The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.

1. Deledda International School
Language loss and
cultural consequences
Alessandra Giglio
TOK Seminar, 25 January 2013

2. Deledda International School
How does this seminar work
• First half: Prof. Giglio will talk about the
phenomenon of the death of languages and
which is its direct cultural consecuence
• Second half: the students will be divided into
two groups, depending on the language they
are studying (or studied until 10° grade) and
will meet M.me Goalard and Prof. Sanchez,
that will speak about what has been lost and
changed in French and Spanish
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7 billion of people
How many languages do we have?
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Why?
Because of the supremacy of Lingua Franca.
(English, in this particular moment; French, in
the past; Spanish, even before, …)
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“Essa non poteva essere la lingua di una
cultura, e noi apprezziamo il favore che
padre Goudon fece loro quando decise di
tornare ad insegnare loro il francese nel
1860. Questa iniziativa li mise in
condizione di entrare in contatto con l’alta
cultura dell’Occidente”
Storico francese in Nuova Caledonia
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Have you ever heard of “biodiversity”?
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So, what’s the point here??!
Not a big deal if we loose languages:
we will communicate better
in the future, that’s it.
No, it’s not.
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“Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose”
…100% sure?!?
G. Stein on Shakespeare’s inspiration
• Inuit people have a lot of words to express all
the concepts related to “snow”/”ice”
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12. • ‘snowstorm’ — pirsuq/pirsirsursuaq
Deledda International School
• ‘large ice floe’ — iluitsuq
‘sea-ice’ — siku (in plural = drift ice) • ‘snowdrift’ — apusiniq
• ‘pack-ice/large expanses of ice in motion’ — • ‘ice floe’ — puttaaq
sikursuit, pl. (compacted drift ice/ice field = sikut • ‘hummocked ice/pressure ridges in pack ice’ —
iqimaniri) maniillat/ingunirit, pl.
• ‘new ice’ — sikuliaq/sikurlaaq (solid ice cover = nutaaq) • ‘drifting lump of ice’ — kassuq (dirty lump of glacier-calved
• ‘thin ice’ — sikuaq (in plural = thin ice floes) ice = anarluk)
• ‘rotten (melting) ice floe’ — sikurluk • ‘ice-foot (left adhering to shore)’ — qaannuq
• ‘icicle’ — kusugaq
• ‘iceberg’ — iluliaq (ilulisap itsirnga = part of iceberg
• ‘opening in sea ice imarnirsaq/ammaniq (open water
below waterline)
amidst ice = imaviaq)
• ‘(piece of) fresh-water ice’ — nilak
• ‘lead (navigable fissure) in sea ice’ — quppaq
• ‘lumps of ice stranded on the beach' — issinnirit, pl. • ‘rotten snow/slush on sea’ — qinuq
• ‘glacier’ (also ice forming on objects) — sirmiq • ‘wet snow falling’ — imalik
(sirmirsuaq = inland ice) • ‘rotten ice with streams forming’ — aakkarniq
• ‘snow blown in (e.g. doorway)’ — sullarniq • ‘snow patch (on mountain, etc.)’ — aputitaq
• ‘rime/hoar-frost’ — qaqurnak/kanirniq/kaniq • ‘wet snow on top of ice’ — putsinniq/puvvinniq
• ‘frost (on inner surface of e.g. window)’ — iluq • ‘smooth stretch of ice’ — manirak (stretch of snow-free ice
• ‘icy mist’ — pujurak/pujuq kanirnartuq = quasaliaq)
• ‘hail’ — nataqqurnat • ‘lump of old ice frozen into new ice’ — tuaq
• ‘snow (on ground)’ — aput (aput sisurtuq = avalanche) • ‘new ice formed in crack in old ice’ — nutarniq
• ‘bits of floating ice’ — naggutit, pl.
• ‘slush (on ground)’ — aput masannartuq
• ‘hard snow’ — mangiggal/mangikaajaaq
• ‘snow in air/falling’ — qaniit (qanik = snowflake)
• ‘small ice floe (not large enough to stand on)’ — masaaraq
• ‘air thick with snow’ — nittaalaq (nittaallat, pl. = • ‘ice swelling over partially frozen river, etc. from water
snowflakes; nittaalaq nalliuttiqattaartuq = flurries) seeping up to the surface’ — siirsinniq
• ‘hard grains of snow’ — nittaalaaqqat, pl. • ‘piled-up ice-floes frozen together’ — tiggunnirit
• ‘feathery clumps of falling snow’ — qanipalaat • ‘mountain peak sticking up through inland ice’ — nunataq
• ‘new fallen snow’ — apirlaat • ‘calved ice (from end of glacier)’ — uukkarnit
• ‘snow crust’ — pukak • ‘edge of the (sea) ice’ — sinaaq 12

