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A review by acrickettofillthesilence
Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany
1.0
Woof.
I knew going into this that the central premise experimented with the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. What I didn't know was just how strong the author would lean in and just how agitated certain logic flaws would make me.
For context, Sapir-Whorf is a not-too-subtly-racist claim that the language you speak determines how you think. The strong form of this hypothesis will basically make it sound like you have blinders on based on what words are or are not available in your language. To anyone who believes this concept, I'd like you to think of a time when a word was on the tip of your tongue but you just couldn't quite place it. Did that mean you couldn't conceptualize whatever it was you were trying to say? Obviously not. Strong Sapir-Whorf is bull and was used to justify all kinds of cultural xenophobia and racism.
If the author had toyed with the weak hypothesis, that the language you speak can lightly influence the way you think about the world, I might have been more sympathetic to this novel.
But nope. The book outright claims that Native American languages don't have numbers (except Sioux, which allows for some things to be plural), and that French speakers cannot conceptualize what 'warm' is. This is said all in the span of two paragraphs.
Okay, so maybe it isn't that he doesn't understand the self. Maybe it's that he doesn't understand how pronouns are used as variables to refer back to nouns. If this is your argument, please refer back to the second and third bullets in this list.
I won't even go into all the linguistic babble the author uses to convince you that the main character is an expert. I find this book dangerously bad in the portrayal of S-W and what it means to speak a language. Full stop.
PS: These problems could have dropped a good book down to 2 or 3 stars. I also did not find the narrative compelling.
I knew going into this that the central premise experimented with the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. What I didn't know was just how strong the author would lean in and just how agitated certain logic flaws would make me.
For context, Sapir-Whorf is a not-too-subtly-racist claim that the language you speak determines how you think. The strong form of this hypothesis will basically make it sound like you have blinders on based on what words are or are not available in your language. To anyone who believes this concept, I'd like you to think of a time when a word was on the tip of your tongue but you just couldn't quite place it. Did that mean you couldn't conceptualize whatever it was you were trying to say? Obviously not. Strong Sapir-Whorf is bull and was used to justify all kinds of cultural xenophobia and racism.
If the author had toyed with the weak hypothesis, that the language you speak can lightly influence the way you think about the world, I might have been more sympathetic to this novel.
But nope. The book outright claims that Native American languages don't have numbers (except Sioux, which allows for some things to be plural), and that French speakers cannot conceptualize what 'warm' is. This is said all in the span of two paragraphs.
Spoiler
And then the icing on the cake is the claim that the Butcher can't use pronouns, which obviously means he doesn't understand the concept of the self. This argument is the funniest to me because in the exchange where Rydra teaches the Butcher pronouns, it's clear he already knew what they were, considering:- He responded just fine to Rydra referring to him as you.
- He responded to people calling his name and knew that the name referred back to himself.
- He seemed to have no problem with the people around him each calling themselves I and me without being the same person.
Okay, so maybe it isn't that he doesn't understand the self. Maybe it's that he doesn't understand how pronouns are used as variables to refer back to nouns. If this is your argument, please refer back to the second and third bullets in this list.
I won't even go into all the linguistic babble the author uses to convince you that the main character is an expert. I find this book dangerously bad in the portrayal of S-W and what it means to speak a language. Full stop.