Our language: organ and mystery

People who speak «good German,» as they say, are held in high regard. Anyone who doesn’t speak English in international business comes across as «stupid.» In a personal relationship, «speechlessness» leads to a crisis, and in international politics, to conflicts. Language is the quintessential psychosocial organ of human beings. Nevertheless, we normally don’t think about this organ at all, just as we don’t usually think about our liver or our muscles. Only when things go wrong or when we want to make a change does that change. Suddenly, our organs—including our linguistic and non-linguistic abilities—become a topic of discussion: Do we even speak enough with one another, and in the right way? Do I always find the right words? Is my personal speaking style appropriate? Do I speak enough languages? Suddenly, we realize how important this «organ» is. But how does it work, and what does the term «social organ» actually mean?

The result of hard work

As we grow older, we usually forget or push aside the fact that our language skills are the result of years of hard work during the first two decades of our lives. For years, we learn our native language; for years, we learn one or even several foreign languages; and to top it all off, we spend years painstakingly learning their visual representations—that is, their writing systems—and how to put well-crafted sentences on paper; some people need decades to produce truly good texts in their native language. Throughout this process, the educational system rewards or punishes us through gains in social status or social decline, and we experience early dramas of success or failure within our circle of friends or within our families.

«Do we even talk to each other enough—and in the right way? Do I always find the right words?»

Later on, the stress of raising children is often forgotten. But there is one thing we should always keep in mind: Language is the cultural skill and social competence par excellence, and the time spent acquiring it is, for everyone, the crucial period of cultural fine-tuning—that is, of attuning oneself to societal language and social calibration. Our native language encompasses not only linguistic knowledge but also an understanding of the world within our cultural sphere. No one invents a language for themselves; real languages are conventional. We must always accept them as given and conform to them if we want to be «correct» in our expression. Our native language becomes second nature to us, as the saying goes, and we experience it as a kind of bodily organ.

Correct, incorrect, delusional views

What is an «organ»? The term comes from the Greek word *organon*, which can mean both a tool and an instrument or a bodily organ. In this sense, our native language is a mental organ of our self and its identity, but at the same time also a tool for communication. The aforementioned “tuning” premise—that is, the social attunement resulting from decades of language acquisition, with its dramas and successes, as well as from daily language use—leads people to a wide variety of conclusions regarding language: some correct, some incorrect, and some delusional.

«When languages are no longer viewed as tools, the ways of looking at them become difficult or even problematic.»

The «language-as-tool» hypothesis, which we all believe in, is correct and highly plausible, for with the help of language we can indeed communicate most effectively—and even more than that: achieve calculated effects of our actions, for example by having other people react to our speech time and again in the way we desire—in the sense of a concept of “informal linguistic compulsion.” Language, as Niklas Luhmann would have said, lies at the interface of human cognitive systems and can trigger connecting operations between people. We experience this every day through the exchange of texts (the concrete manifestations of applied language), and that is why we can realistically have a fundamental trust in language as an “organ” that mediates both personal and shared interests.

«As we grow older, we usually forget or push aside the fact that our language skills are the result of hard work.»

One of the major misconceptions about the functions of language, however, is the simple stimulus-response hypothesis. It assumes a command-like stimulus-response mechanism: one person says something, and the other reacts accordingly. If communication actually worked that way, we wouldn’t need rhetoric, the art of phrasing and argumentation, or the effort of crafting sophisticated texts. Such effort would then be completely unnecessary.

The imperative mood rarely works

In reality, however, communication based on what one might call «imperative speech» rarely works, and only under one very specific condition: All participants must be familiar with the respective ritual order and the agreed-upon “chain of command”; in which case a single command is indeed sufficient to trigger a response: for example, a teacher calling for order in a classroom, a brief announcement from a boss, a dirty talk during sex, or a march command in the military, to name just a few examples. Otherwise, however, linguistic influence in people’s everyday lives requires the elaborate art of phrasing mentioned above—which we cannot simply dismiss as trivial soft skills. They shape our lives; too much depends on them, and we must train and refine these skills throughout our lives because circumstances change every day and require new approaches to linguistic situations. So there are two aspects: the linguistic stimulus-response mechanism in ritualized, standard situations, and the sophisticated rhetoric of speech under changing, complex conditions.

A source of controversy?

