The Silent LanguageIn the everyday but unspoken give-and-take of human relationships, the silent language plays a vitally important role. Here, a leading American anthropologist has analyzed the many ways in which people talk to one another without the use of works. The pecking order in a chicken yard, the fierce competition in a school playground, every unwitting gesture and action-this is the vocabulary of the silent language. According to Dr. Hall, the concepts of space and time are tools with which all human beings may transmit messages. Space, for example, is the outgrowth of an animal's instinctive defense of his lair and is reflected in human society by the office worker's jealous defense of his desk, or the guarded, walled patio of a Latin-American home. Similarly, the concept of time, varying from Western precision to Eastern vagueness, Is revealed by the businessman who pointedly keeps a client waiting, or the South Pacific islander who murders his neighbor for an injustice suffered twenty years ago. |
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Page 81
... deal of evolution basic to culture had taken place in the very systems that are thought of as most characteristically human . Each PMS is obviously so rich and complex that it can be made the subject of a lifetime's work . It is ...
... deal of evolution basic to culture had taken place in the very systems that are thought of as most characteristically human . Each PMS is obviously so rich and complex that it can be made the subject of a lifetime's work . It is ...
Page 107
... deal with americanos , On the whole , Americans have developed no system for making the law easy to live with , as have the Latin Ameri- cans . Our own formal system says that it is reprehensible to use influence and doubly so for ...
... deal with americanos , On the whole , Americans have developed no system for making the law easy to live with , as have the Latin Ameri- cans . Our own formal system says that it is reprehensible to use influence and doubly so for ...
Page 150
... deal with people who take great pleasure in saying such things as , " Oh yes , but in the United States people cry when they are happy too . " This is quite true . But the fact is that we think it is " natural " to cry when sad and ...
... deal with people who take great pleasure in saying such things as , " Oh yes , but in the United States people cry when they are happy too . " This is quite true . But the fact is that we think it is " natural " to cry when sad and ...
Contents
INTRODUCTION | 13 |
chapter two WHAT IS CULTURE? 43 | 43 |
chapter three THE VOCABULARY OF CULTURE | 57 |
Copyright | |
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activities adaptive Ameri American analysis analyzed Anasazi anthropologist Arab areas asked associated awareness basic begin behavior Benjamin Whorf bisexuality category of sets child communication complex concept congruence deal defense describe descriptive linguistics developed difficult discover duration everything example experience fact feel foreign formal patterns formal systems going handling Hopi hour hydroponics important Indians informal patterns interaction isolates Japanese language Latin America learning leeway linguistic living look matter means Middle East minutes Mogollon nature Navajo norms once over-all overseas person phoneme play pottery Pueblo Ralph Linton ranked reader relationship rest of culture scientist screw thread sets situation skiing society someone space talk teach technical tend territory theory things thought tion tradition Trager Trobriand Islander Truk trying ture United usually women words