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Loss of Native American Languages Affects Our Understanding of the Natural World

41 points by dnetesn 5y ago

throwuxiytayq 5y ago
> In Hawaiian traditions and belief systems, for example, the tree snails were connected to “the realm of the gods.” Hawaiian royalty revered them, which protected them from overharvesting. Having learned this piece of trivia, I don't feel like my understanding of the natural world has moved an inch. While there are important reasons to preserve these languages, I'm having a hard time buying this one.
- earleybird 5y ago
  I agree that it is important to preserve these languages and have the same concern about the claim. I'm inclined to believe that it is experiencing the natural world that builds understanding. Expressing that understanding is separate from the understanding itself.
meristohm 5y ago
Quick example from starting to learn Anishinaabemowin/Ojibwe : there different color-names for living things and non-living things. The brown fur of a squirrel has a different quality to it than the brown of dirt, and the language reflects that more readily than English. Gaeilge/Irish has more-specific terms for rain, at least according to The Blindboy Podcast (he wrote the forward to the recent edition of the Hiberno-English Dictionary). I try to describe in English the differences between the rain of the Midwest (big, cold drops that hit hard) and the Pacific Northwest (rain so light you don't need a raincoat), and can imagine cultures eventually making up easily-spoken words for common phenomena.
- el-salvador 5y ago
  > I try to describe in English the differences between the rain of the Midwest (big, cold drops that hit hard) and the Pacific Northwest (rain so light you don't need a raincoat), and can imagine cultures eventually making up easily-spoken words for common phenomena. We do in Spanish, some of the words used in my country are: Lloviznar: Very light drizzle Pringar: Drizzle Temporal: Rain that lasts for more than a day Llover: Tropical rain Elver (slang): Very strong rain, with dark clouds, strong winds, thunders and lightnings I once had a conversation with a European friend in which we briefly couldn't agree if it was raining or not, due to the difference in what each of us considered rain was. I was like "Look, but that's not even rain" and they said "of course it rains, look".
- homonculus1 5y ago
  Spitting, drizzling, showering, raining, pouring. What is it with ignoring English descriptives and then acting like other languages are superlatively rich?
  - troon-lover 5y ago
chillacy 5y ago
I recall stumbling upon a linguistic feature more common to native American languages called grammatical evidentals, where certain statements required some sort of marker which indicates how the information is known to the speaker: whether by direct experience (I saw the rain), or hearsay (I was told it's raining), etc. I have considered on occasion that this would be useful, as a great deal of internet arguments stem from the fact that English allows for the construction of sentences which state subjective experience as absolute truth.
- vinay427 5y ago
  Somewhat related: I first stumbled upon this evidentiality while Wikipedia surfing about Bulgarian and a few other (South?) Slavic languages a while ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarian_grammar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarian_grammar

41 points by dnetesn 5y ago

> In Hawaiian traditions and belief systems, for example, the tree snails were connected to “the realm of the gods.” Hawaiian royalty revered them, which protected them from overharvesting. Having learned this piece of trivia, I don't feel like my understanding of the natural world has moved an inch. While there are important reasons to preserve these languages, I'm having a hard time buying this one.

earleybird 5y ago
I agree that it is important to preserve these languages and have the same concern about the claim. I'm inclined to believe that it is experiencing the natural world that builds understanding. Expressing that understanding is separate from the understanding itself.

meristohm 5y ago

Quick example from starting to learn Anishinaabemowin/Ojibwe : there different color-names for living things and non-living things. The brown fur of a squirrel has a different quality to it than the brown of dirt, and the language reflects that more readily than English. Gaeilge/Irish has more-specific terms for rain, at least according to The Blindboy Podcast (he wrote the forward to the recent edition of the Hiberno-English Dictionary). I try to describe in English the differences between the rain of the Midwest (big, cold drops that hit hard) and the Pacific Northwest (rain so light you don't need a raincoat), and can imagine cultures eventually making up easily-spoken words for common phenomena.

el-salvador 5y ago
> I try to describe in English the differences between the rain of the Midwest (big, cold drops that hit hard) and the Pacific Northwest (rain so light you don't need a raincoat), and can imagine cultures eventually making up easily-spoken words for common phenomena. We do in Spanish, some of the words used in my country are: Lloviznar: Very light drizzle Pringar: Drizzle Temporal: Rain that lasts for more than a day Llover: Tropical rain Elver (slang): Very strong rain, with dark clouds, strong winds, thunders and lightnings I once had a conversation with a European friend in which we briefly couldn't agree if it was raining or not, due to the difference in what each of us considered rain was. I was like "Look, but that's not even rain" and they said "of course it rains, look".
homonculus1 5y ago
Spitting, drizzling, showering, raining, pouring. What is it with ignoring English descriptives and then acting like other languages are superlatively rich?
- troon-lover 5y ago

chillacy 5y ago

I recall stumbling upon a linguistic feature more common to native American languages called grammatical evidentals, where certain statements required some sort of marker which indicates how the information is known to the speaker: whether by direct experience (I saw the rain), or hearsay (I was told it's raining), etc. I have considered on occasion that this would be useful, as a great deal of internet arguments stem from the fact that English allows for the construction of sentences which state subjective experience as absolute truth.

vinay427 5y ago
Somewhat related: I first stumbled upon this evidentiality while Wikipedia surfing about Bulgarian and a few other (South?) Slavic languages a while ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarian_grammar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarian_grammar