My First Draft

My First Draft


  Everyday we absolutely use langauge and we create and develop culture. We cannot live without language and culture in a society. Think about our daily lives. We naturally use language to communicate with others to seek better way to develop our culture. In other words, language could have an influence on culture. You might say this idea is a common belief that most people know so obviously that it doesn't need an explanation such as writing this essay. However, despite of our high recognition of this, we are not aware of importance of it. In fact, most of us don't even know that why this idea could be substanitated.

  The idea of linguistic influence on culture is included in Whorfian theory by Whorf. Whorfian theory is categorized into two, the strong and weak version. The strong version says that language could determine the way we think, and in contrast, the weak one says linguistic categories and usage could influence the way we think and certain kinds of non-linguistic behaviour. Among the related theories, there were some theories which opposed the topic. However, there was a theory of Fishman which agreed on the topic by proposing that language is a key of culture.

  Specifically, the idea could be called as linguistic-cultural parallelism according to the study of Robert Leon Cooper, named The Influence of Language on Culture and Thought. This is the claim that each language reflects the culture of its speech community. In addition, it explains that language and culture have connections between them. For example, Korean has a lot of honorifics and low talks because Korean culture puts an importance on vertical human relations.

  There is difference of argument between linguists and cultural anthropologists. It's because the relations between language and culture is not that clear. However, despite of this, many linguists and cultural anthropolgists agree on that language and culture are inseparably related. Also, there is a simple idea related to this that society and individuals are connected too because culture is formed by society and the society is made of individuals.

   Despite the thesis has a difficulty in showing evidences, however, it could be explained by the natural progress and common ideas. First of all, language habits lead to formation and transformation of culture. According to the article which mentions the idea of thesis, culture is defined by the activities of people, sometimes governed by a geographical boundary. People formed their own society and made their own way of life, and this activity is called as cultural formation. After this for a time, culture is learned and also changes as time goes by. This alternation is passed from parents to children also by language.
   Like this, language has had a great role in inheritance because it's hard to inherit cultural formation or alternation without language. Therefore, language habits of the era must have influenced these processes such as that we commonly say we need to have better language habits for better society. It means that language habits would also become as a part of culture.
   This argument is exactly same as the reason why language habits influence cultural formation and alternation. The second reason that human mind and behavior affects society could be explained by this argument too. People express their mind by language and behave following their mind all the time in their society, and usually people in one society resemble this naturally. Language has always been a weapon to express one's ideas and feelings. In other words, human mind and behavior would be expressed by language, which pervades all over the society, and would show the lifestyle of society, so-called culture. In addition, because each person cannot be isolated from society, they would affect each other by their mind and behavior.
   Finally, let's see the third reason that culture usually follows the way of expressing feelings or some things which are helped by language. As you could refer to the first reason and the second reason, culture is formed by the way of expressing feelings (namely, mind). It is easy to know when we just look at ourselves. We always express something by languages, and usually this reflects which culture we have. It is because language is a kind of culture. If people use bad words, their culture becomes to be bad just as the words they say. That's why some argue that people should always be aware of how they say.
   In conclusion, language has a profound effect on culture. According to the idea of The Influence of Language on Culture and Thought: Essays in Honor of Joshua A. Fishman's Sixty-fifth Birthday on page 17, my thesis has a scientific name, 'linguistic-cognitive parallelism' or 'linguistic-cultural parallelism.':

This is the claim that there is a close correspondence between linguistic patterns, on the one hand, and cognitive and cultural ones, on the other. Each language reflects the culture of its speech community. In the following this claim will be called parallelism, for short.

   My thesis already has been a classical argument, and can be easily explained by either some papers or our common lifestyles, although there is some conflicts in stating whether language or culture has an influence on another.

  Obviously my argument is ambiguous when we consider the role of culture. Yes, it has already been a hot issue between linguists and cultural scholar. It is very complicated because both are so intertwined that there must be an apparent conclusion. Because of this, some of cultural scholar argued that culture has an influence on language, not vice versa. They first stated that all the vocabularies of one culture reflects what the cultural area values. This is well shown in Korean culture too. Korean has a lot of vocabularies related to honorifics or relatives, which reflect vertical culture or culture that values blood relationship. However, according to the supporting idea of behaviorist Watson, some cultures do not even include certain emotions defined by other cultures in their vocabulary. It means people express their mind first by language, act following their language, and finally those actions form particular culture.

  They secondly stated that language is just a verbal expression of culture. Namely, language is just a tool for people. It is flawed in considering a role of language. Culture would not exist if people don't express their mind and lifestyles by language. As I mentioned, language as a tool has a significant effect on forming society and its culture. To form culture, people should talk with each other.
  Related to both of those ideas, in addition, Whorf argued that since grammar is more resistant to change than culture, the influence from language to culture is predominant. Grammar is a kind of structure of language. Considering common argument that we should analyze language structure to know culture, resistance against change of grammar could be explained that language is more consistent than culture is. It's hard to say changeable thing affects something just as this case.

  Language and culture are so inseparably related to each other that their relationships are easily discussed between scholars. For example, like my thesis, an influence of one on another. Whof and other scholars have discussed this idea, and they called this linguistic-cultural parallelism. Among its categories, I think the argument of linguistic influence on culture is definitely right. Although cultural anthropologists criticize that cultural influence on language is much bigger than vice versa, linguistic influence on culture is more significant. It's because language becomes a part of culture. Language contributes to formation and transformation of culture. In addition, people express their mind by language or behavior and these things affect every thing in society. It means, without language, people could not even contribute to their own culture. The significant role of language is in analyzing human, ourselves. Namely, developed studies on language could even apprehend every thing related to human. Culture is one of the things they already discover, I argue. Because people desires communication, it is natural that language plays a significant role in either forming or affecting culture definitely. I totally agree that language must have a profound effect on culture.

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I finally finished writing my first draft. However I don't know whether I can have more than two paragraphs per one part (introduction / narration / confirmation / refutation and concession / conclusion). Please give me answer if you see this, Mr. Landfried.