Language use becomes socially controversial when individuals within the speech community feel attacked. These are situations or contexts that can escalate into criminal communication. I am referring to the stimulus-response mechanism involved in verbal abuse, insults, and stigmatization. Every language, as a system, has corresponding «registers»—as they are called in linguistics—specifically for such questionable purposes (which, however, do exist). Recently, for example, there has been an intensifying debate about words from the racist linguistic register. Internationally, the word «Neger»—which has had racist connotations from the very beginning—has become the focal point of the discussion. So far, this debate has unfolded on two levels: first, an ethically justified call to avoid vocabulary from this register (including the question of alternative terms: “person of color,” “Black person,” and so on…).

«The term »organ' (...) can refer to a tool, an instrument, or a bodily organ."

Second, launching campaigns to impose taboos that impose strict requirements of unutterability and, in the case mentioned, seek to allow only the euphemism «N*-word» (which would eventually have to be redacted as well, because everyone knows what it’s really meant to express). Structurally speaking, the taboo is a psychosocial, quasi-religious regulator of linguistic order—as examined by Sigmund Freud (think of religions in which, for example, one is not allowed to utter the name of God or the devil)—that insists on absolute and repressively enforced compliance. As we are currently seeing, this is even becoming a part of discourse in democratic societies, where people negotiate what can or cannot be said without reproach, and what should or should not be avoided linguistically («Indian» banned, «Indigenous» permitted …).

Language Policy and Emancipation

While discussions about the use of racist language focus on protecting the dignity and integrity of certain fellow citizens, other language policy campaigns serve democratic and emancipatory goals. For example, many activists believe that regulating language can advance gender equality. This concern is legitimate and entirely understandable. And from a rhetorical perspective, discussions about gender asterisks can undoubtedly stimulate awareness-raising processes in one direction or another. Here, too, it remains to be seen what will ultimately prevail. That is how it is with democratic debates on language regulation. When it comes to linguistic-theoretical justifications, however, caution is warranted. Due to a lack of understanding of the linguistic function of grammatical forms, a great deal of linguistic mysticism is being spread. The French «Mond» is not feminine, and the German «Mond» is not masculine in the sense of gender, even if such naive conclusions might seem possible. Projecting formal linguistic system facts onto real gender relations is pure misdirection. To avoid misunderstandings: I am speaking of languages as sign systems that their users never created, and not of the texts that some people cobble together using the language system.

Authoritarian Systems: Just Do It

Historically speaking, authoritarian regimes have usually taken the easy way out when it comes to language policy, often imposing rules without regard for principles of language use—and just as often without success. Against this backdrop, it is curious to note the identitarian legislative initiative that passed through France’s political bodies in 2013, which stigmatized English as a language and provided for imposing heavy fines on French newspapers if they used Anglicisms on their front pages. It was unmistakably the work of French language purists.

«Efforts to purify language elevate linguistic issues to the level of political discourse.»

In all these cases, we are dealing with efforts at “language purification” that have existed for centuries in countries such as France and Germany and that elevate language to the status of a topic of political discourse, mostly with dubious justifications that regularly boil down to mystical notions of substance and no longer allow one to think of language as a tool. However, when languages (and there are, after all, only individual languages, not “language” in and of itself) are no longer viewed as tools, the perspectives often become difficult or even problematic.

The organ as a «sacred cow»?

Then, language often becomes part of language policy, speculation and activism surrounding identity, and linguistic mysticism. Native languages are sometimes elevated to ideologically and speculatively charged concepts of being, with the underlying premises being purely a matter of faith. And our linguistic faculty is then viewed, in a highly exaggerated manner, as inviolable and as a kind of «sacred cow.» And here, too, I do not wish to leave any room for misunderstanding: Mother tongues do indeed form part of the identity of large social groups that we classify as regions, nations, or countries. The question is simply how far one should take this mysticism in the modern world when it comes to preserving them.

«Aren't language change, adaptations, and innovations absolutely necessary to keep language—this »tool'—functioning properly?"

Does it really make sense to demonize English (see the example of France mentioned above)? Aren’t language change, adaptations, borrowed words (which have always existed), and innovations absolutely necessary to keep language—as a «tool»—functional in ever-changing circumstances? These issues must be discussed regularly and repeatedly, because there can be no definitive answers here. Why? Because our languages are, on the one hand, something constant and deeply rooted in our lives, but at the same time, they are also something functional and subject to constant pressure to adapt. We must continue to talk about this and exchange views with a sense of proportion.