Re: Origin and function of language
Richard Foy (rfoy@netcom.com)
Fri, 28 Jun 1996 14:08:54 GMT
In article <Pine.SOL.3.91.960625090110.8789E-100000@taurus.cus.cam.ac.uk>,
Mark Leney <mdl1002@cus.cam.ac.uk> wrote:
>On Mon, 24 Jun 1996, Paul Crowley wrote:
>
>> I can see no problem with this. One just has to look at the immense
>> cultural differences today between, say, Americans, French, Italian,
>> German and British, and how those differences are embodied in
>> language. It's also easy to see how in total war those differences
>> could (and, to some extent, did in WW1 and WW2) lead to success or
>> failure. I don't think any scientist would suggest that these
>
>So, (apologies for wandering off the subject here) you are saying that
>the results of WW1 and WW2 were in part due to linguistic differences
>between the warring nations. I think that is about the same as saying
>that Yiddish caused the Final Solution.
I don't think so. I think it would be the equivalent of saying that
the German language was a factor in the Final Solution, which I don't
see as impossible. For example:
If the German language is a language that is rich in authoritarian
convepts etc it could increase the probabilty of such things as the
Holocaust. Also if the English language were a language of love of
country as contrasted wtih duty to country it could lead to an edge
in war along with of course a great productive capacity.
--
"Do you know why Moses wandered in the wilderness for fourty years."(pause)
He was a man and men don't ask directions." --Nun in the play Nunsense
URL http://www.he.tdl.com/~hfanoe/womquote.html Womens Quotations
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