Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (PC) Flashcards

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1
Q

What is the hypothesis linked to?

A

Linguistic Engineering

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2
Q

What is said about people who speak different languages?

A

They perceive the world in a different way because the language they use is different and it determines the way in which they view things.

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3
Q

Who did Whorf study?

A

The Hopi Indians in North America

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4
Q

What was different about the Hopi’s language?

A

They didn’t have time divided like we do in English.

e.g. they don’t have past, present or future in their language

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5
Q

What did Whorf argue about Hopi’s conception?

A

They didn’t fully understand time as we do, their conception is different

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6
Q

What does the Hopi’s language involve instead?

A

Two other tenses:
Manifested
Becoming Manifested

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7
Q

What does the Manifested tense involve?

A

All that is and ever has been, physically

Includes senses and concrete items

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8
Q

What does the Becoming Manifested tense involve?

A

Anything which is not physical

There is no definite origin and they cannot be seen with senses

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9
Q

What do these two tense allow the Hopi to do?

A

They do allow them to express time, just not in the same way that we would recognise

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10
Q

What is one flaw of this hypothesis?

A

Whorf only visited one man from the community once. This could suggest that this way of speaking was the one man’s idiolect and not a true representation of the whole community

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11
Q

What helped support the hypothesis?

A

Other people did studies similar and found that people do think differently depending on the language used

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12
Q

What was the study that helped this hypothesis?

A

Kay and Kempton’s (1984) study of Mexican language in Tarahumara

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13
Q

What was the key concept of Kay and Kempton’s study?

A

The Mexican language only had one word for the colours “blue” and “green”, whereas English differs between the two

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14
Q

What did Kay and Kempton find from this variable in the two languages?

A

English speakers were able to differentiate better between the two colours compared to the Mexican speakers of Tarahumara.
This suggests that their knowledge of the words influenced their perception of the colour itself

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15
Q

What is a criticism of the hypothesis (and linguistic determinism)?

A

If language controlled our thoughts, language change would never happen because we would never have any new ideas or concepts.

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16
Q

Do linguistics agree with this hypothesis?

A

To an extent, yes as language does provide some influences to our perception of the world

17
Q

What is a study that criticises the hypothesis?

A

Study of Aboriginal languages.

18
Q

What does the study of Aboriginal languages show?

A

They do not have a developed system for numbers, only relying on words such as “some” “many” etc. However they are still able to count and calculate.