How does the language we use reflect, define and construct our cultural/social identity and relationships?
Language holds a lot of power and it can solidify our identity, culture, and relationships. It can bring people closer together as it allows us to directly communicate. Living in Singapore and going to an international school, English became my main language and my ability to speak Hindi significantly decreased.
While I can still speak the language, I cannot read or write, and I no longer feel confident having a proper conversation. When I go back home to India, I find it hard to relate and connect to my relatives. I feel unable to properly express myself as my language ability isn’t advanced enough anymore to have the same complex conversations as I would in English. As a result, I take on the role of a tourist more than being a close cousin or niece. My western accent and messy Hindi send a message that I’m out of touch with my culture or that I’m perhaps even “white-washed”. While language is not the only component of my cultural identity, it plays a significant role. I can conform to the cultural norms in behaviour, but my perceived identity somewhat separates me from my relatives, with the most tell-tale sign being my weaker grasp of Hindi.
However, while language can construct and limit relationships and cultural identity, it doesn’t define them. In an increasingly diverse world, language barriers aren’t as big of obstruction as they used to be. Language definitely plays a big role in our identity, but it doesn’t necessarily define our ability to forge relationships as the world becomes more interconnected and linguistic learning becomes a more integral part of education.
How much of our social identity is reliant upon our language use?
Language can be further categorised into more subsets such as dialect, idiolect and even accent. The link between our social identity and language use becomes much more complex when we consider the precise distinctions. Accents are one of the more apparent features that heavily connects to our social identity. In my case, even if I speak Hindi my western accent indicates to distant family that I’m disconnected in some way. This heavily defines my social identity in the familiar context. In our international school, we tend to see people from all around the world enter with unique accents and the more time they spend here, the more westernised their accent becomes. It becomes a form of assimilation and fitting in. As humans, we judge and make assumptions about people, and language happens to be one of the most apparent characteristics we can scrutinise. The reliance of our social identity on language use varies from person to person, but it plays a very distinct role in our perceived identities.
What do we mean by inclusive/exclusive language?
At its core, exclusive language is any choice of words that can isolate or ostracise people, regardless of intent. Inclusive language is the opposite– vocabulary that addresses everyone without singling people out. Exclusive language means different things to different people as what we find exclusive and inclusive is also impacted by our personal experiences. However, some things are generally considered to be exclusive, and one of the most common examples of this is gendered dialogue. We hear a lot of gendered language with simple things like the human race being called “mankind”, and artificial materials being classed as “man-made”. A vast majority of gendered vocabulary tends to be androcentric, and while these words on their own aren’t so exclusive, the accumulation of male-centred vocabulary is what creates the exclusive connotation. Today, there is an increasing push to use more inclusive language, like gender-neutral nouns that don’t confine titles and classifications.
Exclusive language can also be broader than the specific vocabulary, and more about tone and intent. Something I see more commonly is dialogue that draws attention to someone’s differences as a way to scrutinise and embarrass people. For example, when non-native English speakers are made fun of for mispronouncing English words. I have experienced this quite a bit, especially when I still had an Indian accent before joining UWC.
