Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis, Essay Example

“The Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis” discusses the concept that languages that are more similar in nature contribute to populations being more similar in terms of culture. Furthermore, when languages are more different, the culture will be more different as well. In a sense, the similarities and differences of a language can be tied in to the geographic locations in which they are spoken in addition to a common evolutionary history. For example, Dutch and German are closer to one another than the various dialects of Chinese are due to a historical closeness of these two cultures.

Based on my own personal observations, it appears that the linguistic relativity hypothesis holds true in modern society. Because Dutch and German speaking societies would regularly engage in trade, they would often need to communicate. While it is difficult to determine whether these languages started out as similar or became this way because of continued interaction, it is clear that the language commonality benefitted the relations of these two groups. Meanwhile, Chinese dialects have developed because during the feudal period in China, many great families went to war with one another and each family and culture was considered to be the enemies as others. As a consequence, each region attempted to remain independent and there was not much mixing of ideas. As this continued over time, these languages continued to become more distinct, leading to more significant differences between the dialects to be seen.