Through the language glass
by Guy Deutscher · first published 2010
88% recommend12% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Readable, nicely written history of linguistic relativity, with a big focus on color names across languages and the evidence on how language shapes perception; suits curious general readers.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
This book confronts the thorny question of how and whether culture shapes language and language, culture. Linguistics has long shied away from claiming any link between a language and the culture of its speakers: too much simplistic (even bigoted) chatter about the romance of Italian and the goose-stepping orderliness of German has made serious thinkers wary of the entire subject. But now, acclaimed linguist Guy Deutscher has dared to reopen the issue. Can culture influence languageand vice versa? Can different languages lead their speakers to different thoughts? Could our experience of the wo
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There's a good book about this whole complex of themes, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis [1] that basically your language determines the way you think (100 words for snow, more/fewer words for colours, etc.): Through the Language Glass: Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages by Guy Deutscher. TL;DR: no, language doesn't determine how you see the world. There might be one notable exception - there's a tribe somewhere (forgot…
on “New theory why languages don’t all have the same number of terms for colors” ↗There's a fascinating book on this topic, that is Guy Deutscher: Through the Language Glass.
on “Why Red Means Red in Almost Every Language (2015)” ↗If this interests you, Through the Language Glass: How Words Colour Your World by Guy Deutscher is a must read.
on “The sea was never blue” ↗There's quite a bit of interesting discussion of this sort of thing in Guy Deutscher's book "Through the language glass: Why the world looks different in other languages".
on “According to Japanese Traffic Lights, Bleen Means Go” ↗…From: The Natural History of Innovation. By Steven Johnson What Technology Wants. By Kevin Kelly The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer. By Siddhartha Mukherjee Culture, society and travel Through the Language Glass: Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages. By Guy Deutscher Sweetness and Blood: How Surfing Spread from Hawaii and California to the Rest of the World, With Some Unexpected Results. By Michael…
on “Economist books of the year (science and technology picks)” ↗…light blue in Russian. The book is also in response to the general public's view and romanticism of linguistic relativity and in particular in response to a book by another linguist Guy Deutscher titled 'Through the Language Glass', where Guy feeds into the perception that language helps shape the way we think, and it is a good book but it still doesn't get close to saying that other languages see more colours. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXBQrz_b-Ng
on “Why Are Plants Green? To Reduce the Noise in Photosynthesis” ↗For those interested in learning more about the subject, I would recommend Through the Language Glass by Guy Deutscher. It deals heavily with the relationship between language and color as part of exploring the overall relationship between language and culture. (This particular experiment is one of the…
on “How we gave colors names and it messed with our brains (part II)” ↗Again -- if you are interested in this topic, I would recommend reading Through the Language Glass: Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages by Guy Deutscher. It deals with numerous facets of the relationship between language and culture in an accessible and comprehensive manner.
on “The Power of Language” ↗…that the only we have such a large palette of basic color terms is that we have a large dying/painting industry and can thus compare specific shades easily. Guy Deutscher has a great chapter on this in "Through the Language Glass". http://www.radiolab.org/story/211213-sky-isnt-blue/
on “Toki Pona: a human language with 120 words” ↗Shameless plug, but the book 'Through the Language Glass', by Guy Deutscher covers this and more about language and thought in a very entertaining way. Check out the book, or find my notes about it here: alvaroduran.me/through-the-language-glass
on “Our Language Affects What We See” ↗For anyone who finds this stuff fascinating, There's a great book, "through the language glass" by Guy Deutscher. I really enjoyed it.
on “How the Languages We Speak Shape Our Realities” ↗Good one, but the part where we as a society collectively define what 'violet' and 'purple' means is lacking. It's all been covered in a wonderful book called Through the Language Glass, by Guy Deutsch. Find my notes on that book on https://alvaroduran.me/through-the-language-glass Edit: fix link
on “The Difference Between ‘Violet’ and ‘Purple’ (2015)” ↗I can wholeheartedly recommend the book Wikipedia mentions Deutscher, Guy (Aug 4, 2016). Through the Language Glass: Why The World Looks Different In Other Languages. Random House.
on “Wine-dark sea” ↗…hypothesis. For example, the available colour names in a language affects the way people classify colours as measured by the way they perform a task in which language is not used. See Guy Deutscher's "Through the language glass" for an overview of this and many other fun things. There's also the whole business of how propagandists twist language around in order to influence people. How is that not an example of language affecting…
I found Through the Language Glass a fascinating read. One main topic in the book is names for colors. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8444621-through-the-lang... A thing that stuck with me is how European explorers thought some…
on “Sunlight affects whether languages have a word for ‘blue’” ↗