on translation

[William J Poser]

On my use of Navajo as an example, I wasn't suggesting that the Navajo
situation is typical but mentioning it as an example of the variety of
ideas people have as to what would be useful to have in their language.

With regard to linguists' role in recording culture, that again is complicated.
Certainly linguists working on endangered languages should be prepared
to record some cultural information, and in order to investigate some linguistic
topics have to learn about related aspects of culture (I couldn't
understand the different Carrier words translatable as "scraper"
until I learned to do skins) but it is also necessary to recognize
that linguists are not necessarily well qualified as students of culture.
This of course varies from linguist to linguist. Furthermore, the wider
the range of topics studied, the more time and effort is necessary.
When, as is so often the case, a single linguist is at work on a language,
he or she may not have the time or expertise to do both a good job on the
language and a good job on culture. Indeed, even within the linguistic
area there are specialized areas that most linguists are not well equipped
to study, in particular, the biological terminology. It is highly
desirable to have a professional ethnobiologist involved.

The other issue here is that in communities that are concerned about
who studies what, which is very common, linguists often receive permission
only to work on language. Even if they receive other information in the
course of their work, there are issues as to what they can do with it.
Depending on the arrangement with the community and the community's
sensitivities, as well as the kind of information, it may be that they
are expected to ignore this information, or record it but keep it to
themselves. In some communities there are even problems with handing
over the notes or tapes to the community. For example, suppose that
a linguist learns about traditional spirituality in a community that 
is split between evangelicals who regard all such things as pagan evil,
and people more sympathetic to traditional practices. Depending on which
group is in power, they may or may not be interested in preserving
this information, and may even use it to persecute the people who
provide it.

The upshot is that while I think that it is good for linguists to know how
to collect cultural information, especially information related to
linguistic topics (such as kinship terminology), the overall task of
documentation is one that probably should involve more than just linguists.
Furthermore, communities that want cultural information recorded should
discuss this with the linguist and negotiate how it is to be handled and
what the boundaries are.

Bill