothesis may bring. If it is true, study of different languages will give us exposure to a variety of useful ways of thinking GAlexander 1936:263-269; Carroll 1958:34-35). Thus, a contribution of linguistic relativity, according to Wharf (1971:84-85, 218), will be the greater appreciation of patterns of thought other than those engendered by the Indo-European language family; we may come to fully appreciate that the languages of modern civilization are not superior to other languages and, in fact, are inferior in dealing with certain ideas. Further, Wharf (1971:81-83) suggests that the hypothesis is relevant to problems of human relations, understanding, education, and language reform. Thus, Chase (1954:78) mentions that even a brief visit to the United Nations would show the problems of inter-language communication and, indeed, a study by Glenn (1954:173-178, 166-167) of discussions in the Security Council shows how complementary linguistic and cultural analysis could be fruitful in avoiding international dis­ agreements; for example, applying the term "expanding economy" to the 3 United States is heresy to th~ Russian since the term is reflexive in the Russian language and implies that capitalism is inherently expansive. As a matter of fact, the School of Languages and Lin­ guistics of the Foreign Service Institute at one time considered Wharf's writings to be essential reading for foreign service agents (Leary 1952:196). Also, it has been claimed that poor thinking due to poor use of language can be linked to America's political and economic difficulties, as well as the problems of war and slums (Chase 1938:18-29). And if language and culture are integrated, accultura­ tional situations have the potential for disturbing this integration with disastrous results, and such problems must be cons~dered by foreign service programs (Thompson 1950:562-563). A final practical consequence of the hypothesis that might be mentioned is its implications for teaching foreign languages; if thought varies with language, a new language should perhaps be taught as a new world structure at variance with that inherent in the student's native language (Carroll 1963:17-19; Cassirer 1965:133). Thus, although Penn (1972:55-56) maintains that the only contribution of the Whorfian Hypothesis has been to challenge linguistics and force it to be empirical in searching for universals, it would be more correct to say that the hypothesis has pointed to a relation between language, thought, and behavior which, if it has any truth at all, has relevance not only to the theoretical aspects of linguistics, anthropology, and psychology, but is also extremely pertinent to practical problems such as international communication and formulation of scientific languages. While Hockett (1954:107-111) 4 cautions that we should not let investigation of this hypothesis cause us to neglect other relations between language and culture, there has never been any real danger of that, even at the time when Wharf's ideas were most popular (see, e.g., Casagrande 1955; Goodenough 1964: 39; Greenberg 1964; Kroeber 1941; Nida 1945; Reichard 1950:201-204; Voegelin and Harris 1945:456-461). Rather, the danger is that what will be neglected is linguistic relativity, and this would be an unfortunate mistake in view of its potential significance. What is needed ac this point is an assessment of the work that has been done in this area so far in order that research on the problem may find new direction and take steps toward ascertaining specifically in what ways language is a key to thought and behavior. In this paper I shall attempt to provide such an assessment of the results and problems of the research that has so far been directed toward exploring linguistic relativity, with special emphasis on the anthropological literature investigating this problem. I THE HISTORY OF THE FORMULATION OF THE HYPOTHESIS Although writers have disagreed in their beliefs regarding the strength of language's influence and the areas in which it is exerted (Carroll 1963:1-2), one form or another of the linguistic relativity hypothesis has been discussed by many scholars in many ages. In a sense, in fact, the history of the hypothesis is as old as mankind itself for, as Fishman (1960:325) points out, the association of a people's individuality with their language is an ethnographical commonplace. In Western history, the question of the relation between language, thought, and behavior can be traced from Plato through Francis Bacon to John Locke (Penn 1972:41-48). In more recent times, linguistic relativity has been proposed by numerous scholars, thus earning it such titles as the "Humboldt-Boas-Cassirer-Sapir-Whorf- Lee" Hypothesis (French 1963:391-392; see also Lounsbury 1959:195). The ideas of each of these scholars will be discussed briefly below. Begun as a reaction against Kant's innate ideas (Penn 1972: 1 48-51), the German lineage of linguistic relativists starts with Johann Georg Hamann, proceeds to Johann G. Herder, and then to Wilhelm von Humboldt (Penn 1972:19-22, 48-55), and the tradition has lived on among the recent Neo-Humboldtists, Jost Trier, Walter Porzig, and Johann Leo Weisgerber. Thus, Hamann maintained that language is a clue 5 6 to how reality is experienced by a people, that it provides "access to the spirit of a people" (O'Flaherty 1952:23-25). Although Herder was not consistent in his views (Sapir 1907:137-139), at one stage he did agree with his mentor, Hamann, that language and thought are one (Penn 1972:51-53).2 Of this German tri~p1rate, Humboldt is perhaps best known for his linguistic relativism. In Ohman's" words (1953: 123-124), he saw language as a 11 central force influencing and forming the mind and behavior of human beings." Even stronger than this, he essentially saw language as a determinant of how the world is exper- ienced (Penn 1972:19-22).