Linguistic Relativity - Definitional Issues and Debates

Definitional Issues and Debates

The concept of linguistic relativity describes different formulations of the principle that cognitive processes such as thought and experience may be influenced by the categories and patterns of the language that a person speaks. Empirical research into the question has been associated mainly with the names of Benjamin Lee Whorf, who wrote on the topic in the 1930s, and his mentor Edward Sapir, who did not himself write extensively on the topic. Whorf's writings became the focus of empirical studies in psychology in the mid 20th century, and this strand of research often referred to the question as the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis, or sometimes the Whorfian hypothesis. This usage has been criticized as a misnomer, since Sapir and Whorf did not in fact formulate a hypothesis for empirical research, and because it is unclear to what extent Sapir actually subscribed to the idea of language influencing thought. Currently, researchers prefer to use Whorf's own terminology, by referring to the principle of linguistic relativity. This formulation implicitly acknowledges that Sapir and Whorf were not the first or only scholars to have theorized about relations between language and thought and that other strands of thinking about the issue also exist.