• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Safety Risk .net

Humanising Safety and Embracing Real Risk

  • Home
    • About
      • Privacy Policy
      • Contact
  • FREE
    • FREE SAFETY eBOOKS
    • Free Hotel and Resort Risk Management Checklist
    • FREE DOWNLOADS
    • TOP 50
    • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS
    • Find a Safety Consultant
    • Free Safety Program Documents
    • Psychology Of Safety
    • Safety Ideas That Work
    • HEALTH and SAFETY MANUALS
    • FREE SAFE WORK METHOD STATEMENT RESOURCES
    • Whats New In Safety
    • FUN SAFETY STUFF
    • Health and Safety Training
    • SAFETY COURSES
    • Safety Training Needs Analysis and Matrix
    • Top 20 Safety Books
    • This Toaster Is Hot
    • Free Covid-19 Toolbox Talks
    • Download Page – Please Be Patient With Larger Files…….
    • SAFETY IMAGES, Photos, Unsafe Pictures and Funny Fails
    • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
    • Download Safety Moments from Human Resources Secretariat
  • PSYCH. OF SAFETY & RISK
    • What is Psychological Safety at Work?
    • Safety Psychology Terminology
    • Some Basics on Social Psychology & Risk
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk – Prof Karl E. Weick
    • The Psychology of Leadership in Risk
    • Conducting a Psychology and Culture Safety Walk
    • The Psychology of Conversion – 20 Tips to get Started
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk And Safety
    • Psychology and safety
    • The Psychology of Safety
    • Hot Toaster
    • TALKING RISK VIDEOS
    • WHAT IS SAFETY
    • THE HOT TOASTER
    • THE ZERO HARM DEBATE
    • SEMIOTICS
    • LEADERSHIP
  • Robert Long
    • ALL POSTS
    • Learning Styles Matter
    • There is no HIERARCHY of Controls
    • Scaffolding, Readiness and ZPD in Learning
    • What Can Safety Learn From Playschool?
    • Presentation Tips for Safety People
    • Dialogue Do’s and Don’ts
    • It’s Only a Symbol
    • Ten Cautions About Safety Checklists
    • Zero is Unethical
    • First Report on Zero Survey
    • There is No Objectivity, Deal With it!
  • Slogans
    • Researchers Reveal the Top 10 Most Effective Safety Slogans Of All Time
    • When Slogans Don’t Work
    • CLASSIC, FAMOUS and INFAMOUS SAFETY QUOTES
    • BEST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2022
    • CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
    • COVID-19 (Coronavirus, Omicron) Health and Safety Slogans and Quotes for the Workplace
    • Safety Acronyms
    • You know Where You Can Stick Your Safety Slogans
    • Sayings, Slogans, Aphorisms and the Discourse of Simple
    • Spanish Safety Slogans – Consignas de seguridad
    • Safety Slogans List
    • Road Safety Slogans 2022
    • How to write your own safety slogans
    • Why Are Safety Slogans Important
    • Safety Slogans Don’t Save Lives
    • 40 Free Safety Slogans For the Workplace
    • Safety Slogans for Work
  • Safety Culture
    • Safety Culture Silences
  • Psychological Safety
You are here: Home / Robert Long / Linguistics and Safety

Linguistics and Safety

August 1, 2022 by Dr Rob Long Leave a Comment

imageWhen I was teaching Linguistics in Secondary and Tertiary contexts, I would always repeat the well-known aphorism: ‘say what you mean and mean what you say’.

How unfortunate that the safety industry has no interest in Linguistics and thinks it is fine to speak gobbledygook to people (https://safetyrisk.net/believe-the-impossible-and-speak-nonsense-to-people/ ).

I have discussed messaging many times before (https://safetyrisk.net/congruence-in-messaging-in-safety/; https://safetyrisk.net/all-that-you-dont-see-in-messaging/ ) in blogs in terms of: ‘grammar’, semiotics, language, discourse, paralinguistics (eg. gesture, poetics), structure, philosophy and ideology. What a strange industry that takes no interest in these things and then wonders why its messaging doesn’t work or indeed that it invokes the opposite of intent.

Most often language is not spoken consciously. Language emerges from our worldview just as the words we use reflect our worldview. It is rare indeed that we think rationally and slowly about language. Language emerges from our unconscious as we speak.

