STRANGE VIRTUES: ETHICS IN A MULTICULTURAL WORLD.Chapter 6

STRANGE VIRTUES: ETHICS IN A MULTICULTURAL WORLD

SIX: STRANGE COMMUNICATIONS

Edward Sapir and his student Benjamin Lee Whorf are well known among linguists for their hypothesis that language is "a self-contained, creative, symbolic organization, which not only refers to experience largely acquired without its help but actually defines experience for us by reason of its formal completeness and because of our unconscious projection of its implicit expectations into the field of experience."

Language and the Way We See the World

The assertion of the "Sapir-Whorf hypothesis" is that language is not just a neutral medium through which we express our ideas but a powerful structure that shapes all that we think, say and do. Most of what we see and understand is filtered through language. The implication for crosscultural ethics is that different languages produce different perceptions of the world. Language and culture cannot be separated. Therefore we cannot hope to really see the world through the eyes of another culture without learning the language.

George Kraft suggests that if a person spends two months, two years or ten years in a country, the entire time should be spent in learning the language. No other task better communicates the gospel. The same advice could be given to a tourist spending two weeks in a country. Language learning is the best way to open the door to communication, understanding and human connection. By becoming learners and making the difficult effort to speak with foreign words, we demonstrate our care for people and allow them to show us how they name their world. Sometimes it is less important how well you speak than that you are trying. Halting phrases bring smiles and approval. On the other hand, skill in a language acts like a passport to real relationship. Skill or fluency entails a deep understanding of the culture. Fluency is lacking as long as we translate our language into another. Fluency requires that we experience reality through the categories of the new language. Then we not only will communicate clearly but may also instinctively say the right thing, at the right time, in the right way. If we think in another language we may say very different things from what we would ever say in our own language. The following story illustrates the point.

Sometime in nineteen oh six I was walking in the heat of the day through the bazaars. As I passed an Arab Cafe, in no hostility to my straw hat but desiring to shine before his friends, a fellow called out in Arabic, "God curse your father, O Englishman." I was young then and quicker tempered, and could not refrain from answering in his own language that I would also curse his father if he were in a position to inform me which of his mother's two and ninety admirers his father had been. I heard footsteps behind me, and slightly picked up the pace, angry with myself for committing the sin Lord Cromer would not pardon-a row with Egyptians. In a few seconds I felt a hand on each arm. "My brother," said the original humorist, "return and drink with us coffee and smoke [in Arabic one speaks of 'drinking' smoke]. I did not think that your worship knew Arabic, still less the correct Arabic abuse, and we would fain benefit further by your important thoughts."