identity, lang, culture - on final

identity is

a condition or fact that a person (or thing) is itself and not something else

• from an anthropological viewpoint, identity is a product of an action and is NOT a natural intrinsic quality

• also the result/outcome of the classification of the world (of how we perceive the world we live in) → classification is the basic mental activity because classification represents the basis of cultural construction because through cultural construction, people make order/sense in the universe of their perception

identity is a double process because it involves

a definition of the others around us and a definition of oneself

identity construction is also a

contested process, must ask when identity becomes important/under what circumstances? dramatic circumstances, when change happens too fast - we cannot understand it when it is outside of our control, we start to question the rules we live under and our own identity

linguistic is anthropological because

linguistic anthropology (like social and cultural anthropology) draws from a wide range of disciplines, examines structure and patterns of a particular language + situations/social contexts within which language is used and what certain terms mean in that particular context

linguistics fits significantly into anthropology because (linguistic) anthropology

is holistic and comparative

• and we better understand the relationship between language and cultures by comparison

all languages are relative in the sense

that languages are often related to other languages - they are all effective forms of communication and CANNOT BE RANKED

linguistic ethnocentrism does not equal linguistic

relativism

• linguistic ethnocentrism is the idea that ones own language is better than/superior to others

what is the relationship between language and culture?

there is a relationship between language and culture

• what kind? different languages name the world in different ways. is it because different people perceive the world differently or is it because the languages they speak causes them to do so?