Against Homogenisation
In recent days, a few media outlets have mentioned the amusing The Meaning of Tingo. It is a compendium of words from other languages that name rather specific or complicated concepts, that have no English counterpart. My favourite is Backpfeifengesicht, “A face that cries out for a fist in it.”
The preservation of languages is the first front in the battle against homogenisation. People who speak in a different way also think in a subtly different way too. For example, there is a real conceptual difference between “I had a dream” and the French “J’ai fait un reve” (which means “I made a dream”).
We need these alternative ways of thinking, in politics and art. They can remind us that things may not always be what we preceive them to be, and they can help us solve problems.
January 24th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
[...] I doubt very much that my inital thought, that the Eyaks of Alaska are some kind of Eskimo (or Esquimaux, as Chesterton has it), is correct. Nevertheless, their Northerly homeland does remind me of the story about how Eskimo’s have fourty words for snow (or is it fifty? Or a hundred?) What special, specific thoughts and words have we lost now that Mrs Smith Jones has passed away? Matthew Parris, writing in the Spectator last week, says “I know exactly what I mean. I just can’t think of the word for it” referring to those Meaning of Liff or Meaning of Tingo type words that should exist, but do not. How many words, phrases and thoughts could the Eyak have taught him? [...]