Who knows why we fight? George knows.

 

Linguist George Lakoff lecturing on the relationship between words and politics. Flickr: Pop! Tech 2008. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

In the early days of this blog, we published a series of posts about George Lakoff’s views on wars between values and nations; we revisit some of those posts today.

Lakoff is an activist cognitive psychologist/linguist who devotes great attention to the conflict in values between liberals and conservatives, and the ways in which the family values that are communicated to children can play out in the readiness of adults to make love or war.

For example, in his book Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think, Lakoff argues that while conservatives value a “strict father” morality (using punishment to establish respect for authority), liberals value a “nurturant family” morality emphasizing empathy and democratic forms of conflict resolution.

Lakoff also emphasizes the role of metaphor in the decisions people reach regarding political issues.  Many judgments are propelled by a “nation-as-person” or “nation-as-family” metaphor in which industrial nations are viewed as “mature” and knowledgeable while other nations are seen as “primitive,” “backward,” and needing to be taught a lesson.

In his book, The Political Mind, Lakoff explains that ideas with a strong emotional component (e.g., regarding the extent to which wars are considered necessary and winnable) are influenced not just by information but also by how they are framed, the language in which they are embedded, and the effects of that language on the brain.

To learn more about Lakoff’s views about how family values connect with major political philosophies and behavior read this article and tell us what you think.

 

 

 

Values and rhetoric: Lakovian framing, metaphors and stories


George Lakoff, like Albert Bandura, analyzes the ways that people frame deadly behaviors to give them the trappings of morality. On August 26, 2010, our blog introduced Lakoff’s work; today we continue that exploration.

According to Lakoff, both liberals and conservatives use linguistic techniques, such as metaphors, storytelling, and framing, to justify political views.  For example, people often conceptualize nations as persons or even families, referring to their “founding fathers” or their “homeland,” or equating Iraq with Saddam Hussein. This nation-as-person metaphor presumes that there are :

  • “Adult nations” (those that are “mature” and industrialized)
  • “Nation-children,” which are industrializing and have moral standards but may need guidance, and
  • Backward nations, which are underdeveloped, in need of morals, and must be taught a lesson.

Many people justify invasions of other countries through what Lakoff labels the self-defense and rescue stories, each of which involves a blameless victim country, an inherently evil villain country, and a hero country:

  • In the self-defense story, the villain nation commits a crime against the victim nation, and the victim fights the villain off, thus becoming a hero.
  • In the rescue story, the villain threatens or attacks the victim, and the hero comes in and defeats the villain, thereby saving the victim.

Other people justify invading another country by using fear-instilling stock phrases such as “terrorist” or euphemisms designed to make inhumane actions seem sterile or even desirable—e.g., calling invasion a “military operation” as though it were something clean and sterile.

What other stories can you think of that people tell each other to justify aggression, including torture,  by their governments?

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology (with thanks to Tristyn Campbell for contributing to this post)