LANGUAGE AND CULTURE – A PERSPECTIVE

Frederick Kang’Ethe Iraki

Introduction

The importance of language in our daily intercourse cannot be gainsaid. Chomsky’s arguments suggest that there is a language faculty in the human brain that enables a human child to learn any language in just about four years. Contrary views argue that there is no such faculty, since language derives from general purpose mechanisms of the brain. Recent experiments with brain imaging, especially Positron Emission Tomography (PET) and Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (FMRI), reveal that both arguments are not entirely unfounded. Whatever the argument, both camps acknowledge the centrality of language in human cognitive development. With respect to communication, again two views emerge. One, promoted arduously by philosophers like John Locke and Bertrand Russell, espouse that language is essentially for communicating thoughts. The other view claims that language is part and parcel of thought, i.e. language plays a cognitive function, and is not a mere vehicle of thought. Interestingly, studies on animals demonstrate that animals can think too, and yet they have no language like ours.
Similarly, studies in aphasia, especially among patients afflicted with William’s Syndrome, show that language can be grossly impaired leaving cognition intact. Consequently, the two extreme views need reconciliation. A moderate view expressed by Vygotsky and later Piaget posits that language is not a sine qua non to cognition, but it plays a vital role in developing the human mind. This is the position adopted in this discussion.
Culture is a product of the human mind and it is defined, propagated and sustained through language. The relation between language and culture is indisputably symbiotic.
Language serves as an expression of culture without being entirely synonymous with it. In most cases, a language forms a basis for ethnic, regional, national or international identity. The concept of nationhood finds resonance in the adoption of a national language around which the diverse ethnic communities can rally. In France, for instance, the forceful adoption of French as the national language significantly reduced the import and value of the ten-plus regional dialects. As a result, France could boast of a true national culture; nationhood had been secured thanks to a unifying language. The same could be said of the adoption of Kiswahili in Tanzania. In Kenya, the concept of nationhood remains elusive, probably due to the ambivalent status accorded to Kiswahili.
In this article, we discuss the interplay between language and culture and how these two constructs evolve with time. We also discuss the vital role of language in creating mental representations.

Language
Definition

A language can be defined as a system of signs (verbal or otherwise) intended for communication. It is a system since its constituent components relate to each other in an intricate and yet organized fashion. Again, it is intended for communication, for it can be safely assumed that we speak to pass on information to others. But communication is not the only function of language. In fact, language can be used for dreaming, internal monologue, soliloquy, poetry, etc. For the sake of this discussion, we take the position that, essentially, language plays a communicative role.

Culture

The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines culture as “customs, civilization and achievements of a particular time or people.” In general terms then, culture defines a people’s way of life. Indeed, it can be considered as the sum total of norms and values espoused and cherished by a particular people. If values are patterns of behavior, norms are standards of behavior.

Language and culture

Language encodes the values and norms in a given society. As a culture changes, so does the language. For example, in Gîkûyû, certain words have become near obsolete in the wake of cultural mutations. The words kîrîîgû and mûirîîtu described an uncircumcised and a circumcised girl respectively. However, the near-disappearance of the rite among girls has meant the disappearance of the term kîrîîgû in Gîkûyû.1 The two opposites are no longer valid in society, therefore the language had to adjust. In comparison, the opposites kîhîî-mwanake (uncircumcised boy-circumcised boy) holds strong, for the rite is still valued for boys among the Gîkûyû. Historically, early Christians in colonial Kenya spearheaded the condemnation of female circumcision. The missionaries converted the Africans into the new faith, and the new converts reaffirmed and preached the stand of the church on the circumcision rite. The ramifications of the church’s influence in colonial Kenya need not detain us here. Suffice it to say that, although the rite persists in some communities, it has been dealt a deathblow by modernity. Indeed, some medical perspectives claim that the rite is pernicious and a danger in childbirth. In addition, women lobbyists have also indicated that the practice undermines a woman’s sexuality and therefore should be done away with.
Clearly, mutation in people’s thinking, whether influenced by the new religion or by modern thinking, can render obsolete a cultural practice or value. Once rendered obsolete, language seals off the issue by dropping some terms related to the value. The Gîkûyû example illustrates how the term kîrîîgû or its diminutive karîîgû have almost disappeared from ordinary Gîkûyû language. The two words are no longer politically correct and are therefore avoided. Recently, a presenter on cultural issues was invited to give an exposition of Gîkûyû customs on a call-in programme by the Kameme FM radio station. When it came to describing an uncircumcised girl, he could not utter the term. In its stead, he employed the circumlocution “that word for describing an uncircumcised female.” Despite the frantic efforts by the callers requesting the term, the presenter steered clear of it and promised, on a light note, to give it in the next edition of the programme. In comparison, he had no qualms whatsoever in orally distinguishing a kîhîî from a mwanake.
From the linguistic malaise felt by the presenter with respect to the term kîrîîgû it can be surmised that the Gîkûyû language seems to censure the use of a term associated with a much-demonized cultural value, namely female circumcision. In other languages that do not have this rite, there are no two terms to discriminate between young female persons. For instance, in Dholuo and Luhya, the terms nyako and (o)mukhana suffice to describe a young female person. In a word, a cultural shift entails some linguistic adjustments, and words can disappear from a language altogether as a result of a change in culture.