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Even if Stephen Pinker says this is not
really true…
But this is not the point: “you
invent the words to express [the
world around you]” S. Pinker
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5ljEBkCeMQ
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“Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose”
…100% sure?!?
• “C’è una tribù dell'Amazzonia che usa 16
parole distinte per dire 'verde', mostrando
grande attenzione per la realtà circostante: la
nostra società occidentale invece guarda più
allo specchio che alla finestra.”
Niccolò Fabi
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Let’s take the concept of “colours”
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Six thinking hats theory (De Bono)
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… sure that is negative??
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18. http://www.internazionale.it/opinioni/lee-marshall/2012/08/21/nel-blu-dipinto-di-azzurro/
Deledda International School
How to translate colours?
[…] andate a cercare l’icona di Twitter che sta laggiù da qualche parte. L’uccellino di che colore è? Non
pensateci troppo: vi chiedo di nominare il colore non come adulti che hanno studiato la gamma pantone, ma
come dei bambini, usando una delle dodici parole base per i colori che esistono in italiano.
Per me, sia il colore di sfondo della testata [della rivista Internazionale, nda] sia l’uccellino di Twitter sono blue.
Il primo è sicuramente un dark blue, con un tocco di cobalt o indigo. Il secondo, l’uccellino, si avvicina a un
light blue, pur essendo un light blue piuttosto dark: in realtà, quasi un medium blue. Non so se vi ricordate (la
nostra memoria informatica è notoriamente corta), ma fino a giugno di quest’anno l’uccellino Twitter era ben
più light, e aveva anche un ciuffo in testa. Comunque, il concetto è questo: per un inglese come me, light blue,
medium blue e dark blue sono gradazioni di un solo colore.
In italiano ci sono due modi di tradurre l’inglese blue non qualificato da altro aggettivo: blu e azzurro. Lasciamo
da parte il celeste, che sarebbe sempre tradotto in inglese con un blue accompagnato da qualche notazione:
light blue, sky blue, eccetera. Potrei sbagliarmi, ma scommetto che per voi il colore dello sfondo della testata
Internazionale è blu, mentre l’uccellino di Twitter è azzurro. Ditemi se sbaglio.
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First we express, then we think
or
The language or the culture goes first?
First we think, then we express?
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Is a rose a rose a rose?
Does all of this mean that language influences
world’s perception? Or viceversa?
“The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.”
L. Wittgenstein
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LAD
• Noam Chomsky (1960) claims that we have a
Language Acquisition Device in define
Therefore, we don’t our brain. It is a
cognitive, innate instinct that allow us to learn a
anything.
language.The world (and the
• A child basically has all the potential structures of
language!) is already set
all the languages incannot interfere he selects
and we his brain; however,
and uses only the structures that he hears.
with that.
• In this way, we learn the only language we are
exposed to.
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• Do different languages give us a different
knowledge of the world?
• Do you know differently in the different
language you know?
• Do we need to understand a culture, in order
to understand a language?
• Why do we have some concepts that seem
universal?
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A really good add-on on this
http://www.ted.com/talks/wade_davis_on_endangered_cultures.html
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Further materials
• http://www.ted.com/talks/patricia_ryan_idea
s_in_all_languages_not_just_english.html
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5ljEBkCe
MQ
• D. Nettle, S. Romaine, Voci nel silenzio,
Carocci, 2000, Roma
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25. Deledda International School
References
• http://infographiclabs.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/complex_world_langua
ge_families-600x2480.jpg
• http://www.transparent.com/language-resources/infographic-speaking-of-languag
es.jpg
• http://webmarketing.toweb.co/significato-colori-infografica/
• http://blog.focus.it/graphic-news/2012/02/21/il-significato-dei-colori-nel-mondo/
• http://affreschidigitali.blogosfere.it/galleria/2010/10/i-colori-piu-popolari-del-201
0-e-il-loro-significato-quando-il-colore-rappresenta-il-mondo.html/2
• http://lizneale.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/32_large.jpg
• http://www.docstoc.com/docs/123680090/Linking-TOK-to-Language-B
• http://www.wikipedia.com
• http://www.dr-fdtc.com/cultural-differences/cd/ch3-03a.html
• http://johncarlosbaez.wordpress.com/2011/11/15/eskimo-words-for-snow/
• http://www.internazionale.it/opinioni/lee-marshall/2012/08/21/nel-blu-dipinto-di
-azzurro/
• D. Nettle, S. Romaine, Voci nel silenzio, Carocci, 2000, Roma
• M. Pagel, “Un mondo di parole”, Internazionale, n. 983 anno 20
• D. McCandless, Information Is Beautiful, Rizzoli, 2011, Milano 25