TOK presentation topic? Urgent!

[Guest Woosang Lee]

Hello everyone!

So I have TOK presentation tomorrow and I have been preparing for 2 weeks but I really am not sure which topic I should choose. So far I have thought of:

How can we be certain if common sense is true?

Real life examples: e.g. Did all Vikings have horned/winged helmet?

Involving: Language, imagination, memory(?), history, natural science

How can our sense perception affect our emotion? / How can we know if our emotion is not a result of our sense perception?

Real life examples: e.g. Horror film with a funny music?

Involving: Sense perception, emotion, natural science, human science

How accurate is language in describing the truth? / How is language used to describe the truth?

Real life examples: e.g. Twist of truth?

Involving: Memory, language, imagination, reason

Any comments or advice would be appreciated!

I have read the official presentation guide here on IB survival and other things (such as official IB TOK presentation guideline, etc.) but I am still not very sure about it...

[Henriette Bucher]

Hej!!

if you have you presentation tomorrow, why are you unsure about which topic you should choose? You should know it already.. Anyway! Here's my TOK presentation!

I just did my TOK presentation, you can look at mine if you want to (got an A), did it on prezi

http://prezi.com/8f8k2azgqjfc/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy&rc=ex0share

and here's my notes

Knowledge Question:

What role does language play in the creation of collective historical memories?

Real Life Situation:

Our real life situation is a BBC News Article about how an Amazonian tribe located in Peru, which is isolated from the rest of the world and lacks in human growth. The Peruvian tribe, specifically known as the Mascho Piro tribe, relies heavily on language to define their culture as they have no outer influence and no other countries to aid their development. The society is slowly dying out because of the loss of language, culture, and basic human necessities (e.g. food, water, clothes). The Mascho Piro tribe has no evidence of written language, as they communicate solely by their tribal verbal language. The tribe speaks a dialect of the Piro Language of Peru, a specific dialect that only members of the same tribe know. They actively avoid contact with non-natives to the tribe, to preserve their culture, history, and collective identity.

Areas of Knowledge:

Our real life situation explores the area of indigenous knowledge systems. Indigenous communities, peoples, and nations are those which, having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories, consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing on those territories, or parts of them. They form at present non-dominant sectors of society and are determined to preserve, develop, and transmit to future generations. Their ancestral territories and ethnic identities, forms as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal system. Indigenous people represent more than 5000 languages and cultures, spanning over 70 countries of the world, with a diversity that escapes generalization to the level of definition. With the Mascho Piro tribe, knowledge and culture is developed and shared with the aid of language and memory, two ways of knowing. Language is a powerful tool within the society, especially when it is used to transcend barriers. In this case, language is closely related to the survival of the tribe as it orally transmitted, meaning that it is generally not documented. The oral language used by the Mascho Piro tribe depicts their collective memory as experiences and knowledge is shared through forms of story telling.

Deconstruction of the Knowledge Question:

Our knowledge question investigates the role of language and how it ultimately affects the creation of collective historical memories. Collective Memory refers to the shared pool of information held in the memories of two or more members of a group of people. Collective Memory is a branch of collectivism, which exists to oppose the idea of individualism in human nature. Collectivism is any philosophic, political, religious, economic, or social outlook that emphasizes the interdependence of every human; and in regards to our real life situation, how the tribe’s cultural identity is formed through language. The Amazonian tribe stresses cohesion within their particular cultural group, as language, memories and knowledge are all shared due to collectivism.

Sub-Questions:

Some developing questions that we chose to focus include:

• What are the different forms of language and how is it received/emitted?

• Do Cultural practices dictate language or does language dictate cultural practices?

• Is the role language has in the creation of collective memory deliberate or accidental?

1^st Developing Question - What are the different forms of language and how is it received/emitted?

Oral Language:

While written language can be documented and tested countless numbers of times, oral language is very context and culture specific as it differs in every group of people and can essentially only be heard and transmitted once. An indigenous worldview is characteristically passed on informally and orally: through language, songs, and dance and through demonstration and shared work, through all of the rituals and customs of everyday life. This is because indigenous cultures depends an oral transmission; language ultimately creates the foundation of shared memories within a community. Oral histories and archives are the basis of cultural identity within a community, and the Mascho Piro tribe of Peru relies greatly on their shared knowledge. Language is the primary means by which the knowledge of one generation is passed on to the next, so the impact of language loss is grave. When languages and cultures deteriorate, so do the knowledge, environment, memory, and history; this loss ultimately takes away the identity that humanity cherishes.