Unfortunately, an industry that speaks so much religion and theology of ‘saving’, ‘faith’, ‘belief’ and ‘spirit’ can’t then stand on some engineering platform and claim it is NOT religious. Remember all the zero zealots standing in front of the ‘we believe’ Hillsong banner? (https://safetyrisk.net/no-evidence-for-the-religion-of-zero/ ). Have you watched the Spirit of Zero (https://safetyrisk.net/the-spirit-of-zero/ ) video from global safety? Now tell me that the linguistics and semiotics are not religious.

Linguistics reveal philosophy. We chose words consciously and unconsciously these tell us one’s hidden worldview.

Any study of literature will tell you that text is evidence of meaning, purpose and worldview. That is why we study novels, poetry and drama in High School. It is one of the foundational skills in analysis in Literature to learn about language and what it communicates. For example, you can’t speak the language of hate and claim the message is about love. We know the worldview of King Lear (and Shakespeare) by what he says.

If you are interested in learning about Linguistics you could start here:

  • Lakhoff and Johnson (1980) Metaphors We Live By
  • Stamenov and Gallese (eds.) (2002) Mirror Neurons and the Evolution of Brain and Language
  • Wiggins (2019) The Discursive Power of Memes in Digital Culture, Ideology, Semiotics and Intertextuality
  • Kramsch (2021) Language as Symbolic Power
  • Johnson (2007) The Meaning of the Body
  • Velmezova, Hull and Cowley (2015) Biosemiotic Perspectives on language

There is so much to study in the discipline of Linguistics. And here is the thing, all Disciplines use language to express worldviews eg. engineering language, science language.

Linguistics is both specific and generalist, like the Discipline of Education or Semiotics in that, they study across all disciplines. Whereas other disciplines are quite insular and don’t even study their own linguistics, semiotics or pedagogy.

Similarly, a study of metaphor will reveal that all metaphor is conceptual, embodied and unconscious. In many ways, we are what we speak and what we speak tells us what we believe. How fascinating that when it comes to speaking about culture that Safety is silent on Linguistics (https://safetyrisk.net/culture-silences-in-safety-linguistics/ ). When Safety talks about culture it always ‘behaviours’ and ‘systems’.

So, this brings us to the dominant worldviews in Safety (Behaviourism, Positivism, Scientism, Individualism), whether articulated consciously or not. Whether one claims to be a Behaviourist of not, if you speak behaviorist language (products, outputs, capacities, measures, productivity, behaviours, components) then that is the meaning given. There can be no separation between language and identity. The brand might be ‘differently’ but the message is Behaviourist (https://www.artofwork.solutions/measurement-differently ).

Behaviourism is the first language of Safety (other than religious language), that dominates safety discourse. And there is nothing wrong with such language as long as it is ‘owned’ by the speaker. It is unethical to pretend one is one thing (eg. pragmatic in propaganda) and yet another thing (Behaviourist) in discourse. In Linguistics, we also study the difference between discourse and Discourse.

Unfortunately, many don’t own their worldview in safety. Sometimes we are only able to work out worldview by language and discourse.

The challenge then is to recognize the validity of other Disciplines and ‘schools of thought’ in order to work in dialectic to some sense of balance. Without a Transdisciplinary approach this is highly unlikely. Unfortunately, the echo chamber of safety loves to spruik the language of ‘learning’, ‘debate’ and ‘critical thinking’ but has no intention of entering into dialectic with ‘the other’.

Similarly, the language of ‘heroics’. The language of heroics is metaphysical language, adored by Safety (https://safetyrisk.net/no-gurus-no-stars-no-heroes-needed-in-safety/ ). This is the language of movies, fiction and semiotic unreality, mapped here: https://safetyrisk.net/culture-silences-in-safety-semiotics/

It is nonsense to speak the metaphysical language of ‘heroics’ to fallible people (https://www.humandymensions.com/product/fallibility-risk-living-uncertainty/ ). Indeed, the language of ‘heroics’ alienates ordinary people to the everyday messages of safety. If only heroes can be safe, then why bother? If safety is about heroes then safety is other worldly.

