this post was submitted on 28 Jan 2025
18 points (100.0% liked)
Linguistics
592 readers
2 users here now
Welcome to the community about the science of human Language!
Everyone is welcome here: from laymen to professionals, Historical linguists to discourse analysts, structuralists to generativists.
Rules:
- Stay on-topic. Specially for more divisive subjects.
- Post sources whenever reasonable to do so.
- Avoid crack theories and pseudoscientific claims.
- Have fun!
Related communities:
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I think that the text has some merit, but it misses the full picture, and the conclusion is crap.
Sure, what matters is what you say, on a discursive level; not the specific words that you use to say it. And meaning is not hard-coded into the words, it depends on a thousand things, it changes over time, yadda yadda.
So far, so good. However meaning doesn't depend on "intent", as the intent only exists inside the head of the speaker; meaning is socially negotiated between the speaker and hearers. And some words become associated with prejudice in a way that, even if the speaker tries to cancel it out, they still sound "unfortunate".
I also think that the author is building a big strawman on what "politically correct language" is supposed to be. It is not just about the individual words.
At the end of the day it's about manners and putting forth a reasonable effort to make others feel welcome and comfortable.
Yup, pretty much.