Is language primarily just a tool of communication or an expression of identity and culture?

[Dna8]

@ Thread Father

First and foremost, language is the means by which we express our humanity.

Secondary to the above, language is an expression of identity and culture.

[Tooting Carmen]

bump

[Teutone]

tool of communication

learning a language doesnt give you any idenitity

civic "nationalist" think immigrants can be part of a nation by just learn the language while this is the least important part of identity.

[Tooting Carmen]

tool of communication

learning a language doesnt give you any idenitity

civic "nationalist" think immigrants can be part of a nation by just learn the language while this is the least important part of identity.

What are the most fundamental aspects of identity then?

[Teutone]

What are the most fundamental aspects of identity then?

Ancestry.

[Tooting Carmen]

Ancestry.

But that is merely what you are in a strictly ascribed sense, it doesn't necessarily reflect on what you do, think and say. And nor does it work for New World countries of course, since they have ancestors from roughly everywhere.

[JamesBond007]

Let us discuss.

Both because if everyday language, like the English language or French language, were not part of identify then everyday language would have went under the same perfection as the international language of size,order and shape : mathematics. Everyday language is far more primitive than mathematics.

Think about Ludwig Wittgenstein's criticism of language and it is obvious that everyday language is not as logical as mathematics and unlike math it leaves room for sentiment of the individual and nation.

[Teutone]

But that is merely what you are in a strictly ascribed sense, it doesn't necessarily reflect on what you do, think and say. And nor does it work for New World countries of course, since they have ancestors from roughly everywhere.

Ancestry influence your behaviour and mindest like nothing else. In countries like Germany thats how the remaining nationalist see it.
We are völkisch ever since.
There is no way anyone can be german without german ancestry.

Just like I never will be a Kurd or Japanese no matter if I learn their language or got some worthless piece of paper like a citizenship.

[Tooting Carmen]

Ancestry influence your behaviour and mindest like nothing else.

That's a very deterministic viewpoint. So you don't think that people are shaped by their environments and upbringing as much if not more than their genetics and that humans are, at least to some extent, tabulae rasae?

OK, let me ask you this: is a girl originally from Thailand who was adopted by a German couple as a baby, grows up in Germany, doesn't speak a word of Thai or follow any Buddhist or SE Asian cultural traditions still ultimately Thai and not German, due to her genetics and phenotype?

[Teutone]

That's a very deterministic viewpoint. So you don't think that people are shaped by their environments and upbringing as much if not more than their genetics and that humans are, at least to some extent, tabulae rasae?

OK, let me ask you this: is a girl originally from Thailand who was adopted by a German couple as a baby, grows up in Germany, doesn't speak a word of Thai or follow any Buddhist or SE Asian cultural traditions still ultimately Thai and not German, due to her genetics and phenotype?

Yes, she is not German but Thai.
As Jared Taylor is not Japanese.