When the medium of the message (https://safetyrisk.net/the-medium-is-the-message/ ) is contradiction, the outcome is confusion, alienation and disorientation.

One of the things I respect about Dominic Cooper is that he owns his worldview. You don’t hear any equivocation or ‘game playing’ with Dominic and this deserves respectful debate. Indeed, there are elements of such a worldview I agree with and accept, but there are other views, Transdisciplinary views that could also enter the dialectic.

Indeed, my own worldview of an existential dialectic welcomes the exchange of worldviews. We just need the mutuality in language so dialectic can occur. This is why Dr Ashhurst’s work (https://www.researchgate.net/scientific-contributions/Craig-Ashhurst-2132771207 ) on Collective Coherence and Boundary Objects is so important for learning and dialectic. We actually need a common language to undertake such a dialectic and this requires an openness to Transdisciplinarity.

The only impediment to dialectic is a binary absolute eg. Zero. Zero doesn’t accept nor countenance (by its own ideology) the non-absolute This is the nature and language of the binary worldview. In Zero there can be no dialectic.

The first step to a dialectic in safety (aside from zero language) is to learn the language of the other, to understand its meaning and give equal validity to a mutuality in discourse. Without such movement there is no learning.

  • Bio
  • Latest Posts
  • More about Rob
Dr Rob Long

Dr Rob Long

Expert in Social Psychology, Principal & Trainer at Human Dymensions
Dr Rob Long

Latest posts by Dr Rob Long (see all)

  • How to be a Safety Extremist - August 15, 2022
  • The Safety Worldview and the Worldview of Safety, Testing Due Diligence - August 13, 2022
  • The Enemy of Safety – Humans - August 13, 2022
  • The Sacred Bra Tree - August 7, 2022
  • Understanding Psychological Terminology - August 7, 2022
Dr Rob Long
PhD., MEd., MOH., BEd., BTh., Dip T., Dip Min., Cert IV TAA, MRMIA Rob is the founder of Human Dymensions and has extensive experience, qualifications and expertise across a range of sectors including government, education, corporate, industry and community sectors over 30 years. Rob has worked at all levels of the education and training sector including serving on various post graduate executive, post graduate supervision, post graduate course design and implementation programs.

Please share our posts

  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Robert Long, Semiotics Tagged With: language, linguistics

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Search and Discover More on this Site

Never miss a post - Subscribe via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,460 other subscribers

VIRAL POST!!! HOW TO QUIT THE SAFETY INDUSTRY

NEW! Free Download

Please take our 2 minute zero survey

Recent Comments

  • Rob Long on How to be a Safety Extremist
  • Admin on How to be a Safety Extremist
  • Rob Long on How to be a Safety Extremist
  • Rob Long on How to be a Safety Extremist
  • Andrew Floyd on How to be a Safety Extremist
  • grumpy on How to be a Safety Extremist
  • Rob Long on How to be a Safety Extremist
  • Ray on How to be a Safety Extremist
  • Rob Long on How to Leave the Safety Industry
  • Wynand on How to Leave the Safety Industry
  • Brian Edwin Darlington on How to Leave the Safety Industry
  • Brian Edwin Darlington on Culture Silences in Safety – What Culture Isn’t
  • Rob Long on How to Leave the Safety Industry
  • Rob Long on How to Leave the Safety Industry
  • Brent Charlton on How to Leave the Safety Industry
  • Richard Brookes on How to Leave the Safety Industry
  • Rob Long on The Rhizome as a Learning Model for Risk
  • Ooker on The Rhizome as a Learning Model for Risk
  • Rob Long on Safety Doesn’t Need Military Language
  • Manjit Handa on Safety Doesn’t Need Military Language

FREE eBOOK DOWNLOADS

Footer

Top Posts & Pages. Sad that most are so dumb but this is what safety luves

  • Free Safety Moments and Toolbox Talk Examples, Tips and Resources
  • BEST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2022
  • Download Safety Moments from Human Resources Secretariat
  • Road Safety Slogans 2022
  • How to be a Safety Extremist
  • 15 Safety Precautions When Working With Electricity
  • The Enemy of Safety – Humans
  • IDEAS FOR SAFETY TOOL BOX TALKS, HARD HAT CHATS and SAFETY MOMENTS
  • CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
  • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS, CHECKISTS, REGISTERS, TEMPLATES and APPS

