Steven Pinker, Ph.D recently wrote a book I intend to read called The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature. The Times of London says it’s “A display of fiercely intricate intelligence and nobody with the least interest in language should miss reading it.”
In the book, Pinker includes a chapter on swearing. That chapter was adapted to an article for The New Republic and I have a copy of the article. It’s quite good and I need to read it again. Pinker says that taboo words are actually stored in differnt parts of the brain from other words:
THE STRANGE EMOTIONAL power of swearing–as well as the presence of linguistic taboos in all cultures– suggests that taboo words tap into deep and ancient parts of the brain. In general, words have not just a denotation but a connotation: an emotional coloring distinct from what the word literally refers to, as in principled versus stubborn and slender versus scrawny. The difference between a taboo word and its genteel synonyms, such as shit and feces, cunt and vagina, or fucking and making love, is an extreme example of the distinction. Curses provoke a different response than their synonyms in part because connotations and denotations are stored in different parts of the brain. (more…)
