The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis: Cultural Differences And Aspects Of Different Cultures

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Taylor, by classification, is considered an armchair anthropologist. He learned aspects of different cultures through the writings of others, and verified the information by examining accounts made by different people and saw what lined up (Taylor 1873: 33). He defined culture by the thoughts of one molded together with the thoughts of others .He viewed the different cultures of the world as a primitive form of the European culture, and had very ethnocentric ideals (Cool 2016). Taylor judged cultures based on his own understanding of his own culture; he compared their values and standards to what was valued in his own culture (Cool 2016)1. Malinowski, Mead, and Geertz believed that the only way to fully understand a different culture was …show more content…

Inside every speaker of a language is a thought world, which is how they can make sense of the overly-detailed world the live in, and portray how they see things to others. Whorf shows an example of how languages differ from culture to culture by comparing the Standard Average European language to the language of the Hopi Indians. When compared, there are major differences that would make it very difficult to understand either languages depending on what culture you are familiar with. In the Hopi, all their nouns are singular and plural, to them just the word water implies an amount (Whorf 1939: 219). This unlike the Standard Average European language; in this particular language they have to have something that gives an amount or shape of whatever they are talking about, like a glass of water. The Hopi don’t distinguish time as the SAE do; they don’t place time in an imaginary place, they can only talk about what is happening at the moment. The speakers of SAE puts time in an imaginary place, they can talk about the past, present, and future. The way the two different cultures speak showcase the differences in the cultures. The SAE culture is an industrialized culture, their language is all about saving time and efficiency; they are worrying about how much time they are wasting. The Hope culture is an …show more content…

Language socialization is how new members of the society learn how to become part of that culture; how they learn what is right and wrong in that particular culture (Cool 2016). Karrebæk studied language socialization through food in the Danish classroom. Every culture has their own view of healthy food and people judge people based on their food choices. In the Danish culture, rye bread is a staple; it’s a part of their history. It is seen as the healthy choice and the necessary choice for a child’s lunch. The teachers inspect the lunch and make sure there is rye bread, and if there isn’t any rye bread the teachers express their concern about how unhealthy it is and that they pitied the child for not having parents that cared about healthy food (Karrebæk 2012: 8). The words the teachers use makes the child feel like his or her meals are inadequate, and in order to be considered a good child, they have to bring rye bread, which is integrating the child into the Danish culture and society. The relationship between culture and language is language provides clues on how the culture works. It gives people insights on what is important to the specific culture and how they see the world. The Danish culture places value on rye bread, and it is seen through integration in their society. The SAE culture places value on time and the Hopi places

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