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Step 4 of 7~8 min read~29 min left
The Grammar of Animacy
Examine Kimmerer's account of what a language of animate beings does to ethics and perception.
“In Potawatomi and many other indigenous languages, this grammar of animacy means that we have the linguistic structure to speak of the living world as if it were alive, as if it was a person, as if it were our family, because in our way of thinking, it is. [...] In English you have to say 'it', water is it, land is it, a tree is it. But in Potawatomi, almost all of those beings are animate. [...] The 70% verb rule: a stream is not a static thing, it is a way of being. The world is alive, dynamic, always changing. [...] Western cultures have a strong preference for generic abstract nouns whereas indigenous cultures tend to use precise verbs that name relationships and interactions with living systems. Indigenous languages reflect the idea that there exist other kinds of thinking selves beyond the human. — Robin Wall Kimmerer, quoted in kateconklin.com (2025) and Kosmos Journal; Science Friday 'Grammar of Animacy' (2022)”