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A review by scotchneat
Language: The Cultural Tool by Daniel L. Everett
3.0
Everett is not a Chomsky proponent. Instead, he argues that we invented language and we can lose it. He combines anthropology, structural analysis, linguistics and field study to bolster his argument.
I'm not a linguist, but I'm not sure I'm convinced of his central argument in the end. I agree that language is heavily influenced by culture and socialization, but there seems to be SOMEthing we have that is like an innate capacity to develop it.
Nevertheless, the stories of the people he visits are interesting and he is very good at parsing the linguistic structures for laypeople. And his point that specific cultures omit certain concepts because they are understood by everyone and need no expression, or the exact opposite, and they are absent from the culture's concepts.
I'm not a linguist, but I'm not sure I'm convinced of his central argument in the end. I agree that language is heavily influenced by culture and socialization, but there seems to be SOMEthing we have that is like an innate capacity to develop it.
Nevertheless, the stories of the people he visits are interesting and he is very good at parsing the linguistic structures for laypeople. And his point that specific cultures omit certain concepts because they are understood by everyone and need no expression, or the exact opposite, and they are absent from the culture's concepts.