Language and Culture

1
Language and Culture
2
Relationship between Language and Culture

• Like Chicken and Egg
• Culture influences the type of language
• the invisible ritual used imposed by culture on
  language users - Kramsch, 1998
• Language determines how people think and what
  people think about
• Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
• language determines what we think - Kramsch,
  1998

3
Culture and Language

• In Korea, respect for elders is very important
  hence there are many variations of I and You
  (ie. Na, Jor, Chaih/ Nor, Tang Shin, Chanae)
• Due to Confucianism
• Similar case for my mothers dialect group
• Toilet Talk in Korea

4
Culture and Language

• In some languages, words simply do not exist
  hence people are unable to grasp the concept
• Idea of Cooling and Heaty food in Singapore

5
What I feel

• Language and culture are interdependent
• They influence each other
• If one changes, the other changes too
• Examples Period and SMS talk
• It is impossible to tell now whether culture
  influenced language first or the other way around

6
The End

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