THE MIND AFFECTS THE LANGUAGE OR THE LANGUAGE AFFECTS THE MIND? A LITERATURE REVIEW ON VERBAL COMMUNICATION

Abstrak

This article aims at identifying the relationship between language and mind and listing some expressions in Indonesian language which seem illogical based on the the literature review. According to the Greek philosophers,Plato and Aristotle, who are supported by the rationalists such as Rene des Cartes, mind affects and shape the language. This can be proved with the practice in daily comunications, that is, how people use the language to communicate. The expertise and intelectual competence of a person can be seen from the types of sentence patterns he/she chooses to express his/her ideas. The sophistication of his/her sentences reflects his/ her level of intelectual competence. On the other hand, according to Sapir and Worf, language shapes and affects the mind. This is supported by the fact that one language can have several words to express the same thing in certain domains. Based on the pros and cons, it is concluded that mind and language affect each other in the sense that the mind shapes the language and at the same time language affects the mind. In daily communication we find illogical sentences because people do not say what they mean to say.