How Words Influence Reality

A Saussurian take on perception

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“The true alchemists do not change lead into gold; they change the world into words.” (William H. Gass)

After an incredibly insightful conversation with my friend and Medieval scholar Stephen (his Substack) I was newly reminded of a topic I had been meaning to delve into for some weeks now: how language shapes reality.

Any semi-observant individual would agree, I assume, that the words we use have an affect on how we interpret the world. Language, to an extent, engenders reality, even reveals reality. We fabricate and understand reality through language, we think reality up through our linguistic choices. Language, then, not only describes the world, but also serves to create our subjective take on the world.

“Without language, thought is a vague, uncharted nebula.” (Ferdinand de Saussure)

Postmodern linguists would agree that we perceive a subjective reality. Ferdinand de Saussure, widely recognized as the founder of modern theoretical linguistics, postulated that the meaning we obtain through language is based on our ability to differentiate one thing from another. Our ability, in short, to establish differences. Words (signs) can be divided into two parts: signifiers and signifieds. Signifiers are the sounds or letters used to denote a word, and signifieds are the mental images which correspond to the word. Both can be seen as two sides of the same piece of paper, each of which make up the whole sign. The relationship between signifiers and signifieds is arbitrary, there is no natural reason for it. For example, look at the word ‘dog’. The relationship between the sign (dog) and an actual dog is arbitrary. The same dog is a ‘cane’ in Italian and a ‘hond’ in Dutch, all denoting the same animal. Likewise, there is nothing in the word ‘Google’ that brings to mind “an online search engine”, yet Google’s logo and the mental image it brings forth are inseparably one. The connection between the two are made mentally and form the dualistic unit called the aforementioned Saussurian ‘sign’.

Saussure’s interpretation is, more or less, the paradigm in which we live today. Now, to underline the differences between ‘cane’, ‘hond’, and ‘dog’, I wonder how the languages we understand change the way we construct the world around us. There are around seven-thousand languages, all with their own unique sounds, vocabularies, and structures. In the Pormpuraaw community (in Australia), for example, the concept of left and right are non-existent. Instead the Pormpuraaw people locate themselves relative to the sun. In Russian, the sky is not blue as there isn’t a word for blue. Rather, there are two distinct words for light blue and dark blue (goluboy and siniy respectively), leading Russian speakers to see the sky relative to that distinction. What more, and this is particularly interesting to me, certain languages can heavily impact the way we view time. Keith Chen (an American behavioral economist, you should watch his TedTalk) compared the thinking patterns between speakers of so-called ‘futured’ languages and ‘futureless’ languages. Futured languages (English, for example) differentiate between the past, present, and future, whereas futureless languages (Chinese, for example) use the same phrasing to delineate yesterday, today, and tomorrow. This distinction, of course, has an effect on our perception of time, and specifically our attitude towards the future. “Futureless language speakers are 30% more likely to report having saved in any given year than futured language speakers. This amounts to 25% more savings by retirement, if income is held constant. Chen’s explanation: when we speak about the future as more distinct from the present, it feels more distant — and we’re less motivated to save money now in favor of monetary comfort years down the line.” (Keith Chen)

In another TedTalk, by Lera Boroditsky, she mentioned something which struck me in particular: “the beauty of linguistic diversity is that it reveals to us just how ingenious and how flexible the human mind is. Human minds have invented not one cognitive universe, but 7,000.” Language, then, is invented. We invented the cognitive universe we each occupy. And while this is a beautiful thought in itself, it is also somewhat terrifying. If language has such a profound affect on our sense of reality, how are the technologies we use daily, especially those made for communication, shaping our world and our perception of it?

“Ours is the first age in which many thousands of the best-trained individual minds have made it a full-time business to get inside the collective public mind. To get inside in order to manipulate, exploit, control is the object now. And to generate heat not light is the intention. To keep everybody in the helpless state engendered by prolonged mental rutting is the effect of many ads and much entertainment alike.” (The Rape of the Mind - Joost Meerloo)

Having recently finished the book from which I derived the previous quote, I think the theme of mass manipulation through language would be a good starting point for an upcoming post.

All in all, language is a strange phenomenon. It broadens our linguistic capabilities, and, in turn, broadens our mental universes and sense of “reality”. Whether or not you believe in the underlying powers inhabited by Saussure’s dualistic unit of signifiers and signifieds, it is worth noting the impact words have on our daily life. We shape our experience, and hence our sense of reality, through words. So, I’d advice to choose them wisely.