Linguistic Anthropology and Popular Culture

[Harold F. Schiffman]

Dear linganthers,

I've been asked to contribute to a volume of studies on the contributions
and interactions of anthropology to/with popular culture.  My contribution
would focus on linguistic anthropology and its interaction with the ideas
about language found in popular culture.

I've been teaching a freshman writing seminar for some years that focuses
on these issues, so I guess that's why I've been asked.  I focus in the
course on a number of things, such as media representations of (foreign,
and/or non-standard) language; one locus is in cartoons and comic strips;
another in advertising, especially the phenomenon of "foreign branding";
the major locus is film and TV representations of language, such as in
science-fiction, the Disney movie and other feature-length animated
movies; the representation of language "disability" (deafness, mental
retardation, wild-child phenomena); and language acquisition (e.g. John
Travolta learning Portuguese in 10 minutes after being struck by
lightning; Kevin Costner learning Lakota, also in short-order, etc.)
Finally, a focus also on who learns and uses foreign language (usually mad
scientists, bright but dowdy women, the occasional man, as in INdiana
Jones) and for what purposes (decipher the funny writing on the crypt, get
the gold before the bad guys do).

It is my impression, and this is what I need help with, that depictions of
linguistic anthropologists doing what they do have not been foregrounded
in such representations.  I.e. we have the popular conceptions of
archeology, we have the ethnographic film made by anthropologists that
depict Nanook of the north, or Ishi, or whatever, but we don't have
depictions of people (a) learning language (and the real time it takes) or
(b) doing field work; or (c) using language for some legitimate purpose.

I think it's because archeology and the discovery of "hidden treasure"
etc. are glamorous and exciting, and/or can be glamorized (as in INdiana
Jones movies) but what linganthers do is considered boring and nerdy, and
best left to wigged-out mad scientists, or is relegated to women (as in
"The Mummy" where a smart young British woman deciphers stuff, while her
useless twit of a brother just messes things up; the action-figure
American guy then takes over and saves the day).  Or, we have Indiana
Jones speaking Chinese, Hindi, whatever, when he needs to, but no
depictions of him actually swotting at *learning* language(s).

The only place I see some serious work done by linguists is in the wide
reception of Deborah Tannen's work on men and women's different uses of
language.  Can anybody else think of anything else? Is there not, instead,
a tendency for popular culture to *reject* our conceptions of language,
and to substitute other conceptions?  Are we complicit in the construction
of these popular ideas, or have we been simply ignored?

Hal Schiffman