Recent Posts

  • How to be a Safety Extremist
  • The Safety Worldview and the Worldview of Safety, Testing Due Diligence
  • The Enemy of Safety – Humans
  • The Sacred Bra Tree
  • Understanding Psychological Terminology
  • Beware False Profits and Messiahs in Safety
  • Risk Boldly
  • Poetics of the Self
  • Culture Silences in Safety – What Culture Isn’t
  • There is No Objectivity, Deal With it!
  • When Only More Guilt Will Do
  • How to Leave the Safety Industry
  • Keep Counting Every Time You Don’t Achieve Your Goal, That’s Professional
  • Safety and Non-Neuroscience
  • Paperwork and Usability in Tackling Risk
  • Safety as a Masculinist Activity
  • You Don’t Want a Compliance Culture
  • The Soul of Mental Health
  • Identity and Safety
  • Psychosocial Controls and Measures for Who?
  • Linguistics and Safety
  • Not a Profession’s Bootlace
  • Cultural Silences in Safety – Power and Politics
  • History and Safety
  • What is Psychosocial Safety
  • It’s the –ism That Matters
  • A Guide to Psychosocial Safety Skills
  • Doing Away With Health and Safety–Language and People
  • The New Enemy of Safety – The Unconscious
  • Tape Down Those Leads
  • More Safety Code to Disguise Behaviourism
  • Why Safety is Attracted to Behaviourism
  • Safety Culture–Hudson’s Model
  • Understanding Safety as an Archetype
  • The Purpose of Safety
  • Learning Styles Matter
  • Due Diligence and Holistic Ergonomics Workshops
  • Having FUN in Safety FUNdamentalism
  • 80% of Safety Practitioners Are Idiots
  • Risk Homeostasis Theory–Why Safety Initiatives Go Wrong
  • Culture Silences in Safety – Semiotics
  • Flooding is Dangerous, and I don’t Mean the Water….
  • Cultural Silences in Safety – Aesthetics
  • Impacts of Cognitive Dissonance in the Workplace
  • What Can Safety Learn From Playschool?
  • Risky Conversations, The Law, Social Psychology and Risk
  • Due Diligence Videos – 10000 downloads
  • Release the Safety Monster and Wreck a Good TV Show
  • Paper Safe
  • Safety Starts with Us

FEATURED POSTS

The Paradox of Positivism for Safety

How Do Workers Make Decisions?

How Groupthink Works

Vision Can’t Come from Safety Compliance

I am a Spreadsheet King

Calculators, Matrices and Mumbo Jumbo Risk Assessment

Compliance, Obedience and The Attraction of Risk

Making Safety Better by Using Our Adaptive Toolbox

Suggested Safety Reading for 2018

Ways in Which the Workplace Harms Us

A Parallel Universe in Safety

Study at The Centre for Leadership and Learning in Risk

Holistic Ergonomics

Starting Points, Worldviews and Risk

What Can Safety Learn From Playschool?

The Mythic Symbology of Safety

Deconstruction and Reconstruction for Safety

Making Sense of Semiotics and Safety

Push or Pull – It’s Not Your Fault – It’s a Norman Door!

Why we make mistakes

The Binary Barnacle

Affirming Chance

What is Critical Listening when Dealing with Risk?

Models From Social Sensemaking

We Are Such Experts….

‘False Consciousness’ and Perception in Risk and Safety

An Social Ecology of Resilience

People are not Rats–Moving Beyond Behaviour Based Safety

CLLR April 2017 Newsletter–Not Your Usual Safety Newsletter!!

The Repression of Uncertainty

An Ethical Psychology of Risk

So, You Want Culture Change

Third Group Commences the Graduate Program in The Psychology of Risk

A Poetics of Safety

Understanding Psychological Terminology

What Safety and Risk Could Learn From Patch Adams

How to use signs, symbols and text effectively in communicating about risk

Critical Thinking and Questioning in Safety

Can There be a Feminist Safety?

I’ve got a feeling this isn’t right, but…..

More Posts from this Category

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,460 other subscribers

How we pay for the high cost of running of this site – try it for free on your site

What is Psychological Safety at Work?