The Great Pirahã Brouhaha

Linguistic Diversity and Cognitive Universality

Bibliographic Data

ID2295216
AuthorsJanet Chernela (Department of Anthropology, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland, USA;, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume52
Issue1
Pages137-149
Publication date2023-10-23
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueAnnual Review of Anthropology (BOOK_SERIES)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0084-6570 • E-ISSN: 1545-4290
PublisherAnnual Reviews (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1146/annurev-anthro-052721-091031
OpenAlexW4383198439
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited51

Claims made by linguist Daniel Everett, that the Pirahã language, spoken by a small group of native Amazonians, lacks features thought to be universally present in languages, captured the imaginations of scholars and prompted broader questions on the nature of language, the diversity in languages, and the universals shared by them. Everett claimed that, in Pirahã, he had found a language without numbers, colors, mythology, abstract thinking, or recursive embedding. These claims were challenged by proponents of a universal grammar and by other biological linguists concerned with identifying shared faculties that undergird human cognitive capacities and by linguistic anthropologists concerned with the products of those potentials as they are actualized in the interactivity of speaking. Situating the Pirahã in historical and sociological context, I question the novelty of a faculty of language and many of Everett's claims of Pirahã exceptionality, and I explore the renewed interest in the nature of language

Anthropological linguistics · Applied linguistics · Cognition · Epistemology · Grammar · Linguistic relativity · Linguistic universal · Linguistics · Problem of universals · Sociology · Universality (dynamical systems · Historical Linguistics and Language Studies · Multilingual Education and Policy · Philosophy · Psychology · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation

Tools

Open DOIOpen Access