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Language as a Barrier

Language as a Barrier. Language is used to promote national identity How translations impede intercultural communication English Only Arguments. Language Defined.

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Language as a Barrier

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  1. Language as a Barrier Language is used to promote national identity How translations impede intercultural communication English Only Arguments

  2. Language Defined • Our text states: “One definition of language is that it is a set of symbols shared by a community to communicate meaning and experience” pg. 133. • Language, then has a direct relationship to culture. Language bonds a people together and reflects what those people saw, ate, and thought.

  3. Mother Tongue Efforts were made to trace the origins of all the world’s languages back to a single or even first language. Study of Language Origins

  4. Linguistic Word Orders • Table 6.1 page 133 • Syntax – how words are arranged to convey meaning: SOV • Colorless Green Ideas Sleep Furiously • Grammar – Rules for ordering – often culturally derived. • Focus on Theory 6.1 Social Constructivism --Says we make sense of our reality through social interaction.

  5. The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis • This hypothesis is divided into two understandings of how language works: • Linguistic Determinism -- Language structures and controls thought and cultural norms. • Linguistic Relativity--language and culture influence one another, “culture is controlled by and controls language” (p. 138, Jandt).

  6. Sapir-Whorf updated: • Elements of Whorf’s Hopi example of time were later discovered. • Even so, the linguistic relativity does provide a useful way to think about the relationship between language and culture. • Linguistic characteristics and cultural norms influence each other: Culture is controlled by and controls language.

  7. Applications • Vocabulary: Richness in words indicates importance of the thing or activity in the culture. • Examples: Eskimo languages have many words for different kinds of snow.

  8. Case Study: Arabic and Arabian Culture • Arabs are predominately Muslim- followers of Islam. The holy book of Islam is the Koran, written in Arabic. • With the spread of Islam came the spread of Arabic. Arabic, like all modern languages, has changed over time. • Role of spoken and written language in the culture derived from the poetic influences of the Koran/Islam.

  9. Grammar and syntax • The second level of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis is grammar and syntax. • According to Whorf, the study of how words and their component parts combine to form sentences (grammar) and the rules for forming grammatical sentences (syntax) have an even greater influence than vocabulary on language and culture.

  10. Language Barriers • Language is the set of symbols shared by a community that functions to communicate meaning and experience. • Languages reflect unique properties of cultures. • Hence, language can also create communication problems especially when it comes to translation and language choice.

  11. Translation Problems • Vocabulary equivalence • Idiomatic equivalence • Grammatical-syntactical equivalence • Experiential equivalence • Conceptual equivalence • One solution: Back translation

  12. Language as Nationalism • When a group with more power enforces the use of its language on another group, it is attempting to make its culture dominant. • Referred to as cultural invasion. The Brazilian Freire (1992) used the term to refer to the act of one group imposing its own view of the world on another (p. 147).

  13. The Spread of English • English is the native language of 12 countries and semi- or unofficial language of 33 others (p. 149). • English, as we speak it has changed greatly but originally was a mix of German, Angles, Saxons, Latin, Old Norse, and French.

  14. Countries where a language was enforced (cultural invasion) • India-- English spoken but brought to the sub-continent as the result of colonization by the British. • South Africa -- European settlers brought German, Dutch, French into the region. Later replaced with Africaans (a Germanic Language) and combined with Malay, Portuguese, French, English, and native African languages.

  15. Languages Continued • Australia and New Zealand • Aboriginal and Maori • Canada • Quebecois • United States • Hispanic and Latin languages • Hawaii • American Indian Languages

  16. English as Official Language • There are movements in the U.S. to create an official national language. Known as the English First Movement, proponents advocate that all people speak English. • Opponents argue that the U.S. should appreciate cultural diversity and language is culture. See Table 6.5, p. 161.

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