Language/culture evolution

Cultural values, as we have seen, appear, then wax and wane. Languages are no exception. A language can appear, mostly from a contact with other languages, blossom, then wither and die altogether. The French language was born out of Popular Latin in the 9th century. It is chronicled in the Serments de Strasbourg (Strasbourg oaths) and in the Séquence de Sainte Eulalie (St. Eulalia’s poems). Why do languages die? We shall not attempt a detailed rejoinder here, but it can be argued that when a civilization disintegrates, so does its language since language is the medium that purveys the values of that civilization. The result of a collapse of a civilization is the death of a language. The Greek and Roman civilizations are a case in point. Classical Greek and Latin are today termed “dead” languages as opposed to modern Greek and Italian. etc. The argument is that for a language to be alive and vibrant, the culture of the people it represents has to be alive and vibrant as well. As the culture evolves through time and space, so does the language.

Language change

Technically speaking, a language is made up of several parts of speech. These include grammatical words such as prepositions, articles, tenses, moods, plurals, etc; and lexical words entailing nouns, verbs, adverbs and adjectives. The latter category is also termed by pragmatists as constituting conceptual terms, i.e. they designate or denote objects in the world. Upon hearing a lexical item, one can associate it with a concept. Conversely, the former category of words does not create concepts, but rather indicate how we should relate the concepts between them. In other words, they give us instructions on how to manipulate concepts. Language change primarily concerns conceptual terms. As we learn new ideas or concepts, we require a word to describe them. We rarely meet new grammatical words, so change here is minimal, if any. Some illustrations are in order at this juncture.
In religion, the Judeo-Christian world-view, introduced by Christianity and Islam, was factored in linguistically by African cultures. New or different spiritual forces compete for man’s soul in a seemingly Manichean theatre. In the latter picture things are black or white, evil or good. For instance, in Kiswahili, terms like shetani, mwokozi, malaika, mnabii, kanisa, musikiti, kafiri, mtakatifu and many others exist as a result of the contact with the novel religious concepts vis-à-vis those of the indigenous religions.
In politics, concepts like democracy, voting, capitalism, nationhood, citizens and many others impinge on language. African languages have had to adjust to accommodate these new concepts in the political domain. Words like demokrasia, kupiga kura, ubepari, raia or mwananchi have been coined to take into account new political realities or cultures.
In the domain of generating and harnessing economic wealth, new economic systems demand a change in the language. Words like Marxism, socialism, communism, and many others, had to be coined to describe new concepts and ideas. Upon contact with socialism, the Tanzanian President coined the term ujamaa.
The leaps in technology have driven the creative genius of language to propose new words to describe the new gizmos. These include jet, helicopter, computer, laptop, CD-Rom, anti-virus and many more.
New social arrangements can also demand of language to change. In France, for example, a couple can live together in an arrangement called concubinage. This is an arrangement which holds the middle between being married and being single. In some communities in Kenya, a woman can be married or kept. The latter description means she is a mistress. On a light note, some people refer to the condition as kufugwa, Kiswahili for “to keep an animal.”
These illustrations underline the idea that conceptual words keep growing and expanding as we live out our lives. These terms have the knack of creating mental representations of concepts in us.

Language and Mental Representations

Values and norms are etched in our minds thanks to language. Language affords expression to and helps in formulating values and norms. Language expresses what should or should not be done. Indeed, taboos are encoded in language. Our minds and our behaviors are greatly influenced by language. Whorf, a renowned anthropologist, explains in Linguistique et anthropologie2 that a petrol tank that is labeled EMPTY, although potentially explosive due to fumes, may not deter a smoker from lighting up a cigarette next to it. This is because the word EMPTY transmits the meaning that there is nothing inside.
Our emotions too are expressed metaphorically in language. George Lakoff in Metaphors we live by3 notes that we talk of boiling rage, rising temper, letting off steam, as if these emotions were physically rising up in a tube. Through language, therefore, we create mental pictures of these emotions and react accordingly. We ask angry people to cool down as if they were a hot metallic entity.
The link between words and mental representations is therefore very close. In fact, when translating from one language into another, one has to be sure that the mental representation is retained in the translation. A word for word translation may violate the fidelity of the translation, since the mental representations evoked by the translation may differ from the original text. Good translations focus on creating the same effects in the translation as in the original. For instance, the term bread evokes a different mental image depending on whether the hearer is French or African. For the Frenchman bread has different shapes (flute, baguette) and accompanies every meal, from breakfast to supper. To an African, bread has one shape, it is sliced or whole, and it is taken with tea in the morning, or as a meal with a soft drink or milk. In other words, the two persons do not have the same mental representation of the term bread, hence the challenge in translation.
Taboo words are easier to enunciate in a foreign tongue than in one’s mother tongue. Due to cultural sanctions, a speaker feels the starkness of taboo words and insults when expressed in the mother tongue. Put in another way, the vulgarity of a term is somewhat diminished if it is expressed in a language other than one’s own. Insults and four-letter words are a case in point here. Translating them into one’s mother tongue does not have the same effect. Part of the reason for the “shock” in the mother tongue is that our language is a repository of our ethics, and these words are, strictly, no-go areas; they should not be uttered in public. Each language mirrors the values of its speakers, hence the censure.

Conclusion

Language and culture are intertwined like the two-sides of the same sheet of paper. They breathe, blossom, shrivel up and die due to many reasons. Both of them are sensitive and adapt to prevailing circumstances. Language gives full expression to people’s values and norms, and since values and norms are dynamic by nature, language has to be in tandem with cultural transformations. Technological, political, economic and social innovations require language to enrich its lexicon to capture the new realities. Indeed, our minds create mental representations of values thanks to language. The collapse of a value system may sound the death knell to the language in question. The death of a culture will almost certainly be followed by the demise of the language associated with that culture.

Notes: 1. The term mûirîîtu has persisted to describe any young unmarried woman who has not had a baby.
2. B. L. Whorf. Linguistique et anthropologie. Paris: Denoel, 1969.
3. G. Lakoff. Metaphors we live by. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1980.