One particular assumption having received much attention in fiction is popularly known as the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis. The claim is that the structure of a language somehow affects the way its speakers perceive their world, either strongly, in which case "language determines thought" (linguistic determinism), or weakly, in which case "language influences thought" (linguistic relativity). (For a list of languages that are merely mentioned, see the relevant section in List of constructed languages.)
The extreme case of the strong version of the hypothesis would be the idea that words have a power inherent to themselves such that their use determines not just our thoughts, but even that which our thoughts are about, i.e. reality itself. This idea, however, is more properly treated within ontology than linguistics.[citation needed]
Languages exploring the Sapir–Whorf hypothesisedit
Constructed languagesedit
Láadan was designed by linguistSuzette Haden Elgin in her science fiction novel Native Tongue, about a patriarchal society in which the overriding priority of the oppressed women is the secret development of a "feminist" language, Láadan, to aid them in throwing off their shackles.
Loglan, by James Cooke Brown, was designed for linguistic research with the specific goal of making a language so different from natural languages that people learning it would think in a different way if the hypothesis were true.
Lojban is the successor of Loglan and has the same goals.
Toki Pona, by Sonja Lang (née Kisa), is inspired by Taoist philosophy, among other things, and designed to shape the thought processes of its users in Zen-like fashion.
Fictional languagesedit
Namededit
Babel-17, by Samuel R. Delany, is centered on a fictional language that denies its speakers independent thought, forcing them to think purely logical thoughts. This language is used as a weapon of war, because it is supposed to convert everyone who learns it to a traitor. In the novel, the language Babel-17 is likened to computer programming languages that do not allow errors or imprecise statements.
Marain, in Iain M. Banks's Culture series. The Culture believes (or perhaps has proved, or else actively made true) the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis that language affects society, and Marain was designed to exploit this effect. A related comment is made by the narrator in The Player of Games regarding gender-specific pronouns in English. Marain is also regarded as an aesthetically pleasing language.
Newspeak, a government-constructed dialect of English described by George Orwell in his dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, does not have any of the words expressing the ideas underlying a revolution with the idea that its speakers cannot revolt. All of the theory of Newspeak is aimed at eliminating such words. For example, bad has been replaced by ungood, and the concept of "freedom" has been eliminated over time. According to the appendix on Newspeak, the result of the adoption of the language would be that "a heretical thought ... should be literally unthinkable, at least so far as thought is dependent on words." The language is under continuous development during the events of the novel, with the Ministry of Truth (Minitrue in Newspeak) releasing progressively thinner and thinner Newspeak dictionaries.
Pravic is one of the languages used in The Dispossessed, by Ursula K. Le Guin, that takes place partly on a world with an anarcho-communist society. Pravic contains little means for expressing possessive relationships, among other features.
Tamarian, in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Darmok", is unintelligible to Starfleet's universal translators because it is too deeply rooted in local metaphor and consequently its sentences have no meaning to other civilizations.
Valiant, Technicant and Cogitant, in The Languages of Pao by Jack Vance, are designed to stimulate the development of warrior, technical and mercantile castes in a stagnant society. The mastermind behind this experiment, Lord Palafox, says in chapter 9: "We must alter the mental framework of the Paonese people, which is most easily achieved by altering the language." His son, Finisterle, says in chapter 11 to a class of linguists in training: "every language impresses a certain world-view upon the mind."
Unnamededit
In Anthem, by Ayn Rand, the World Council attempted to enforce collectivist thinking among the populace by removing from the language all words expressing individuality.
In Dune, by Frank Herbert, Lady Jessica (who has extensive linguistic training) encounters the Fremen, the native people of Dune. She is shocked by the violence of their language, as she believes their word choices and language structure reflect a culture of enormous violence. Similarly, earlier in the novel, her late husband, Duke Leto, muses on how the nature of Imperial society is betrayed by "the precise delineations for treacherous death" in its language, the use of highly specific terms to describe different methods for delivering poison.
