Linguistic relativism is the hypothesis that the way we speak influences or controls the way we think. It follows from this idea that speakers of different languages think and experience the world in different ways. To what extent is this the case? Linguists and philosophers will probably never agree, but while they argue, there are a couple of points that you and I can take away from this discussion and apply to our photographic practice.

I am sure every photographer has thought about the concept of sunlight filtering through the leaves of a tree even though their language may not have a distinct word for this phenomenon. I am quite convinced that even my little baby has discovered this thing of beauty – I noticed him staring raptly up at the shifting sunlight on the hood of his pram one day as we were walking down a tree-lined avenue – and he has hardly any language at all yet. Japanese is the only language I know (though there may be others for all I am aware) where there is such a word – komorebi.

Invention would be impossible if we were unable to think about things for which we don’t have words. Take ‘ansible’, a word coined by fantasy and science fiction writer Ursula K. Le Guin to refer to a device capable of communicating instantaneously across any distance in space. We don’t have a word for it because it doesn’t exist, but someone was able to think about the idea and from there to create a word for it. I am quite sure that this is how the camera came about, too.

We see then that are limits to how constrained our thoughts are by the language we speak. On the other hand it is safe to say that language can create habits of thought. It is well worth it to be aware of and even break those habits. One of the most famous examples is the metaphor that “Argument is war”. The idea here is that since we speak of debates as arguments to be won, we think about it this way, too. However, there is no reason why we can’t think about a debate for example as a way to reach agreement and consensus rather than to win a point.

Christine Valters Paintner, in her book Eyes of the Heart: Photography as a Christian Contemplative Practice, makes a similar point for photography. She points out that we use possessive and aggressive words for photography – we shoot and we take images. It would go too far to infer from this that photography is an aggressive practice, but it is worth it, as Paintner suggests, to take a moment to use different words: how does it affect our photographic practice if we receive images rather than take them?

For me, the distinction between taking and receiving a photograph matches the difference between digital and film photography. My dSLR is a tool for taking it all in; with practically unlimited storage space I click and click and click in order to take it all in and miss nothing. With film, I slow down and wait for the beauty to come to me.

The moral of all of this? Open up to new experiences and ideas. Learn a few words in another language, travel, talk to a stranger. Read a book. Think outside not only the box but your own language. That is how we grow as people and how we grow as photographers.

Jenny