5 Quotes & Sayings By Edward Sapir

Edward Sapir was born in San Francisco, California, in 1884. He graduated from the University of California at Berkeley in 1902 with a bachelor's degree in mathematics. He was employed as a research mathematician for five years at the U.S. Geological Survey Read more

In 1909 he married fellow UC-Berkeley graduate Lillian Hultin, who was to become his lifelong business partner. The couple moved to New York City where Sapir worked as a financial and statistical analyst and later as an editor and proofreader for McGraw Hill, Inc. Sapir also became involved with the motion picture industry and was a member of the Motion Picture Educational Association (MPEA).

His wife Lillian was elected president of the organization. In 1927 they both left New York and returned to California where they purchased a small ranch near Santa Paula, California. A year later they purchased an additional acreage on which they built their home and founded the "Sapir-Hultin Ranch" school for children with learning disabilities.

After some time as residents of New York City, Sapir and his wife returned permanently to California and lived out the remainder of their days on their ranch near Santa Paula.

1
The attitude of independence toward a constructed language which all national speakers must adopt is really a great advantage, because it tends to make man see himself as the master of language instead of its obedient servant. Edward Sapir
2
It is quite an illusion to imagine that one adjusts to reality essentially without the use of language and that language is merely an incidental means of solving specific problems of communication or reflection. Edward Sapir
3
We see and hear and otherwise experience very largely as we do because the language habits of our community predispose certain choices of interpretation. Edward Sapir
4
Human beings do not live in the objective world alone, nor alone in the world of social activity as ordinarily understood, but are very much at the mercy of the particular language which has become the medium of expression for their society. Edward Sapir