By Correspondent Dallas Darling
Courtesy Of "The World News Network"
"Much the most important thing about language is its capacity for generating imagined communities, building in effect particular solidarities. After all, imperial languages are still vernaculars, and thus particular vernaculars among many." -Linguist Stephen R. Anderson.
The mass killing of dozens of people in Norway by an anti-immigrant, anti-multicultural extremist is just one of many warnings to nations around the world that not only is multiculturalism and diverse ethnic studies needed to prevent such tragedies, but so too is multilingualism, or the familiarity and acquisition of multiple languages.
But sadly, intolerance, mixed with exclusionary globalization, has shifted patterns of language use. Through certain kinds of mass and electronic medias, backed by military and corporate powers, some languages are increasingly used in international communication while others lose their prominence or completely disappear.
Since language consists of arbitrary symbols and sounds-letters, words, phrases, and sentences-that provide vital interaction with others, including explanations and concepts and ideas about one's environment and the world-the impact of diminishing languages has led to a decrease in creative thought and imagination and inter-cultural communications.
One major concern is the rising significance of English-as used by military and corporate media conglomerates-that is rapidly dominating other languages. Its emphasis on, and repetition of, words and concepts describing violent wars, weapons, consumerist values, and materialistic lifestyles, appears to be having a destructive impact on other cultures.
Western corporative and militarized "vernacular" English is endangering the ecological health of Earth as well.
More societies are internalizing and pursuing the vocabulary and ideas of conspicuous consumption. Violent-like English phrases and concepts have saturated much of the world, homogenizing diverse interactions and cultural perceptions.
For example, violence in !Kung San tribes (Bushmen of Kalahari) were almost unknown until they came into contact with modernization, including the English language and its imperial and colonial overtones. Indigenous tribes around the world have also become more aggressive when introduced to English and its numerous concepts of violence.
At one time, the Semai of Malaya had no explicit word for "kill" and thus, murder was unknown. This changed, though, when they were recruited by the British colonial government to join in the campaign against Communist guerillas in the early 1950's. Introduced to violent words and imagery, they became obsessed with killing.(1)
Acquiring various languages, more peaceful and less violent and imperial ones, are important in socialization. Before the British arrived, Semai parents trained their children in nonviolence. They did this by not striking their children and by substituting the word "hit" for kill. When they did have to "kill" for food, they did it with words of remorse.(2)
Scientific discoveries have shown how words can activate large portions of the human brain, along with emotions.
When words like war, terror, Muslim extremists, killing, murder, illegal aliens, attacks, Islamic terrorists, etc...are repeated every day and over and over again, extensive areas of the brain are activated leading to "brain change."(3)
This brain change partially explains Anders Breivik's shooting rampage and bombing in Norway. He had acquired and internalized extreme far-right vernaculars. Violent and reactionary words and phrases mainly from American right-wing thinkers(4) and Neo-Nazism, Far-right Zionism, Islamaphobia, and Knights Templar, influenced his worldview.
Once these "communal" words are learned and their concepts embedded in neurological endings of the mind, they cannot be erased. In fact, they consciously and subconsciously produce frames of reference, narratives, metaphors, and worldview structures. Accepting such language unthinkingly can make some nations more violent and warlike than others.
Noam Chomsky maintains there is an innate cognitive structure in very young children that pertains to language acquisition. In other words, there is a critical period, a window of time and opportunity, that allows children to quickly learn their native, or other, languages. Would a multi-linguistic environment encourage peace and understanding?
Since words and their meanings govern behaviors and perceptions, learning diverse languages, languages that contain many different views and cultural concepts about the world in which one lives, can lead to not only a greater understanding and awareness of the world, but increasing toleration towards others.
Regarding the globalization and homogenization of the English language, specifically a rapacious corporate and military vernacular propagated through electronic empires, let us hope this critical period-this window of time and opportunity to learn new languages and explore their novel ideas and ways of perceiving the world-has not already passed.
Languages are never neutral, especially when they are militarily or economically imposed onto, and into, others.
The amount of violent words and phrases, including reactionary and highly charged and emotional concepts and frames of reference, can easily transform peaceful and egalitarian societies into war-like and unjust societies.
English vernacular, dominated by corporate and military ultra-conservative tycoons who are at war with much of the world, is extremely violent and war-like. It is the fastest growing language in the world, since it is propagated through global mass medias. It is also monopolizing, and in some cases destroying, more peaceful languages and their ideas.
Anderson warned: "In 500 years time...if English is by then the only language left...it will have been the greatest intellectual disaster that the planet has ever known." Is not multilingualism needed more than ever? And would it not help promote a more peaceful and sustainable world?
Dallas Darling (darling@wn.com)
(Dallas Darling is the author of Politics 501: An A-Z Reading on Conscientious Political Thought and Action, Some Nations Above God: 52 Weekly Reflections On Modern-Day Imperialism, Militarism, And Consumerism in the Context of John's Apocalyptic Vision, and The Other Side Of Christianity: Reflections on Faith, Politics, Spirituality, History, and Peace. He is a correspondent for www.worldnews.com. You can read more of Dallas' writings at www.beverlydarling.com and wn.com//dallasdarling.)
(1) Wilson, Edward O. On Human Nature. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1978., p. 100.
(2) Ibid., p. 100.
(3) Szanto, Andras. What Orwell Didn't Know, Propaganda and the New Face of American Politics. New York, New York: Public Affairs Publishers, 2007., p. 70.
(4) See "Norwegian Shooting Suspect's 'Manifest' Inspired By American Right-Wing Thinkers" by Amy Goodman and Jeff Sharlet, Democracy Now! July 29, 2011, http://www.alternet.org.
(Note: Stephen R. Anderson's quotes are taken from Nicholas Ostler's Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World.)
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