GENED 1177 - Language in Culture and Society

Semester: 

Fall

Offered: 

2022

How are language, culture, and society related?

The relation is complicated rather than simple, problematic rather than straightforward. To begin to explore this question, we discuss key theoretical issues and illuminating examples that begin to sketch out an approach to linking language, culture, and society. Specifically, we consider the following problems:

  • How is language use a kind of social action? (It is something we do; it has social effects.)
  • How does language organize and provide access to shared concepts and beliefs? (It has something to do with the way we collaborate, socially, to represent, reflect upon, and think about the world.)
  • How do speakers think about and reflect upon language, and how do these reflections affect how they use it? (We have presuppositions about what language is and rely on these notions to orient to and situate ourselves within social worlds).

Throughout the course, we develop a set of powerful analytical tools for studying both language and culture and, ultimately, for defining their role in social life.

This course has an enrollment cap and is a part of the coordinated, ranked-choice Gen Ed lottery. To participate in the lottery, you must request permission to enroll and rank your choices through my.harvard by 11:59 p.m. EST Tuesday, January 17, 2023. The Gen Ed lottery will run Wednesday, January 18; if you are successful in the lottery, your course petition in your Crimson Cart will turn to a green check that allows you to enroll. Please note that you *may* participate in the Gen Ed lottery even with advising or immunization holds! For timely updates on the Gen Ed lottery, please see https://gened.fas.harvard.edu/spring-2023.