undefined | Better HN

0 pointsnewsbinator4y ago0 comments

> you have to work hard to promote only a single version of it

Yes, you do have to work to make it happen. Up to now we've given languages a free cultural pass, whereas diseases and poverty we keep shoveling trillions into, and we're proud when we've made a 20% dent.

It takes work to pull the species out of what is natural, because what is natural is very often terrible. Diseases naturally evolve to terrorize us. We fight them and sometimes we win.

The first step is admitting that how languages have evolved naturally up to now sucks for an ethical, roughly egalitarian 21st century information-based society.

The sooner we can de-link language from local culture, the better.

And of course that begs the question: can language be delinked from culture?

Yes: my native language isn't the one I'm writing in to you now, and my native culture is whatever I'm making up for myself as I go along, to the chagrin of my parents and many in the culture I was born into.

0 comments

benjaminwai4y ago

Can language be delinked from culture? Maybe. But can a language survive without a culture to encompass it? If you strip culture from a language, wouldn't the language would become toneless and meaningless? Yes, you can call something a 'net' or a 'fish' at a basic level. However in one culture one might say, "You must cast your net to catch the fish" it's plain what it means and it is meaningful, but for someone without the cultural context, it's a head scratcher and may wonder what fish are you talking about?

I'm too, my native language isn't the one I am writing here. I have lived in quite a few different places. Culture is not something I could make up for myself as I go along, I don't think anyone could do so in isolation. I took in the different bits of cultures that i have experienced through, sometimes to the dismay of those around me. I appreciate the perspective that cultures create languages, and without the cultural reference the language would cease its importance and would die.

newsbinatorOP4y ago

> If you strip culture from a language, wouldn't the language would become toneless and meaningless?

Indeed, languages are toneless and meaningless when divorced from their functional role in connecting people and enabling them to share thoughts.

For that reason languages aren't sacrosanct and are replaceable.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse