Sapir-Whorfhypothesis萨丕尔-沃尔夫假说1. ThephilosophicalbasisoftheSapir-WhorfHypothesisisempiricalandthetheoreticalbackgroundisstructuralism.萨丕尔和沃尔夫是语言相对论思想的集大成者2. WhilewerejectthestrongversionoftheSapir-Whorfhypothesis,itsweakerversionisgenerallyacceptedbymostscholars.尽管我们反对萨丕尔-沃尔夫假设的强假设，而大部分学者却普遍接受了其弱假设Sapir-Whorfhypothesis• EdwardSapirandBenjaminWhorf,proclaimedthatthestructureofthelanguagepeoplehabituallyuseinfluencesthewaystheythinkandbehave,i.e.differentlanguagesofferpeopledifferentwaysofexpressingtheworldaround,theythinkandspeakdifferently,thisisalsoknownaslinguisticrelativity.• SapirandWhorfbelievethatlanguagefilterspeople'sperceptionandthewaytheycategorizeexperiences.ThisinterdependenceoflanguageandthoughtisnowknownasSapir-WhorfHypothesis.Strongversion&weakversion• Strongversionbelievesthatthelanguagepatternsdeterminepeople'sthinkingandbehavior;• Weakversionholdsthattheformerinfluencethelatter.ThestudyofthelinguisticrelativityorSWHhasshedtwoimportantinsights:• Thereisnowadaysarecognitionthatlanguage,ascode,reflectsculturalpreoccupationsandconstrainsthewaypeoplethink.• MorethaninWhorf'sdays,however,werecognizehowimportantcontextisincomplementingthemeaningsencodedinthelanguage.MuchwasmadeoftheInuitlanguagewherethereisnopreciseequivalenttothesingleEnglishword"snow."Becausesnowissuchanimportantpartofsurvivalofpeopleofthenorth,theyhadnineteendifferentwordsthatvariedaccordingtotheconditionofsnow.Atfirst,somearguedthatthiswasonlyamatterofwhatsizesandshapesofboxesarethewordsweuseinwhichtoputexperiences.InEnglish,however,wehavenosinglewordmeaningthechemical,di-hydrogenoxide(H2O).Ifyouwanttoobjectandsay,"Butwehavetheword'water,'"letmepointoutthattheword"water"doesnotapplytoconditionsofH2Owhenitisfrozen,crystallizedorvaporized,forwhichwehaveotherwords(ice,snow,steam,fog,clouds,humidity).Fromthetimeweareborn,weareinundatedwiththousandsofbitsofinformationpersecond,assound,smell,touch,temperatureandsight.Theyaremanyandrandom.Inthemselves,theyhavenomeanings.Itisonlythroughourinteractionwithotherhumanbeingsthatwebegintoapplymeaning,andwestarttoputarangeofdifferentinformationbitsintothesamecategories,words.Thosewords,orcategoriesoflargenumbersofinformationbits,differfromlanguagetolanguage.。