The following are quotes from Dr. Boroditsky’s presentation on language and thought and my own connections to these statements (2017).

21:00 – “So the question is, once you’ve learned a language like this with grammatical gender do you actually end up thinking of the sun and the moon as somehow more male like or more female like depending on what gender they are in your language.”

• In British Columbia we start learning French at a fairly young age (in Elementary School). I think the fact that I learned grammatical gender while learning French, impacts the way I view words in English. I do not speak French currently, but because I learned grammatical gender at an impressionable age it had a cross over effect into my general language development. This could explain why I always assume dogs and cats are male (or this could perhaps be due to growing up within a society where the patriarchy is deeply ingrained in culture). 

24:49 – “There’s some evidence suggesting that hurricanes that happen to get female names, these names of course are randomly assigned to hurricanes, are more deadly because people don’t evacuate when they’re told to because they underestimate the potential destruction of these hurricanes.”

• I have a gender neutral/unisex name, Jessie, and often find that people assume I am a man. When said people see that I am, in fact, a woman, they visibly react with confusion. The first day of my teaching practicum in 2014, I walked into the classroom and my practicum teacher said “Oh wow, I thought you were a man.” I could see the disappointment on his face and wondered if he would have accepted me as a student knowing that I am female. I knew from then, much like the hurricanes, that my ability would be underestimated. I think he ended up being pleasantly surprised by my level of competence, despite being a woman (this is meant to bring levity to this post and is meant in a purely sarcastic context). The biggest challenge for society moving forward is trying to undo the stereotypes that the patriarchy has instilled in social norms regarding gender.

28:35 – “This is a split second event (talking about someone being shot) but he makes it into four events right and he just happens to be on one end of that long chain but this is something language allows us to do. I can say we cured polio and that’s one verb for those very complicated protracted events or I can use four verbs to say I shot my friend in the face. In fact, whenever you are choosing a verb you’re taking a perspective on how much time you’re going to compact into an event.”

• Dr. Boroditsky suggests that the English language lacks the context of time when events are retold. I completely agree with this statement and find that it makes communication challenging when deciphering importance based on length. Generally, if something is important I prefer for it to be said explicitly and to the point. If a story is for entertainment or shock value I can understand why it may be drawn out or more details may be added. Because I prefer explicit communication, I struggle with people who tell drawn out stories. Unfortunately, my husband is one of these people. All jokes aside, I do find this type of communication really challenging because I find it very hard to pay attention (for this reason I also truly despise the explanation of board games). I understand that this challenge is something I must overcome as not all people are going to accommodate my impatience with drawn out language. I think I can even learn to appreciate this type of communication if I truly put my mind to it as we can learn from those who use language differently than ourselves.

41:20 – “There are lots of decisions that we make that may be less important but nonetheless still deal with this relationship between language and thought. For example, a few years ago the California prune board petitioned the FDA to allow them to change the name of their product from prunes to dried plums. This cost them millions of dollars to do. Why would they do such a thing? Well, the word prune lived in a bad linguistic neighborhood. Imagine what prunes are associated with, of course, old-age, constipation.” – She later states that changing the name made the product sell MUCH more but they had to have some that still said Prunes because old people didn’t want dried plums….

• I love this analogy because it is very reflective of how language changes and grows within contexts and time. The idea that words belong to linguistic neighborhoods is very similar to gendered nouns. So much of language is socially constructed within a culture and as that culture shifts demographically, so does the context of words. An example of this would be the use of the word ‘sick’ in the 90s. I grew up using this word to mean something that was really cool or awesome while my parents used it in the literal sense of not feeling well. Another word that was used in a different context in the 90s/early 2000s was the word dope. Dope also meant cool or awesome, but the first time my dad heard me say this he gave me a very interesting look and asked if I knew what it meant. He clearly had a different meaning of the word from the 70s, which was a slang term for marijuana. The connotation of words shifts with culture and we have to be able to adapt to the ever changing context of language. The prune company rebranded, spending millions, to change with the context of the language within their culture.

43:54 – “Our languages and cultures make us super smart, we inherit so much knowledge that has been built over thousands of generations of our predecessors.”

• The BC Curriculum identifies the importance of Indigenous perspective and knowledge in education. First Peoples Principles of Learning (First Nations Education Steering Committee, 2007). The Principles of Learning state the following that are related to what Dr. Boroditsky touches on above:
  • Learning is embedded in memory, history, and story
  • Learning involves generational roles and responsibilities
• These learning principles connect deeply with the statement made above by Dr. Boroditsky. We have so much to learn from the Indigenous Principles of Learning and the way Indigenous cultures pass on information and knowledge through storytelling.
• CLICK FOR FIRST PEOPLES LEARNING PRINCIPLES

51:15 – “Communication between any two people even who speak the same language still has a lot of problems. I don’t know if you’re married… but most married people have experienced this.”

• To be completely transparent, communication is one of the biggest challenges in most of my relationships. This does not simply mean that communication isn’t working or is broken, it just means that communication is the component in relationships that I constantly need to adjust and work on in order to foster understanding and empathy within my relationships. My husband and I started going to counseling together to work on our communication ‘tool kit’ after he was in a very bad car accident and suffered substantial brain trauma. I think the way we interpret language, how we learn language, and the communication we grow up with, heavily impacts the way we interact with others. I appreciated Dr. Boroditsky’s humor when discussing communication problems, because it adds some lightness to something that most humans (at least I think) struggle with at some point in their lives. It goes to show how complicated language can be and that language and communication are two very different entities. Language has structure and rules and can be taught using paper and pencil. In my experience, communication is a skill that needs to be learned in an ever changing culture.

57:00 – “People are always using language in new ways. Language has never been static, it’s a living thing and the one thing that has been common throughout history is that older people complain about how younger people are killing the language and soon there will be no more language left because of the kids these days.” – In response to a question about how texting is changing thought.

• I found this statement particularly interesting because I frequently catch myself in my own hypocrisy surrounding cell phones and texting. I thought it was important that Dr. Boroditsky mentioned that this is a chronic feeling among all generations – that the younger generation is doing something ‘bad’ to harm what they have created. I do not necessarily think there is a hierarchy of delivery methods when it comes to communication and instead the communication (content) itself should be the focus of analysis. I also think it is important to note that a lot of the communication related to my job is done through e-mail, which is simply a more formal way of texting. When I find myself being overcritical of teenagers communicating through their phones, I remind myself of this.

References

B.C. Curriculum. (2020, October 5). Indigenous Knowledge and Perspectives in K-12 Curriculum. https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/curriculum/indigenous-education-resources/indigenous-knowledge-and-perspectives-k-12-curriculum

FNESC. (2007). First Peoples Principles of Learning. Retrieved January 17, 2023, from http://www.fnesc.ca/first-peoples-principles-of-learning/

SAR School for Advanced Research. (2017, June 7). Lera Boroditsky, how the languages we speak shape the way we think [Video]. YouTube.