Concept information
Preferred term
language and thought
Definition
- Do Yupik speakers, from western Alaska, think of snow differently than non-Yupik speakers because they have so many more adjectives to describe its texture and density? Do English and Spanish speakers experience reality differently because Spanish has two verb forms for the single English verb to be? Whereas an English speaker would say “I am thin” to describe either a change in condition or a permanent condition, someone speaking Spanish would have two options: “Estoy flaco” suggests that the person is newly thin because of lost weight, and “soy flaco” implies that the person is thin by nature. In short, every time Spanish speakers say they are thin or fat they are expressing a perception of their condition as permanent or temporary depending on the verb form chosen to express it. [Source: Encyclopedia of Bilingual Education; Language and Thought]
Broader concept
Belongs to group
URI
https://concepts.sagepub.com/social-science/concept/language_and_thought
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