Linguistics and Cultural Surroundings connected

The New Yorker posted a great article about a new theory of linquistics that defies Noam Chomski’s http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transformational_grammar as defined in his break through book, Logical Structure of Linguistic. Chomsky (the Einstien of modern linquistics) has revised his theory over the decades. But the basic premise is the same. The theory states that the way in which the human brain creates meaning is instinctual. As such, all of the world’s languages must have the same basic structure. The most fundamental part of this universal structure is the ability to make recursive sentences - the ability to string many different beads of thought into one large continuous bead of thought. For example: The hat is red. The man is wearing a hat. AND IN MOST LAGUAGES YOU CAN THEN TAKE THAT SENTENCE AND SAY: The man is wearing a red hat.

Then came Dan Everett. Dan has been interacting with an isolated Brazilian tribe known as the Pirahã who don’t fit into Chomskian theory. They don’t use their language recursively. So it can be argued that it is not their brains that have shaped the structure of their language but the culture that shapes language. Could this be true of every person?

Dan Everett’s theory reminds me of what Ken Wilber says about how much influence our culture has over how we interpret reality. There is nothing to fear as far as Chomsky being wrong… That is the beauty of science. Newton was right about gravity but Einstein’s theories explain certain things that Newtons classic view of the universe can not. And now modern physics theories can explain some things that Einstein’s view could not.

Chomsky’s theories are providing a look into how the brain processes language and our innate ability to concoct meaning from the words we create while Everett’s theory introduces the impact that culture has in shaping our language.