2^nd Developing Question - Do Cultural practices dictate language or does language dictate cultural practices?

Sapir Whorf:

According to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, language determines our experience of reality, and we can see and think only what our language allows us to see and think. For example: “different languages do not necessarily translate into each other, e.g. subjunctive for Spanish (the motive for the actions does not translate completely into English).” Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf stated that all language is relative, thus the same word can have different meanings for different people. The principle of linguistic relativity holds that the structure of a language affects the ways in which its respective speakers conceptualize their world. The hypothesis believes that language dictates culture, rather than culture dictating language. In the case of the Amazonian tribe, it is clearly noted that the language used within the tribe dictates their cultural balance. The verbal language the Mascho Piro’s use influences the collective memory throughout the community.

Quote:

“Culture has been broadly defined as the human-made part of the environment, including language and subjective elements of culture” – Triandis (2002) Theory of Collectivism-Individualism

Quote Analysis:

The quote stated was found in a segment of an essay on the theory of collectivism and individualism, which explores the idea that culture is inherently influenced by human creations; specifically language, further expanding on Sapir-Whorf’s hypothesis.

3^rd Developing Question - Is the role language has in the creation of collective memory deliberate or accidental?

Going back to our knowledge question, the actual role of language in the creation of collective historical memories will be explored through a different situation.

In George Orwell’s dystopia novel, 1984, a community led by an authoritarian leader depicted as “Big Brother” heavily controls the use of language and memory within the society. In the novel, “Big Brother” controls what can be thought, written, and said, therefore controlling how the society receives and emits knowledge. Orwell deliberately and obviously uses language as a tool to manipulate and influence a society’s collective memory. Throughout the novel, language is constantly used as a barrier, as “Big Brother” uses language to strip the population of their experiences and memory, inevitably reducing their cultural identity into nothing. Orwell wanted to stress the idea that language plays a vital role in collectivism, as it is the foundation of human culture and identity. However, in the Amazonian tribe, it is handled much more differently.

Counter Claim:

Our counter claim explores the perspective of someone outside of an isolated tribe of Mascho Piro. Colonialism and globalization have often fostered insulting versions of indigenous people and their knowledge. Native peoples have been notoriously misrepresented, either romanticized as passive and noble OR degraded as ignorant and savage. Claiming them as “savages” enables westerners to confront and destroy their cultures. Two very well known examples of this are the European colonization of the Native Americans and the British invasion of Ireland. In the Americas, the Europeans took the indigenous people and forced them to leave their families and their villages in order to educate them collectivity, they were forbidden to speak their native language – therefore destroying any last bit of culture and language the indigenous people had. The small populations of Native Americans today still feel as if part of their identity has been lost through their invasion of the Europeans. In Ireland, the British forbade the Irish to speak their native language of Gaelic in schools, inevitably reducing the number of native Gaelic speakers to at least half the amount it was in the 17^th – 18^th century. The Mascho Piro tribe actively attempts to dismiss any foreign communities, therefore reducing the likelihood of brutal colonization.

Conclusion:

To summarize what we have said:

Language can either play a deliberate or accidental role in the creation of collective memories. In the case of the Mascho Piro tribe, the role of language is vital as their source of language is slowly deteriorating, causing their collective memory to die out, which in result destroys the foundations of cultural identity within the society.

We, as humans, interpret and define ourselves through our language; therefore culture is incredibly dependent on how shared knowledge is transmitted through language, either verbal or written.

2^nd Video: 3:35 - 4:00

You're more than welcome to use it, lycka till!

[susanne]

the first one sounds like a past TOK essay topic tbh, but it looks promising

(you probably have to define common sense, because vikings and their winged helmets are NOT common sense (to me at least))

I really like your second one, it looks very interesting and can link into a lot of AOKs

the last one is so overdone don't even touch it