Humanity’s reciprocal gift to the world is language and story
Evidence
Other beings are known to be especially gifted, with attributes that humans lack. Other beings can fly, see at night, rip open trees with their claws, make maple syrup. What can humans do? … We may not have wings or leaves, but we humans do have words. Language is our gift and our responsibility. I’ve come to think of writing as an act of reciprocity with the living land. Words to remember old stories, words to tell new ones, stories that bring science and spirit back together to nurture our becoming people made of corn. — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 1276
Categorization
- XREF: Directly bridges to the Soundscape course — human words as our distinctive contribution among species — and to storytelling-as-method across all four courses. — connects to: Writing itself can be an act of reciprocity toward the world — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom,…, 531; Language enables meanings rather than passively carrying them; Functional language serves to coordinate and subordinate society — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the…, 404 (+1 more)
- SEED: The claim ‘writing is an act of reciprocity with the living land’ is a thesis sentence for the integrative polyad essay — worth mining as an epigraph.
Broader Connections
- Language enables meanings rather than passively carrying them
#expands(0.70) - Functional language serves to coordinate and subordinate society
#qualifies(0.70) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 404