More on Sapir-Whorf from Hymes via Danziger

[Richard J. Senghas]

[Folks, this came in several days ago; I was in final grading crunch so I
wasn't timely in reading and forwarding it. -RJS]

Dear Richard

I have not been able to get this up on the linganth list. I
get "Undeliverable" back. Perhaps you can help.

[Another case of address aliasing/forwarding preventing postings, alas;
I've modified the subscription list hoping to allow you (Eve) direct
postings. Let me know if you still have troubles. -RJS]

When I read your query, I remembered that Dell Hymes had
once mentioned in my presence that in the days of the
Hoijer conference people were referring to the "Whorf-Lee"
hypothesis, meaning Dorothy Lee (see refs below). I found
this interesting and asked Dell for more, telling him
I would post what he wrote to this list. He replied:

Dear Eve,
Your recollection is right.  What I write below comes
without having checked any sources.  When I was a
graduate student at Indiana University (1950-54) Whorf's
ideas came to the fore.  He had been associated with Sapir
to some degree, and Harry  Hoijer (UCLA, a Chicago Ph. D.,
who knew Sapir at Chicago, before Sapir went to Yale)
chaired a conference at Chicago on the subject.  I think
that at the conference it was called the Sapir-Whorf
hypothesis.  Appropriately enough, since Sapir had
articulated such thoughts.  Later, the historical amnesia
of the profession was further corrected by noticing that
Boas had been interested in grammatical categories, and
that the German tradition, from which he began, had
included people in the 19th century, and back indeed to
before that, who wrote of language as a framework for
cultural ideas. Eventually, Wilhelm von Humboldt became the
preferred starting point.  But about 1950, if I have
it right, people knew pretty much only what had been
published in their lifetimes, it would seem.  There was
BenWhorf, who had contributed to the volume in memory of
Sapir.  And there was Dorothy Lee, who had published in
IJAl (I think in 1944).  My impression is that the first
twin name, then, was Whorf-Lee.  Probably (but this should
be checked) in the context of Trager and Smith, who were
very prominent at the time in developing a wider reach for
linguistics (kinesics (Birdwhistell), paralinguistics
(Trager)) in the US. Lee's 1944 paper in the
American Anthropologist must have had a part in this
 "Categories of the generic and the particular in
Wintu:', AA 456: 362-69
and even more so, among linguists, her article in the newly
revived International  Journal of American Linguistics,
vol. 10:  181-87 (1944).
 Hoijer, at UCLA, was to some extent regarded as the
'dean' of anthropological  linguistics, of linguistics in
anthropology, but he was not a coiner of new terms. Rather,
he saw himself as continuing what had been developed.  See
his paper on Navajo.  Well, I got myself up to look into
LANGUAGE IN CULTURE (Comparative Studies in Cultures and
Civilizations No. 3, editors Robert Redfield and Milton
Singer) (AAA vol. 56, no. 6, Part 2, Memoir 79 (December
1954)). Harry's article is clear, rather broad,
acknowledges precedents, focusses on Sapir and Whorf, and
goes on to the Apachean languages.  He doesn't mention Lee,
nor is Lee in the index at the end of the volume.

 A good source, I think, is John Lucy, LANGUAGE
DIVERSITY AND THOUGHT, A Reformulation of the linguistic
relativity hypothesis.  (Studies in the Social and Cultural
Foundations of Language No. 12) (Cambridge University
Press, 1992).  He takes up Lee on p. 70.  In a section
headed:  Grammar as  a direct reflection of culture:  the
work of Lee", John remarks on sutides which typically
PRESUPPOSE (italics in the original) a close linkage
betwen language and thought with (surely 'out' is missing
at this point) concern for establishing the nature and
direction(s) of influence, that is, few of these studies
are directly concerned with the ligusitic
relativity hypothesis as such.  Nonetheless, work of this
type is frequently interpreted as relevant to Whorf's
ideas. Many studies could serve here as illustrations of
this approach (see references to case histories in
Hymes, 1964b, p. 150). but the work of Dorothy D. Lee
(1959b [1944]) is the best known, and though not explicitly
built upon  Whorf's work, has most often been associated
with it"  That seems right to  me.  I heard
discussion of these things at Indiana (Carl Voegelin took
part in the Chicago meeting) and probably with Hoijer (we
spent 1954-5 at UCLA, having taken his Athapaskan course in
the summer Linguistic Institute of 1953).  Although Harry
was not much given to chatting.
Hope this is useful.

Eve Danziger