Group items tagged

This article talks about addiction and mental illness and how many people struggle with these issues. It also highlights the use of language and how the correct language use can and will break stigma and eventually help these poeple get out of their struggles.

A new form of therapy makes use of virtual therapists, who have the capacity to read facial expressions, vocal patterns, body posture, and speech tones. Cleo Stiller, host of Asking For A Friend, said in a video, "[The virtual therapist]'s also interpreting my speech in real time. Am I using positive or negative language? [the therapist] adjusts her questions based off of my responses." The benefit of virtual therapy is that it removes some of the stigmas associated with "seeing a shrink," and allows people to feel more open with their feelings and problems... at least, that's the idea.

This article talks about Pelota mixteca, a sport, and how it has been keeping Oaxacan, a native mexican language, alive. The article talks about the stigma and resistance Mexicans and Mexican-Americans face when speaking non-English languages or their local languages.

Maori is having a revival across New Zealand. Indigenous people are increasingly embracing their language, rejecting generations of stigma and shame associated with its use. And white New Zealanders are looking to Maori language and culture to help them make sense of their own cultural identity. As of 2013, just 3.7 percent of New Zealanders spoke the language fluently, and many predicted that it would soon die out. But analysts say Maori's status is shifting, and a basic knowledge of the language has come to signify cultural cool in a country that continues to wrestle with its colonial and indigenous roots. Now New Zealand's government, which says it wants more than 20 percent of the country's population to speak basic Maori by 2040, has pledged to provide Maori lessons in all New Zealand schools by 2025, despite a dearth of teachers who can speak the language.

This article talks about how the native Maori language is being revived in New Zealand. New Zealand was colonized by the British in the 19th century. Since that time, Maori language was looked down upon making it the minority language, but now with the recent rise of Maori speakers, it has started to become a common language used. This article talks about how every school is teaching Maori in their classes, and how they want Maori to be one of the dominantly spoken languages in New Zealand by 2040.

This article discusses the history of the Maori language and its progression throughout recent history. The Maori language was threatened like many other native languages in the world due to the aggression from the British. In the article shows how the people of the country are coming to terms with the past in order to build a brighter future for the native Maori culture and language.

When it comes to the popular naming of infectious diseases, xenophobia has long played a prominent role. Susan Sontag, in her 1988 work, AIDS and Its Metaphors (a follow-up to her extended essay from a decade earlier, Illness as Metaphor), observed that "there is a link between imagining disease and imagining foreignness. It lies perhaps in the very concept of wrong, which is archaically identical with the non-us, the alien." Cognizant of how geographic labels have been unfairly used in the past, the WHO (World Health Organization) introduced a new set of best practices for naming infectious diseases, in 2015. Geographic names are to be avoided in order to "avoid causing offense," though the WHO did not insist that already established names like Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, or MERS, should be retroactively changed.

There is no such thing as "just language." Anne Curzan, associate dean of humanities and Arthur F. Thurnau professor of English at the University of Michigan, uses her knowledge of linguistics to discuss the social power language holds. Curzan is the author of "Gender Shifts in the History of English" and is the subject of a 36-lecture series titled "The Secret Life of Words." In Curzan's lecture, "Politically Correct: Do Our Language Choices Matter?," she discusses everything from sexist language to preferred pronouns in order to dispel the stigma against politically correct speaking. She spoke to students in the Memorial Union Thursday evening. "It is never just language," Curzan said. "As soon as anyone says it's just language, it's because they don't want to deal with the real issue."

This article talks about how what we say can create stigma around mental health and the reaction our brains have to this language, as well as things we should avoid saying.

This article discusses how communication disorders cause social isolation and low self-esteem, especially in children. Social interaction is essential for psychological development and plays a massive role in a child's confidence and self-image. They talk about how crucial it is that we eliminate social stigmas surrounding communication disorders in order to live in a more inclusive society.

This article explains how words we use to describe addiction can actually greatly affect people's willingness to receive treatment. Certain words or phrases continue to stigmatize the illness.