Yes, I think so.
Some North American tribes (and elsewhere I'd guess) have a way of
saying things that express doing, without an actor doing something to
something else. Some ways of expression are more akin to being,
rather than doing.
On the other hand, European languages are structured on
a subject-verb-object way of expession. Thus, it is part of our
language structure that you do something to something else.
It makes sense that the way our minds frame things make an
impact on our cognition, and the way we act is based on which
perspective we are oriented to. It has profound implications on the
way we act in relation to each other and the earth.
Potentially, the subject-verb-object language structure is the root of Western
denigration of the earth. I know some tribal societies pissed in their own
backyards too, but the big ass Euro slam is the one that will go down
in history.
A colleague in English said comparative deep structures of languages
show that tribal linguistics and Euro linguistics differ in these
ways, and that it is common knowledge in the field of linguistics.
Steve Diver
-- steved@ncatark.uark.eduTo Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with "unsubscribe sanet-mg". To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command "subscribe sanet-mg-digest".