Language, Culture, and Society

Language is one of the main ways that we express culture: it’s the medium for songs and poetry, it’s what we tweet in, it’s how we comfort each other, lie to each other, and so on. Many people view their language as part of their identity. Language is one of the ways we enact laws and contracts, how we spread the news, how we inform and persuade. In this part of the exhibition, we talk about the role that language has in culture and society.  Perhaps more in this section of the exhibition than in any other, we see the visibility and invisibility of language. Humans are extremely good at picking up on linguistic cues and using them to judge people. However, a great deal of that processing happens below the level of consciousness, and in fact our conscious "knowledge" (or rather, what we think we know) may be at odds with the facts.

Dialects of US English

Language does many things; we can tell a lot about a person from how they speak: age, gender, ethnicity, class, and place of origin can all be encoded in language (though not unchangeably!). This map created by Rick Aschmann shows North American English dialects. It was compiled from samples of speech which came  primarily from white speakers; for variation in African American Language, a great resource is the Oraal online archive. There is also regional variation in American Sign Language. As you can see from the map, the US English landscape is complicated, with both major dialect areas such as "the South" and "the Northeast", but also considerable variation within those areas. You can also see more clearly from a map like this that everyone has an accent: different regions of the US are distinguished by how the people who live there sound. To explore the sounds of different US accents you can browse the GMU Speech Accent Archive and to explore different grammatical constructions, see the information at the Yale Grammatical Diversity Project.

Language and Identity

One of the areas where we see particularly focused discussion of language and identity is in language reclamation: the process of bringing languages back after they have ceased to be spoken. Perhaps the most famous is Hebrew, but there are many other communities from around the world where language reclamation is underway. In this TED talk, Queen's University Professor Lindsay Morcom (Algonquin Métis, Bear Clan) explains the importance of language in Indigenous communities. 

Language and Race

To be blunt, linguistics, like anthroprology, sociology, and many other disciplines, has had a problematic relationship with questions of race. At the same time that some parts of linguistics have taken explicitly anti-racist approaches (both for their day and currently), other areas have used linguistics to perpetuate structural racism, as well as other types of discrimination such as sexism. Recent #blacklivesmatter protests have brought new terms to national attention. This Vox podcast features linguist Sonja Lanehart explaining the term BIPOC, and this article includes linguists Jonathan Rosa and deandre miles-hercules discussing the intricacies of and difficulties with the term and how its use changes in context.

Featured Titles

The featured works here provide a very small slice of the way that language and culture interact and can be studied through linguistics.

English with an accent: Language, ideology, and discrimination in the United States

by Rosina Lippi-Green

A classic text, English with an accent takes the reader through key aspects of English in the United States. Everyone has an accent, and this book explains why.

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Languages and dialects in the U.S.: Focus on diversity and linguistics

edited by Marianna Di Paolo and Arthur K. Spears

Ever wondered what some of the languages in the US are that aren’t English? This volume provides some information about a few of the Native American languages of the US, as well as, for example, Spanish dialects in different parts of the country.

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The language warrior’s manifesto: How to keep our languages alive no matter the odds

by Anton Treuer

Treuer’s book distills why language reclamation is important, how language is a crucial part of wellbeing, and how linguists can support language communities and their languages.

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The everyday language of white racism

by Jane H. Hill

Hill shows how language is used, both overtly and subtly, in racist ways. She covers topics such as "mock Spanish" and English-only legislation. This book is crucial for anyone wanting to see the many subtle and not so subtle ways that language reinforces racism.

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Language and gender: A reader

by Jennifer Coates and Pia Pichler

This book is a collection of essays on different facets of language, sex, and gender. It is now somewhat dated but is still a good general overview of the history of some of the major ideas over the last 50 years.

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Language and society in the Greek and Roman worlds

by James Clackson

Language can also be used to study society in history, and Clackson’s book shows how the study of language can provide insights into Ancient Greek and Roman society.

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Yale Courses

Language, Culture, and Identity (ANTH 368). Introduction to the role of language in the constitution of gendered, class, ethnic, and national identities. Ethnographic and linguistic case studies are combined with theoretical and comparative approaches. Professor: Joseph Errington

Language in America (LING 117). This course examines the linguistic landscape of the USA. Covering Indigenous, immigrant, and colonial languages, with a focus on contemporary issues of language and politics, race and ethnicity, discrimination, and reclamation. Language variation, including varieties of English (regional varieties, African American Language), and ideologies around language use (such as ‘English only’ movements). Professor: Roslyn Burns

Language Contact in the Ancient World (LING 103). A new class this year! What languages were people using in our earliest written records? How were they written? What were people talking about in these texts? This course examines the languages of the ancient near east and other civilizations that they interacted with, from Greece to Egypt. Language contact is reflected both in ancient people’s discussion of languages and use of translations, as well as in loanwords and other influences of languages on each other. Based on the written records, we also have information about other languages that were never written down, through names and other borrowed words. From the earliest tokens tracking trade commodities to epic poetry, these written records give us insights into the lives of people in the ancient world: The complaints of scribes in training, correspondences between kings, and dedications to gods. Professor: Chelsea Sanker

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