In Gulf, by Robert A. Heinlein, the characters are taught an artificial language which allows them to think logically and concisely by removing the "false to fact" linguistic constructs of existing languages.
In Mud/Aurora, by D.D. Storm, society is divided in three classes speaking three different languages, designed to allow survival on a hostile, deserted world of a wrecked starship's crew and their descendants. The long-forgotten ship's linguist hid the true history of their world within the language spoken by the descendants of the commanding officers, the Sah.
Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson, explores the (controversial) concept of neuro-linguistic programming and presents the Sumerian language as the firmware programming language for the brain stem which is supposedly functioning as the BIOS for the human brain. According to characters in the book, the goddess Asherah is the personification of a linguistic virus similar to a computer virus. The god Enki created a counter program which he called a nam-shub that caused all of humanity to speak different languages as a protection against Asherah, supposedly giving rise to the biblical story of the Tower of Babel.
In Story of Your Life, by Ted Chiang, the inspiration for the film Arrival, learning the written language used by alien visitors to the Earth allows the person who learns the language to think in a different way, in which the past and future are illusions of conventional thought. This allows people who understand the language to see their entire life as a single unchangeable action, from past to future.
In Stranger in a Strange Land, by Robert A. Heinlein, Valentine Michael Smith is able to do things that most other humans cannot, and is unable to explain any of this in English. However, once others learn Martian, they start to develop the ability to do these things; those concepts could be explained only in Martian.
The Unnamable, by H.P. Lovecraft, explores the idea of whether or not someone can conceptualize something which cannot be described by any name.
In Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius, by Jorge Luis Borges, the author discovers references in books to a universe of idealistic individuals whose languages have peculiarities that shape their idealism. For example, one of the language families lacks nouns, while another primarily uses monosyllabic adjectives to describe objects. As the story progresses the books become more and better known to the world at large, their philosophy starts influencing the real world, and Earth becomes the ideal world described in the books.
Counterexamplesedit
In The Citadel of the Autarch, by Gene Wolfe, one of the characters (an Ascian) speaks entirely in slogans, but is able to express deep and subtle meanings via context. The narrator, Severian, after hearing the Ascian speak, remarks that "The Ascian seemed to speak only in sentences he had learned by rote, though until he used each for the first time we had never heard them ... Second, I learned how difficult it is to eliminate the urge for expression. The people of Ascia were reduced to speaking only with their masters' voice; but they had made of it a new tongue, and I had no doubt, after hearing the Ascian, that by it he could express whatever thought he wished."[1]
Languages exploring other linguistic aspectsedit
Several constructed languages are closer to the oligosynthetic type than any attested natural languages:
Fith,[2] by Jeffrey Henning, has a stack-based rather than (transparently) tree-based syntax.
Gorbiel, by Jacek Tuszynski, designed to adhere to a set of principles for quality control.[3]
Ithkuil, by John Quijada, designed for maximum morpho-phonological conciseness.
Ilaksh, by John Quijada, the phonologically simpler successor to Ithkuil.
Lin,[4] by R. Srikanth, designed for maximum orthographic conciseness.
Justin B. Rye has made sketches of Neanderthalese,[5] in which (among other unusual features) whole syllables, rather than identifiable segments, are phonemes, and Europan,[6] whose syntax cannot be fully represented as trees or even as simple graphs.
Yiklamu[7] was designed by Mark P. Line as a "Russian lawn" experiment (defined as a field whose future paved pathways are determined by where people walk when it's still grass) starting with just a lexicon, but being grammatically simple and assuming that complexity would evolve as a consequence of use.
Zaum is the experimental poetic language characterized by indeterminacy in meaning intended to describe the linguistic experiments of the Russian Futurist poets.
experimental, language, experimental, language, constructed, language, designed, linguistics, research, often, relationship, between, language, thought, particular, assumption, having, received, much, attention, fiction, popularly, known, sapir, whorf, hypothe. An experimental language is a constructed language designed for linguistics research often on the relationship between language and thought One particular assumption having received much attention in fiction is popularly known as the Sapir Whorf hypothesis The claim is that the structure of a language somehow affects the way its speakers perceive their world either strongly in which case language determines thought linguistic determinism or weakly in which case language influences thought linguistic relativity For a list of languages that are merely mentioned see the relevant section in List of constructed languages The extreme case of the strong version of the hypothesis would be the idea that words have a power inherent to themselves such that their use determines not just our thoughts but even that which our thoughts are about i e reality itself This idea however is more properly treated within ontology than linguistics citation needed Contents 1 Languages exploring the Sapir Whorf hypothesis 1 1 Constructed languages 1 2 Fictional languages 1 2 1 Named 1 2 2 Unnamed 1 2 3 Counterexamples 2 Languages exploring other linguistic aspects 3 See also 4 NotesLanguages exploring the Sapir Whorf hypothesis editConstructed languages edit Laadan was designed by linguist Suzette Haden Elgin in her science fiction novel Native Tongue about a patriarchal society in which the overriding priority of the oppressed women is the secret development of a feminist language Laadan to aid them in throwing off their shackles Loglan by James Cooke Brown was designed for linguistic research with the specific goal of making a language so different from natural languages that people learning it would think in a different way if the hypothesis were true Lojban is the successor of Loglan and has the same goals Toki Pona by Sonja Lang nee Kisa is inspired by Taoist philosophy among other things and designed to shape the thought processes of its users in Zen like fashion Fictional languages edit Named edit Babel 17 by Samuel R Delany is centered on a fictional language that denies its speakers independent thought forcing them to think purely logical thoughts This language is used as a weapon of war because it is supposed to convert everyone who learns it to a traitor In the novel the language Babel 17 is likened to computer programming languages that do not allow errors or imprecise statements Marain in Iain M Banks s Culture series The Culture believes or perhaps has proved or else actively made true the Sapir Whorf hypothesis that language affects society and Marain was designed to exploit this effect A related comment is made by the narrator in The Player of Games regarding gender specific pronouns in English Marain is also regarded as an aesthetically pleasing language Newspeak a government constructed dialect of English described by George Orwell in his dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty Four does not have any of the words expressing the ideas underlying a revolution with the idea that its speakers cannot revolt All of the theory of Newspeak is aimed at eliminating such words For example bad has been replaced by ungood and the concept of freedom has been eliminated over time According to the appendix on Newspeak the result of the adoption of the language would be that a heretical thought should be literally unthinkable at least so far as thought is dependent on words The language is under continuous development during the events of the novel with the Ministry of Truth Minitrue in Newspeak releasing progressively thinner and thinner Newspeak dictionaries Pravic is one of the languages used in The Dispossessed by Ursula K Le Guin that takes place partly on a world with an anarcho communist society Pravic contains little means for expressing possessive relationships among other features Tamarian in the Star Trek The Next Generation episode Darmok is unintelligible to Starfleet s universal translators because it is too deeply rooted in local metaphor and consequently its sentences have no meaning to other civilizations Valiant Technicant and Cogitant in The Languages of Pao by Jack Vance are designed to stimulate the development of warrior technical and mercantile castes in a stagnant society The mastermind behind this experiment Lord Palafox says in chapter 9 We must alter the mental framework of the Paonese people which is most easily achieved by altering the language His son Finisterle says in chapter 11 to a class of linguists in training every language impresses a certain world view upon the mind Unnamed edit In Anthem by Ayn Rand the World Council attempted to enforce collectivist thinking among the populace by removing from the language all words expressing individuality In Dune by Frank Herbert Lady Jessica who has extensive linguistic training encounters the Fremen the native people of Dune She is shocked by the violence of their language as she believes their word choices and language structure reflect a culture of enormous violence Similarly earlier in the novel her late