And what he found was kids who were learning Hebrew - this is a language that has a lot of gender loading in it - figured out whether they were a boy or a girl about a year sooner than kids learning Finnish, which doesn't have a lot of gender marking in the language. It takes, GEACONE-CRUZ: It's this phrase that describes something between I can't be, bothered or I don't want to do it or I recognize the incredible effort that goes into. So to go back to the example we were just talking about - people who don't use words like left and right - when I gave those picture stories to Kuuk Thaayorre speakers, who use north, south, east and west, they organized the cards from east to west. All of these are very subjective things. The phrase brings an entire world with it - its context, its flavor, its culture. Trusted by 5,200 companies and developers. MCWHORTER: Yeah. If the language stayed the way it was, it would be like a pressed flower in a book or, as I say, I think it would be like some inflatable doll rather than a person. Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. FDA blocks human trials for Neuralink brain implants. So you can't know how the words are going to come out, but you can take good guesses. Happiness 2.0: Surprising Sources of Joy | Hidden Brain Media Those are quirks of grammar literally in stone. Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Dont Know, by Adam Grant, 2021. So for example, you might not imagine the color shirt that he's wearing or the kinds of shoes that he's wearing. And it's just too much of an effort, and you can't be bothered to do it, even though it's such a small thing. Listen on the Reuters app. In The Air We Breathe : NPR MCWHORTER: Yeah, I really do. But it's so hard to feel that partly because our brains are on writing, as I say in the book. So that, again, is a huge difference. We can't help, as literate people, thinking that the real language is something that sits still with letters written all nice and pretty on a page that can exist for hundreds of years, but that's not what language has ever been. Let's start with the word literally. MCWHORTER: Those are called contronyms, and literally has become a new contronym. It can be almost counterintuitive to listen to how much giggling and laughing you do in ordinary - actually rather plain exchanges with people. Of course, if you can't keep track of exactly seven, you can't count. Yes! So I just think that it's something we need to check ourselves for. If you grew up speaking a language other than English, you probably reach for words in your native tongue without even thinking about it. As you're going about your day, you likely interact with family, friends and coworkers. Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the challenges we all face at various stages of life. VEDANTAM: Languages orient us to the world. If you're bilingual or multilingual, you may have noticed that different languages make you stretch in different ways. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Speaking foreign language). So these speakers have internalized this idea from their language, and they believe that it's right. BORODITSKY: I had this wonderful opportunity to work with my colleague Alice Gaby in this community called Pormpuraaw in - on Cape York. Purpose can also boost our health and longevity. You know, I was trying to stay oriented because people were treating me like I was pretty stupid for not being oriented, and that hurt. How big are the differences that we're talking about, and how big do you think the implications are for the way we see the world? There was no way of transcribing an approximation of what people said and nobody would have thought of doing it. So maybe they're saying bridges are beautiful and elegant, not because they're grammatically feminine in the language, but because the bridges they have are, in fact, more beautiful and elegant. And so even though I insist that there is no scientific basis for rejecting some new word or some new meaning or some new construction, I certainly have my visceral biases. How to Really Know Another Person - Transcripts And why do some social movements take off and spread, while others fizzle? If you can speak more than one language, does this mean that you're also simultaneously and constantly shifting in your mind between different worldviews? VEDANTAM: So this begs the question, if you were to put languages on something of a spectrum, where you have, you know, languages like Spanish or Hindi where nouns are gendered and languages like English where many nouns are not gendered but pronouns are gendered, and on the other end of the spectrum, you have languages like Finnish or Persian where you can have a conversation about someone without actually mentioning their gender, it would seem surprising if this did not translate, at some level, into the way people thought about gender in their daily activities, in terms of thinking about maybe even who can do what in the workplace. Many of us rush through our lives, chasing goals and just trying to get everything done. VEDANTAM: It took just one week of living in Japan for Jennifer to pick up an important, VEDANTAM: There isn't a straightforward translation of this phrase in English. But is that true when it comes to the pursuit of happiness? How to Foster Perceived Partner Responsiveness: High-Quality LIstening is Key, by Guy Itzchakov, Harry Reis, and Netta Weinstein, Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 2021. The size of this effect really quite surprised me because I would have thought at the outset that, you know, artists are these iconoclasts. Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. Of course, you also can't experience anything outside of time. The dictionary says both uses are correct. Purpose can also boost our health and longevity. It's not something that you typically go out trying to do intentionally. Language is something that's spoken, and spoken language especially always keeps changing. But what we should teach is not that the good way is logical and the way that you're comfortable doing it is illogical. So LOL starts out as meaning hardy-har-har (ph), but then it becomes something more abstract. And you suddenly get a craving for potato chips, and you realize that you have none in the kitchen, and there's nothing else you really want to eat. So bilinguals are kind of this in-between case where they can't quite turn off their other languages, but they become more prominent, more salient when you are actually speaking the language or surrounded by the language. VEDANTAM: I understand that there's also been studies looking at how artists who speak different languages might paint differently depending on how their languages categorize, you know, concepts like a mountain or death. Hidden Brain | Hidden Brain Media What do you think the implications are - if you buy the idea that languages are a very specific and unique way of seeing the world, of perceiving reality, what are the implications of so many languages disappearing during our time? So for example, grammatical gender - because grammatical gender applies to all nouns in your language, that means that language is shaping the way you think about everything that can be named by a noun. You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around. Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. So for example, if Sam grabbed a hammer and struck the flute in anger, that would be one description, like, Sam broke the flute. I had this cool experience when I was there. We'll be back momentarily. Researcher Elizabeth Dunn helps us map out the unexpected ways w, Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the challenges we all face at various stages of life. Thank you! Subscribe: iOS | Android | Spotify | RSS | Amazon | Stitcher Latest Episodes: Happiness 2.0: The Reset Button The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. MCWHORTER: No, because LOL was an expression; it was a piece of language, and so you knew that its meaning was going to change. Cholera and malnourishment await Somalis fleeing . For more of our Relationships 2.0 series, check out one of our most popular episodes ever about why marriages are so hard. But also, I started wondering, is it possible that my friend here was imagining a person without a gender for this whole time that we've been talking about them, right? Reframing Your Reality: Part 1 | Hidden Brain Media al, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2004. Today in our Happiness 2.0 series, we revisit a favorite episode from 2020. He's also the author of the book, "Words On The Move: Why English Won't - And Can't - Sit Still (Like, Literally).". 00:55:27 Hidden Brain Happiness 2.0: The Reset Button Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #6: (Speaking foreign language). Imagine you meet somebody, they're 39 and you take their picture. My big fat greek wedding, an american woman of greek ancestry falls in love with a very vanilla, american man. So one possibility for bilinguals would be that they just have two different minds inside - right? You can search for the episode or browse all episodes on our Archive Page. MCWHORTER: Yes, that's exactly true. He's a professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University and the author of the book "Words On The Move: Why English Won't - And Can't - Sit Still (Like, Literally).". "Most of the laughter we produce is purely . VEDANTAM: As someone who spends a lot of his time listening to language evolve, John hears a lot of slang. But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy thats all around us. If you, grew up speaking a language other than English, you probably reach for words in your. VEDANTAM: Our conversation made me wonder about what this means on a larger scale. And it ended up becoming less a direct reflection of hearty laughter than an indication of the kind of almost subconscious laughter that we do in any kind of conversation that's meant as friendly. ADAM COLE, BYLINE: (Singing) You put your southwest leg in, and you shake it all about. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? Freely Determined: What the New Psychology of the Self Teaches Us About How to Live, by Kennon M. Sheldon, 2022. 4.62. Hidden Brain - You 2.0: Cultivating Your Purpose Hidden Brain Aug 2, 2021 You 2.0: Cultivating Your Purpose Play 51 min playlist_add Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the. And maybe the convenience store or the shop is really not that far away. And I can't help surmising that part of it is that the educated American has been taught and often well that you're not supposed to look down on people because of gender, because of race, because of ability. But I think that we should learn not to listen to people using natural language as committing errors because there's no such thing as making a mistake in your language if a critical mass of other people speaking your language are doing the same thing. What do you do for christmas with your family? Or feel like you and your spouse sometimes speak different languages? There's not a bigger difference you could find than 100 percent of the measurement space. We convince a colleague to take a different tactic at work. BORODITSKY: Yeah, that's true. VEDANTAM: For more HIDDEN BRAIN, you can find us on Facebook and Twitter. VEDANTAM: You make the case that concerns over the misuse of language might actually be one of the last places where people can publicly express prejudice and class differences. So new words are as likely to evolve as old ones. But is that true when it comes to the pursuit of happiness? BORODITSKY: Well, you would be at sea at first. How To Breathe Correctly For Optimal Health, Mood, Learning Are the spoken origins of language one reason that words so often seem to be on the move? If it is the first time you login, a new account will be created automatically. Elon Musk's brain chips, starvation in Somalia and Greek anguish But can you imagine someone without imagining their gender? Hidden Brain. something, even though it shouldn't be so much of an effort. So earlier things are on the left. There's a way of speaking right. And if it was feminine, then you're likely to paint death as a woman. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information. But they can also steer us in directions that leave us deeply unsatisfied. Many people have this intuition that, oh, I could never learn that; I could never survive in a community like this. UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #3: (As character) I'm willing to get involved. So I think it's an incredible tragedy that we're losing all of this linguistic diversity, all of this cultural diversity because it is human heritage. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #8: (Speaking Italian). If you're just joining us, I'm talking to John McWhorter. And if you can enjoy it as a parade instead of wondering why people keep walking instead of just sitting on chairs and blowing on their tubas and not moving, then you have more fun. How does that sound now? We lobby a neighbor to vote for our favored political candidate. This week, we continue our look at the science of influence with psychologist Robert Cialdini, and explore how these techniques can be used for both good and evil. Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. It is the very fabric, the very core of your experience. Rightly Crossing the Rubicon: Evaluating Goal Self-Concordance Prior to Selection Helps People Choose More Intrinsic Goals, by Kennon M. Sheldon, Mike Prentice, and Evgeny Osin, Journal of Research in Personality, 2019. And one thing that we've noticed is that around the world, people rely on space to organize time. VEDANTAM: Would it be possible to use what we have learned about how words and languages evolve to potentially write what a dictionary might look like in 50 years or a hundred years? We talk with psychologist Iris Mauss, who explains why happiness can seem more el, When we want something very badly, it can be hard to see warning signs that might be obvious to other people. And I would really guess that in a few decades men will be doing it, too. And if people heard the sounds a little differently and produced them a little differently, if there were new meanings of words - very quickly whatever the original meaning was wouldn't be remembered.
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