Abstract
This chapter critically reexamines current claims about the diversity of ontological orientations among human societies, while revisiting work on linguistic relativity—the social construction of such lived-realities by means of the symbolism of everyday language. Thus, throughout the Pacific Northwest animals and plants think, as portrayed in popular songs and folktales. No sharp line is drawn between animals and humans, and humans owe a huge debt to their spiritual progenitors among other life-forms. At stake here are current claims about the diversity of ontological orientations among human societies, along with classic claims about linguistic relativity, or the social construction of such lived-realities by means of the symbolism of everyday language: in particular poetry and music as pan-human ways of “painting” mental imagery with ordinary sound.
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Notes
- 1.
On the other hand, one may wish to see this split as an instance of late-stage animism, with a split between animals and humans, who emerged from the same spiritual substance, only recently taking on different bodies, with different linguistic capacities; see Descola 1996 [1986]. But here, I think, we are splitting hairs. There is still a split, an ontological divide, at least in NW California.
- 2.
The same pattern is observed in Basque, a mysterious isolate somewhat demystified by Frank (2018, cf. note on p. 202 therein).
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Acknowledgments and Dedication
To begin, I would like to thank Jan Hauck and Guilherme Heurich for inviting me to give a talk on this subject at Oxford University in the fall of 2018, and for giving me stimulating feedback along the way, pushing me to think more deeply about these critical questions in this area: ontology, relativity, and Indigenous models of reality, including language. There’s still so much more for all of us to say! I would also like to thank Michael Silverstein for his generous feedback over the years, particularly concerning the Boasian legacy in linguistic anthropology, along with the question of Whorfianism in particular, based on his own sweeping contributions and his profound knowledge of philosophical debates in this area. This paper is dedicated to the memory of the late Aram A. Yengoyan (1936–2017), my mentor for many years, who cared deeply about human diversity and whose deepest intellectual commitments flowed from his heartfelt defense of human differences—aesthetic, philosophical, ontological, ethical, and otherwise.
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O’Neill, S. (2019). Linguistic Relativity in the Age of Ontology: How Language Shapes Worldview and Ways of Being, Even Going Beyond the Human. In: Głaz, A. (eds) Languages – Cultures – Worldviews. Palgrave Studies in Translating and Interpreting. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28509-8_2
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