husband Duke Leto muses on how the nature of Imperial society is betrayed by the precise delineations for treacherous death in its language the use of highly specific terms to describe different methods for delivering poison In Gulf by Robert A Heinlein the characters are taught an artificial language which allows them to think logically and concisely by removing the false to fact linguistic constructs of existing languages In Mud Aurora by D D Storm society is divided in three classes speaking three different languages designed to allow survival on a hostile deserted world of a wrecked starship s crew and their descendants The long forgotten ship s linguist hid the true history of their world within the language spoken by the descendants of the commanding officers the Sah Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson explores the controversial concept of neuro linguistic programming and presents the Sumerian language as the firmware programming language for the brain stem which is supposedly functioning as the BIOS for the human brain According to characters in the book the goddess Asherah is the personification of a linguistic virus similar to a computer virus The god Enki created a counter program which he called a nam shub that caused all of humanity to speak different languages as a protection against Asherah supposedly giving rise to the biblical story of the Tower of Babel In Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang the inspiration for the film Arrival learning the written language used by alien visitors to the Earth allows the person who learns the language to think in a different way in which the past and future are illusions of conventional thought This allows people who understand the language to see their entire life as a single unchangeable action from past to future In Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A Heinlein Valentine Michael Smith is able to do things that most other humans cannot and is unable to explain any of this in English However once others learn Martian they start to develop the ability to do these things those concepts could be explained only in Martian The Unnamable by H P Lovecraft explores the idea of whether or not someone can conceptualize something which cannot be described by any name In Tlon Uqbar Orbis Tertius by Jorge Luis Borges the author discovers references in books to a universe of idealistic individuals whose languages have peculiarities that shape their idealism For example one of the language families lacks nouns while another primarily uses monosyllabic adjectives to describe objects As the story progresses the books become more and better known to the world at large their philosophy starts influencing the real world and Earth becomes the ideal world described in the books Counterexamples edit In The Citadel of the Autarch by Gene Wolfe one of the characters an Ascian speaks entirely in slogans but is able to express deep and subtle meanings via context The narrator Severian after hearing the Ascian speak remarks that The Ascian seemed to speak only in sentences he had learned by rote though until he used each for the first time we had never heard them Second I learned how difficult it is to eliminate the urge for expression The people of Ascia were reduced to speaking only with their masters voice but they had made of it a new tongue and I had no doubt after hearing the Ascian that by it he could express whatever thought he wished 1 Languages exploring other linguistic aspects editSeveral constructed languages are closer to the oligosynthetic type than any attested natural languages Fith 2 by Jeffrey Henning has a stack based rather than transparently tree based syntax Gorbiel by Jacek Tuszynski designed to adhere to a set of principles for quality control 3 Ithkuil by John Quijada designed for maximum morpho phonological conciseness Ilaksh by John Quijada the phonologically simpler successor to Ithkuil Lin 4 by R Srikanth designed for maximum orthographic conciseness Justin B Rye has made sketches of Neanderthalese 5 in which among other unusual features whole syllables rather than identifiable segments are phonemes and Europan 6 whose syntax cannot be fully represented as trees or even as simple graphs Yiklamu 7 was designed by Mark P Line as a Russian lawn experiment defined as a field whose future paved pathways are determined by where people walk when it s still grass starting with just a lexicon but being grammatically simple and assuming that complexity would evolve as a consequence of use Zaum is the experimental poetic language characterized by indeterminacy in meaning intended to describe the linguistic experiments of the Russian Futurist poets See also editAlien language Artistic language Engineered language Fictional language ISO SIL and BCP language codes for constructed languagesNotes edit Wolfe Gene 1998 The book of the new sun New York SFBC p 776 ISBN 9781568658070 Fith FrathWiki Retrieved 24 July 2016 Gorbiel 1 1 Archived from the original on 13 July 2011 Retrieved 26 May 2010 A Grammar of the language Lin Archived from the original on 3 March 2007 Retrieved 26 May 2010 Pleistocenese A language of 40 000 BC Retrieved 24 July 2016 Europan The decipherment of Non Linear B Retrieved 24 July 2016 Classical Yiklamu Retrieved 24 July 2016 Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Experimental language amp oldid 1192152833, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,
