__/ [ Dave Smith ] on Saturday 06 May 2006 21:31 \__
> Here's an article that I found interesting about the language of the
> Piraha, a small tribe living in the Amazon rainforest.
>
> http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_technology/article362380.ece
>
> It may throw some light on the relationship between thought and
> language, and on the evolution of language.
Fascinating read. Thanks for that....
,----[ Snippet ]
| More than 25 years ago, Professor Everett, then a missionary and now
| an ethnologist at the University of Manchester, decided to try to
| teach members of the obscure Pirahã tribe how to count. He would not
| succeed. Instead, he found a world without numbers, without time,
| one where people appeared to hum and whistle rather than speak.
|
| This isolated tribe of some 350 people in tiny villages in the
| depths of the Brazilian jungle could turn our understanding of
| language on its head and disprove the main work of one of the
| world's most celebrated intellectuals, Noam Chomsky.
`----
|
|
