When I went to
“One of the things about Piraha that immediately fascinated me was the lack of what linguists call “phatic” communication – communication that primarily functions to maintain social and interpersonal channels, to recognize or stroke, as some refer to it, one’s interlocutor. Expressions like hello, goodbye, how are you?, I’m sorry, you’re welcome, and thank you don’t express or elicit new information about the world so much as they maintain goodwill and mutual respect. The Piraha culture does not require this kind of communication. Piraha sentences are either requests for information (questions), assertions of new information (declarations) or commands, by and large. There are no words for thanks, I’m sorry, and so on.”
I think the language we use with others is the language we use with ourselves. If we are constantly in a state of counting and accounting, how does that affect our lives? Mother Theresa spoke of the loneliness of people in the
I consider that today as we enter even further into darkness. Is there a place to accept that our mood may darken or lift, even as our desires and needs, when perceived as one giving and receiving, unite in a perception of dark and light as one?